Author: Derek Jones

  • Presenting Futures Literacy to the Scottish Government

    Presenting Futures Literacy to the Scottish Government

    One of the things we get to do now and again as academics is to speak to governments and politicians in policy areas we are interested in. This year, the OU in Scotland contributed to the Royal Society of Chemistry event Science and the Parliament event. This brings together scientists, business, politicians, and government to […]

  • The Secret Genius of Modern Life

    The Secret Genius of Modern Life

    Members of the the Design Group have been working on an OU / BBC co-production called The Secret Genius of Modern Life, a series that uncovers the secrets behind the miraculous technologies of the modern world, revealing the mind-blowing stories behind their invention. Derek Jones and David Sharp were the academic consultants and it’s probably […]

  • Design@50 – Design in a Time of Climate Emergency

    Design@50 – Design in a Time of Climate Emergency

    The latest Design@50 event focused on the topic Design in a Time of Climate Emergency, featuring reflections and discussion between Prof Stephen Peake, Dr Emma Dewberry, Dr Alessandra Campoli and Dr Derek Jones. The event also featured archive footage from the first Open University course that introduced design, connecting it to far broader issues around […]

  • Design Education: Teaching in Crisis

    Design Education: Teaching in Crisis

    At the end of 2021 we published the special issue Design Education: Teaching in Crisis in the Journal of Design and Technology Education (DATE). This brought together 16 articles from academics around the world to present articles, case studies and opinion pieces based on their experiences during the Covid-19 Pandemic in 2020/21, Over the next […]

  • Design Education: Teaching in Crisis

    Design Education: Teaching in Crisis

    Last year we (Nicole and Derek) opened a call for papers to capture some of the experiences and lessons from design educators during the Covid-19 global pandemic. We are delighted to announce the publication of a Special Issue of the Journal of Design and Technology Education (DATE): Design Education: Teaching in Crisis The Special Issue […]

  • LEARN x DESIGN Conference on Design Education

    LEARN x DESIGN Conference on Design Education

    The 6th International DRS EdSIG Conference on Design Education, LEARN x DESIGN 2021 was held in September 2021, hosted by Shandong university of Art & Design, China. The 2021 Conference was a great success, particularly considering the challenges facing the organisers. Shortly after the announcement was made that Shandong would host the conference, the COVID-19 […]

  • Attitudes and Behaviours

    Attitudes and Behaviours

    We’re on design as a set of Cognitive Superpowers (again). This time looking at two properties we take for granted and don’t seem to include in learning outcomes: Attitudes and Behaviours. I’m going to argue that these are as important as developing Skills or Cognitive Abilities. In particular, that they are necessary aspects of being […]

  • Discovering the Smallest Particle of Design and how that Pleases Santa

    Discovering the Smallest Particle of Design and how that Pleases Santa

    A bit of a festive post to end the year on how the smallest atom of design is and Santa are related. But first: What is the smallest possible particle of design process? At The Open University Design Group, this question has baffled at least one design education researcher for at least a minute. In […]

  • OU Design Summer School 2020 – Week 2 (and mostly 3 if I’m honest…)

    OU Design Summer School 2020 – Week 2 (and mostly 3 if I’m honest…)

    OK, so in the best traditions of being an OU student: life got in the way of what I wanted to do; I realised that what I wanted to do was probably a bit, and I failed to meet my own deadlines… But part of being an OU student is that with these difficulties come […]

  • OU Design Summer School 2020 – Week 1

    OU Design Summer School 2020 – Week 1

    A few of us are working on an OU Design Summer School this year and we already have a great bunch of students working on this. It’s a bit of an experiment in terms of trying to get a community of learning going with a whole range of individual learning goals. I’ll blog separately about […]