Catastrophic: The Card Game

Categories Gamification, Learning & Teaching

Well, seeing as the whole world is rapidly heading to hell in a hand-basket, it seems entirely appropriate that we’ve been road-testing a game called Catastrophic. Now, I’ve made no secret of the fact that I like games and gaming, and I think there are aspects of this that can enhance our teaching sessions. Over the years I’ve attempted to embrace this, with varying degrees of success. For every Minecraft or Twine success, there’s a car-crash tumbleweed-strewn session I’d rather forget… In fact the last…Continue Reading “Catastrophic: The Card Game” →

MOOC the week…

Categories HE Sector, Learning & Teaching, Outreach

Am I the greatest forensic anthropology lecturer in the world? No. But do I get up every day, go to work and strive to be the best lecturer that I can? Also no. But I do make a token effort to get people to learn. This can take different forms, depending on the context and the learners we are working with. And now that I think about it, I’d say that most of my teaching time over the past couple of years has actually been…Continue Reading “MOOC the week…” →

Parting is such sweet sorrow…

Categories HE Sector, Learning & Teaching, News & Updates

Well, it’s official. Tim Thompson has left the building. And entered another one. 100 metres away. On the same campus. This seemed more dramatic when I started… As some of you may know, the School of Science, Engineering and Design is no more. We’ve had a bit of a restructure here at Teesside, and the School that was once my home has been split into its three component parts and spread across the rest of the Institution. Engineering heads over to the new School of…Continue Reading “Parting is such sweet sorrow…” →

Forensic Science and Climate Change

Categories Learning & Teaching

Now this may come as a surprise to many of you, and indeed those of a nervous disposition should sit down for this, but I am not perfect. And neither is my teaching. Sometimes my enthusiasm and personal interests get the better of me, and we end up going way off point in class. Thankfully we use a module evaluation process here which allows our students to go, “Tim, what the hell..?”. One of the comments I got last year, from a few students and…Continue Reading “Forensic Science and Climate Change” →

Inspiration Station

Categories Learning & Teaching

I quite like this time of the academic calendar. I’m usually not long back from leave and although I’m always disappointed that the School hasn’t ground to a halt in my absence, my mind starts to turn to the next semester’s teaching. As you can probably tell, I really enjoy my teaching. I can’t confirm that my students feel the same way, but I’m an AD so they can’t stop me! I pretty much only teach in Semester 1 now, but I have been doing…Continue Reading “Inspiration Station” →

A new forensic teaching resource: JFLM Commentaries

Categories Learning & Teaching, Research

As someone who teaches, I spend the summer recharging my batteries to get ready for the next academic year. As someone who has responsibility for people who teach, I spend the summer wondering why more people aren’t preparing teaching material for the next academic year! It’s very stressful being me… Anyway, I guess what I should be doing is seeing if I can make such prep easier.  Which is what I’ve done! You’re very welcome… When our new team took over the editorial roles of…Continue Reading “A new forensic teaching resource: JFLM Commentaries” →

Skele-rush! Board games, not bored games…

Categories Gamification, Learning & Teaching

So, I like playing games. Most people know that by now. And I don’t mean, like, emotional games, although those can also be fun. Like today, when the poor guy valiantly organising nine graduation ceremonies for thousands of students for next week asked if I was ready to read out the names of the graduates, and I told him I was going to wing it. He went very grey. It was very funny. No, I mean board games. I’m thinking of them again now because…Continue Reading “Skele-rush! Board games, not bored games…” →

Replica worlds – the education benefits of bloody violence in the grimy streets of physical and virtual reconstructions of the past

Categories Learning & Teaching

Let’s face it, children are idiots. They whine a lot and rarely know what’s good for them. For example, some of them don’t even realise that a trip to a museum is not a chore. It’s fun! Who doesn’t want to learn things?! Idiots, that’s who… Anyway, it was just this attitude that we were faced with on a recent trip to Preston Park. Preston Park is a museum and gardens complex near Stockton. The large house was built in 1825 and became a museum…Continue Reading “Replica worlds – the education benefits of bloody violence in the grimy streets of physical and virtual reconstructions of the past” →

Sharing is caring…

Categories HE Sector, Learning & Teaching

Croeso! Which Google Translate reliably informs me means ‘Welcome’ in Welsh. I’m in Cardiff, FYI, so this is not as random as it seems. I’ve spent the last couple of days down here in Wales working with colleagues at the University of South Wales. Last year, Dr Stewart Eyres (Deputy Dean of Computing, Engineering & Science) reached out to the Teaching Excellence Alliance Peer Review College for some support with their work to develop their Foundation Years. Since I was just coming out of my…Continue Reading “Sharing is caring…” →

Back of the net!

Categories Learning & Teaching, Outreach

This weekend I was able to head over to the Riverside to watch Boro play QPR. It’s the first time I’ve seen them play as well as they did – looking (mostly) in control and putting together some really nice passing – Barca on the Tees… It’s not the first time I’ve been to the Riverside though, but this time it did jog my memory of something that we tried many years ago which I hadn’t thought about in ages – our attempt to get kids…Continue Reading “Back of the net!” →