I happen to live in an area where cycling is very popular. Everything from commuting by bike, to getting around, cycling to school or into town as well as the more specialised sports like mountain biking and road racing is GO! There is a bicycle cafe nearby, which serves delicious coffee to bike enthusiasts and locals alike. And, every day as the dogs traverse their daily walk, we meet cyclists on route. In the woods,…
Maren Deepwell Posts
From 6-8 March two of my favourite annual initiatives co-incide: It’s Open Education Week, from 2-6 March, celebrating all things open in Education AND it’s also International Women’s Day on 8 March. Perfect timing to celebrate all things (and people!) inspiring in open education and beyond. To celebrate in proper style, I am organising a schedule to jump on the DS106 Radio airwaves and bring you tunes over the weekend and I would love you…
Last week I went to see Gwen John’s major retrospective, Strange Beauties at the National Museum in Cardiff: Gwen John: Strange Beauties is a once-in-a-generation exhibition, bringing together rarely seen works from Amgueddfa Cymru and collections from around the world to celebrate her 150th birthday. It is the first major collection of her work in over forty years. It tells Gwen’s story as it’s never been told before — revealing new ways of seeing her life…
It’s been a while since I got a keynote invite that had me checking flight schedules. For many good reasons, nowadays I give most of my keynotes from my home office. So it was extra exciting to see the announcement for the 2026 Annual Conference organised by ASCILITE come out last week! Although I worked closely with colleagues in Australia and New Zealand during my time at ALT, this is one event I never made…
This week I have spent a lot of time on trains. Monday: Cardiff – Sheffield. Tuesday: Sheffield – Edinburgh. Wednesday: Edinburgh. Thursday: Edinburgh – Glasgow. Friday: Glasgow – Cardiff. It’s been a joy to connect with colleagues and friends around the edges of a rewarding work trip and I made extra time to see more and connect with some of my favourite people who I haven’t seen in person for a long time. Work travel,…
Earlier this month the open knowledge community celebrated a big milestone as Wikipedia turned 25! I blogged about it on the Reclaim Blog, and had the pleasure of joining a lovely line up to celebrate: It was inspiring to have a conversation about open knowledge, particularly in an age of information abundance (read Dave Cormier’s book on that subject in case you haven’t yet!) . Incidentally, the book’s subtitle, “The Community is the Curriculum” would…
One of my fellow coaches, Helen, a wonderful executive coach for Headteachers, recently shared online that her word of the year for 2026 is ‘analogue’ and that was music to my ears. As regular readers know, I’m a big fan of all things analogue, and the post prompted me to re-read The Revenge of Analogue by David Sax. Although the book was published ten years ago, and some of the research it mentions has been superseded,…
January is usually a time for planning for the year ahead. Whether at work or at home, there’s a whole year of goals yet to achieve stretched out in front of us, and I find that can be a little bit overwhelming. Whilst I am a fan of planning ahead, with so much to do, and only a finite amount of time and energy to do it with, I find I need an antidote to…
Here in Wales the start of the year has been very cold and this morning we even had a light dusting of snow. So close to the coast it rarely snows a lot, but the ice on the roofs I can see through my window as I sit at my desk is a good reminder that winter is here. In a few days, I’ll be back to work as usual, but for the time being…
This is the last post of the year, and this one is for my most trusty office buddy, Posey! Posey turns FIVE tomorrow, and her adventures over the past year have been a big source of joy for me each and every month. I always dreamt of having a dog when I was little, and I am happy and grateful indeed that I have been able to fulfil that dream now that I live a…