My thoughts about...
Structure teaches, whether or not anyone designed it to.
A room, an interface and a set of rules all shape behaviour before anyone intends them to. My work is about doing that on purpose: working out how spatial design, technology and media come together, and turning what holds up into something a school or a team can use. These pages are organised by subject, because the principle travels further than the project does.
What holds it together
Much of my work begins with a simple observation: what people are able to do is partly shaped by the conditions around them.
A classroom influences participation. An interface directs attention. A rule changes behaviour. A representation changes what becomes visible. A system creates incentives and constraints.
I’m interested in how these conditions are designed, and how they can be changed on purpose to support better learning, thinking and action.
The work here covers educational technology, learning spaces, futuring and games, among other things. They look like different subjects. I’ve come to see them as different ways of studying the same problem.
Domains
What I currently think
Each domain page sets out the question, the position, the distinctions that do the work and what I’d still argue about. The first is the frame the others sit inside.
Learning spaces
How might space, participation, tools and routines support the forms of learning intended?
Immersive and extended reality
When does an embodied or spatial digital experience add educational value?
Interactive learning experiences
How should learners act, receive feedback and build explanations inside an interactive system?
Media and multimedia for learning
How should words, visuals and sound combine so that media clarifies rather than distracts?
Evidence of learning
What can the learner now understand or do that they could not reliably understand or do before?
Designing collective thinking
What conditions let a group think better than its members would alone?
Things that might be useful
Ideas made operational
A guide asks: if this idea matters, what should someone actually do differently? The guides have their own section, with a map of the craft and six pathways through the collection.
To take away
If structure teaches anyway, someone should design it on purpose.
Pick the domain closest to what you’re working on. Try two of its questions on your own project this week, then see where the positions get tested.