research and scholarship | Frances Bell

Frances Bell

home at last – for all the mes

You can’t have one without the other

Over the last few weeks on Rhizo14, I have been troubled with the either/or nature of some of our weekly tasks. We could argue about whether or not that was intended but at least some of the students have perceived concepts as being presented in opposition to each other: Cheating as Learning , Enforcing Independence, Is Books…

Is Books making us Stupid? or what I found in our study

Correction:The Book Lost for Words was actually written by Paddy Creber. If you spent eight precious minutes of your life watching this video, I would be thrilled if we could continue the conversation here.

Cool webs for rhizo14?

Wandering across smooth and jagged spaces – bring a blanket and beware the Chief ants

Short cut Apologies in advance – this is a long post. You could just skip it altogether, or look at the pictures and watch the video. Thanks for getting this far. Textiles for Nomads – feeling it for felt This week I have been engaging with De Leuze and Guattari’s ideas of the Nomad and…

Dimensions of power, knowledge and rhizomatic thinking

My first thought when I hear the word power is of an individual exerting power over another – getting them to do something or stop doing something (possibly by raising a physical or verbal fist). But I am guessing that’s not going to be enough in rhizomatic thinking where we are thinking about the connections…

The Perils of Rhizomatic Learning

In this post I am trying to make sense of what (little) I think I know about rhizomatic thinking and fitting it in some sort of context with other post-structuralist thinking in my journey to rhizomatic learning whilst engaged in the #rhizo14 MOOC. Comments and corrections would be most welcome. Post-structuralist Thinking Post-structuralism can be…

Rhizo14 – Cheating and Learning

This is my introductory post for the MOOC Rhizo14. I have joined because I want to understand more about rhizomatic learning. I have been quite interested in MOOCs in general (less so in the enormous MOOCs run by high-profile universities and then spun out into commercial services. What interests me is the comparison between informal…

Identity under re-construction

moocardproof, a photo by frances bell on Flickr. I leave the University of Salford on 31 January as a member of staff, continuing as a student for 6 months as I complete my PhD by publications. Although my usual workload has gradually declined, I am very busy with the ‘work’ of re-constructing my identity. (I…

PhD as Time Team Episode

Preface:I was prompted to write this post by my colleague Andrew Basden’s interpretation of my ‘ critique’ of the area in which he researches and supervises PhDs. However, as I approach the end of this phase of my career (I leave Salford in January 2013), I have been reflecting on various activities, PhD supervison being…

PLE Conference in Aveiro, Portugal and Melbourne

The 2012 Personal Learning Environment (PLE) Conference is being held simultaneously in Aveiro (Portugal) and Melbourne (Australia) in July this year. You can submit paper 1200 word extended abstracts for full papers or 700 words for short papers, posters and doctoral consortium panel participation and there will soon be news on other types of presentation,…