Profile
Over the past 25 years Chris has worked in a variety of educational initiatives in UK Higher Education, public and voluntary sectors. Since 1990 the focus of this work has been on distance education and use of elearning for teaching and learning, initially at Warwick Business School and since 2000 at The Open University. She has, at various times been a student, tutor, manager and lecturer within HE - sometimes holding several different roles at the same time.
In 2000 Chris's career focus changed and she became increasingly engaged in academic work. Starting out as a tutor/moderator on the online course T171 - You, Your Computer and the Net in 2000, she became a full-time academic in April 2002, and has since been very happily employed in the Institute of Educational Technology. During 2009/10 Chris was seconded to the national Support Centre for Open Resources in Education (SCORE) and is still active as a mentor for some of the fellows within the SCORE fellowship scheme.
Chris's main work is based around use and reuse of online resources, although she also plays a leading role in many other IET and OU activities (notably the eLearning Community and as author/chair of IET courses).
Chris is series co-editor of Connecting with e-Learning (with Prof Allison Littlejohn, Glasgow Caledonian) commissioned by Routledge launched. Chris is co-author of two books within the series:
- Prepared for Blended e-Learning (Littlejohn and Pegler)
- The Educational Potential of e-Portfolios (Stefani, Mason and Pegler)
Qualifications
Chris is currently studying for my PhD (part-time). She also have more than her fair share of university qualifications with two undergraduate degrees (Business Studies (Coventry) and Humanities (Open University), an MBA from Warwick Business School and an MA in Online and Distance Education from the OU. Three of these were obtained - at least in part - through distance-education and online learning - proving that she has every confidence in distance education in general and online study in particular!
Teaching Interests
In April 2004 Chris was awarded the first 'Rising Star' Open University Teaching Award for creating and reusing innovative learning objects in H806, H850 and through IET's professional development activities. In September 2004 she received a National Teaching Fellowship as part of the Higher Education Academy's National Teaching Fellowship Scheme (again in the 'Rising Star' category).
Chris was co-author of Learning in the Connected Economy (H806), a 60pt course within the MA in Online and Distance Education developed in partnership with the University of Cambridge, Programme for Industry (CPI). She has also been Course Chair and authored a revision of H850 IET's Postgraduate Certificate in Teaching and Learning in Higher Education and was a main author of its replacement, the OU's Certificate in Academic Practice (H812). She from Autumn 2010 is chairing H808 The elearning professional.
Research Interests
Chris's research focus on elearning - in particular on reusable learning objects, emphasising the social and pedagogical aspects of their use. She has developed leaning objects on three OU courses so far. This experience informs her initial research and early publications on learning objects. She has been lead evaluator of externally-funded reuse/repository projects (e.g. Stor Curam (funded by the Scottish Executive) and PROWE funded by JISC).
In 2003 Chris started a part-time PhD focusing on the impact of digital learning objects and the Internet on versioning and re-purposing of teaching material within campus-based, open and e-universities. She expects to complete this during 2010 - after following many interesting diversions along the way.
Publications
Other Interests
Chris established the OU's 400+ strong e-Learning Community, which she co-leads with Ingrid Nix, Sarah Davies and Graham Healing. This organises and facilitates a range of events throughout the year as well as offering online support and recordings of events.