Clients

Here are some of the organisations for which I’ve worked, both as a freelancer and as a staff member at Learning Materials Design.

The Open Centre for Languages and Cultures

The Open Centre for Languages and Cultures was set up by the Open University’s School of Language and Applied Linguistics, to produce and deliver short non-accredited courses across five languages. They engaged me to edit the pilot course, for which I designed a author-markup system to communicate structure and interactivity clearly to the assistants building the materials. I then trained authors, course managers and assistants for their roles in the production process, and also edited sections of six other courses.

Aula Education

When Coventry University commissioned Aula Education to convert all its modules for online delivery, I was one of the Senior Learning Designers employed to design and agree revised module plans with the academic leads. This included seeking opportunities to make best use of the Aula platform’s capacity for rich social interaction. Aula designated me one of their “super performers”, whose work was exempted from requiring approval by their internal quality assurance.

Marie Curie Cancer Care

The Education section of Marie Curie Cancer Care, which trained their own nurses out of their regional centres, wanted to create an accredited BA in Cancer care / Palliative care, taught through a combination of face-to-face teaching and distance learning. When Learning Materials Design was awarded the contract to produce the distance learning materials, I was part of the team which worked with the Marie Curie lecturers to plan and write them. I was the author of materials for three modules, including the important compulsory introductory Principles of Palliative Care. Marie Curie were particularly pleased with the student results for this module, consistently good across the regional centres, which they attributed to the quality of the materials, that being the common factor.

Oxford Brookes University

When the Westminster Institute for Education at Oxford Brookes University won the government contract to train Gifted and Talented Coordinators in secondary schools, the academic team contracted Learning Materials Design to produce multimedia materials in support of this Masters level programme.

I was one of the LMD writers / editors working on this high profile project: liaising with the academic team, interviewing G&T Coordinators to record their experience of practice, and editing the resulting audio to fit within the learning materials.

UK eUniversities Worldwide

The “e-University” – a government-funded initiative to provide UK universities with an online platform to market and present their courses globally – commissioned Learning Materials Design to produce core materials to help students and tutors learn and teach online. I was the lead writer and editor for these materials, liaising with the UKeU technical team developing the platform, adjusting our writing to its continually-changing expected capabilities.

Department for Education and Skills

The Department wanted some up-to-date video material to accompany its training programme for school governors in secondary schools, and on behalf of Learning Materials Design I managed the contract to produce this and also to create a distance learning version of the face-to-face training.

In close liaison with the Department client, our author and our video director, I oversaw approval of the video plan, the script, the selection of actors, the shoot and the editing. I also presented the finished video at a conference of Department trainers.

The Department returned to LMD for production of its successor training materials for school governors in primary schools.

Bradford Dementia Group, University of Bradford

The Bradford Dementia Group (now the Centre for Applied Dementia Studies) is one of the UK’s leading organisations driving improvements in dementia care. To extend their direct face-to-face teaching and training, they wanted to make use of distance learning materials. The Group contracted me to run two workshops, the first to help the academic team think about the different ways they could use distance learning materials in their teaching and the second to provide them with training in writing learning activities and feedback.

Thanks for a terrific workshop.

Prof. Murna Downs, Bradford Dementia Group, University of Bradford

Middlesex University Business School

When Middlesex University decided to move towards student-centred teaching, the Business School contracted Learning Materials Design to run a series of workshops to give selected lecturers the skills to introduce resource-based learning into their own modules.

I was one of the LMD team which designed and delivered the workshops, adapting them closely to the institutional circumstances and immediate needs of participants. I also wrote a summary of the training and discussions for their future guidance.

Comic Relief

Learning Materials Design offered this popular charity a day of company time, in which all staff worked in a blitz to produce several digital resources, including an induction resource to be used with the numerous volunteers taken on every two years to run a Red Nose Day. I worked with Comic Relief staff to boil down the large collection of documents with which they presented us into a slide deck containing a small number of key messages and essential information points suitable for a staff induction.