Dr John Woollard BSc, PhD, MA(Ed), AdvDipIT, SEN, PGCE
Senior Teaching Fellow
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Dr John Woollard is Senior Teaching Fellow within Southampton Education School at the University of Southampton.
John’s work at the University focuses upon the support of doctorate students in the field of e-learning, computational thinking and the developing computing curriculum. He also supports researchers in the field of special educational needs and specific learning difficulties.
Following his PGCE and teaching at primary level, in 1975 John moved into secondary school special education needs work. He was teacher-in-charge and head of department (SENCo) in three different Hampshire schools before becoming a teacher advisor for IT and Special Education Needs. During the early 1990s John had a variety of positions as consultant, advisor and inspector. John was a Registered OFSTED Inspector for primary schools as well as team inspector for secondary ICT, mathematics and Special Education Needs. In 1997 John moved to LSU College, Southampton to coordinate the MSc in computer based learning course and teach Special Education Needs on the Initial Teacher Training programme. He also taught undergraduate computer science. John joined the School of Education in 1998 and has completed his PhD in 2004. His research focus was pedagogy and the teaching of difficult concepts in and with computers including e-learning and computer assisted assessment. John contributes regularly to the review of current academic and professional literature relating to initial teacher training, in-service training and information and communications technology through the Teacher Training Resources Bank. He also supports new teacher trainers through one-to-one mentoring and contributions to the ICT Tutors network. John was consultant editor of InteracTive - a professional magazine for teachers of ICT. He is an active member of ITTE (IT in Teacher Education Association) and contributes to the research conference on a regular basis. He is chair of Technical SIG (special interest group). John is a member of the Computers at School group based in Cambridge and has developing key stage 3 material to support computer programming, a guide for computational thinking and many teaching resources for computer science for primary and secondary pupils. John was the academic advisor to the CAS Barefoot project and project coordinator for Tenderfoot.
John's consultancy has recently included work for: Microsoft Computers; Childnet International (a child safety charity); British Safety Council (through a KTP project); and the TDA including projects on "diversity and opportunity", e-safety and the provision of training resources and case studies to support the "Professional Standards". John also contributed to the GTP as a subject tutor for ICT, a subject assessor for ICT from 2009 and as an ICT across the curriculum assessor. John has advised on the development of ICT and computing GCE courses in Egypt and Kazakhstan. John is an assessor for the BCS Certificate in Computer Science Teaching.
John is a doctorate supervisor. Current and past student research has included: teacher attitudes to ICT; using chat and online facilities to support language learning and pastoral support; and developing alternative pedagogies to support e-learning and blended learning and more recently studies in special educational needs CPD and computational thinking. He has externally examined 9 EdD and PhD vivas. John has seen successfully guided 11 students through to their final doctoral viva.
John has been and remains external examiner for a number of universities including: the BEd programme at LSU College; the Masters CPD programme at the University of Huddersfield; the PGCE ICT programme at the University of Derby; the undergraduate Computing and IT programme under the University of Exeter; Learning, Technology and Research an online degree offered through the Ultraversity at Anglia Ruskin University, BA Joint Honours in IT at York St John University, PGCE ICT at Christ Church Canterbury University, Nottingham Trent University, Cardiff Metropolitan University, University of Sunderland, University of Brighton, University of Wolverhampton…