Consultancy: Workshops.

Writing to Learn: Developing Writing Skills

I have designed a series of four writing development workshops aimed at PhD students, with special interest in the international student. These include "Getting going", "Finding your voice", "Argument and critique" and "Using your sources". (These build on the successful "Writing to Learn: improving writing skills" run at Queen’s University in Belfast and the University of Ulster).

Academic Integrity

I have worked with the University of Nottingham to develop materials and awareness around issues relating to academic integrity, including plagiarism.

Preparing to Teach

At University College, Falmouth I designed a two-day training event for part time teachers who are recent entrants to the HE sector. Participants came from a range of fields: graphics, journalism, photography, and film studies. This highly interactive event included micro-teaching exercises, in which participants had presentations videoed and played back. Participants also spent time in groups designing curriculum and teaching strategies. This workshop is also useful for postgraduate students and contract researchers, who teach. Related workshops have been run at the Universities of Hull, Reading, and Central Lancashire.

Diversity in the Lecture Room

The university lecture room is a microcosm of the complex diverse society of which it is a part. How can university lecturers teach to embrace equally diverse and complex learning styles? How can specific needs of both international and local students be catered for in the same learning context? What are the issues around traditional and non-traditional learners, often on different programmes, being in one learning site, for teaching academics? Whose responsibility are the 'lost' learners? At the University of Newcastle I negotiated and designed a workshop which addressed questions of diversity and the classroom in HE. A similar workshop was developed for the Oxford Centre for Staff and Learning Development (OCSLD).