designers as learners:
igniting the spark for web-based roleplay

Position:

Project Manager / Instructional Designer / Online Facilitator

Organisation:

West Coast College of TAFE, Western Australia

Email:

housdl@joondalup.
training.wa.gov.au

Website

Louise has been involved in teaching and learning for more years than she cares to remember. With a range of experiences from the corporate, private and government education and training sectors, Louise is fascinated by the process of learning and the way that people relate to and interact with each other.

Louise is currently working at West Coast College, a large vocational education and training College in Perth, Western Australia - the land of glorious golden beaches and pink sunsets. She daydreams constantly, drinks too much coffee and doesn’t practice the piano enough, and one day hopes to buy a deserted tropical island to live on and grow mangos.

Designer as Learner

For the last five years Louise has been lured over to the new and exciting world of online learning. She has been involved in the development of some complex multimedia-based online courses, as Project Manager and Instructional Designer. From these large-scale courses through to more simple discussion-based and content-free online programs, Louise employs a range of instructional design strategies to engage and stimulate learners in an online environment.

As well as doing instructional design, Louise also facilitates a range of online learning programs – from structured accredited courses through to professional development for online teachers. She also participates in a number of online communities, and is usually undertaking at least one online course at any given time.

Her experiences as an online learner and facilitator have provided many insights that have benefited her as a designer – understanding how people learn online and the important elements of interaction and socialisation can best be gained through personal experience.

Current involvement with role-play

Although she has been part of the Australian cheer squad for ‘games for learning’ for some time, web-based role-play is the latest thing to catch Louise’s eye – never one to admit to being completely sane in the first place, it’s only natural that the whimsical world of role-play beckons her to come on in.

From portraying a roguish character during an online conference through to participating in structured role-play, Louise is up for almost anything if there’s the potential to learn something new. Currently, Louise is investigating the application of web-based role-play into some of her online teaching.