1992-1993 Designing, prototyping and evaluating learning environments

Employment context:
Lead eam member of a multidisciplinary (Educationalists, Software Developers, Psychologists, Project Managers) project to build an Intensely Supportive Learning Environment (ISLE).  The project was based within the Institute of Computer Based Learning (ICBL) and funded by Digital Equipment Corp. Digital Equipment removed project funding after one year, for business reasons.

Responsibilities included:
My main responsibility was to design and implement a method to establish the User Requirements of an ISLE that Digital Equipment Corp could eventually develop and sell in academic markets.  User groups included students, lecturers, administrators, Researchers, Librarians across multiple higher education establishments. Specific responsibilities included:

1. Identifying a comprehensive and effective learning model to underpin system development using secondary research and expert interviews.
2. Constructing models of users communication and learning needs based on secondary research and user interviews.
3. Evaluation early prototype ISLEs using inspection methods, in-situ observations during Beta testing, online surveys and semi-structured interviews.
4. Managing the project’s junior HCI specialist.
5. Providing ICBL consultancy on designing evaluations of computer based learning software for a University Funding Council initiative.
6. Teaching university lecturers how to use ICBL provided courseware authoring tools.

Publication: ISLE: A collaborative project to build an Intensely Supportive Learning Environment

Leadership provided by: Professor Terry Mayes