Design

Leading Early Childhood STEM Education and Digital Literacy in the ELSA Projects

I lead the design and delivery of research-informed digital learning programs that improve education at national scale.

Over eight years as ELSA Research Project Manager at the University of Canberra, I led multidisciplinary teams of academics, professional staff, and distributed design and development partners to deliver two of the Faculty of Education’s largest research initiatives. These projects established large-scale digitally enhanced learning programs that continue to reach children, educators, and families across Australia. These programs have been implemented in schools and early learning settings across Australia, supporting thousands of children and educators.

Funded at $14.2M through the National Innovation and Science Agenda (NISA), I liaised with federal government departments to meet contractual milestones and compliance requirements while directing collaboration with leading design and development studios including Two Moos, Mode Games, Stripy Sock, and Anomaly.

The ELSA Preschool Program is now commercially available at elsaprogram.com.au.

The ELSA initiatives were developed to address persistent gaps in early STEM confidence, spatial reasoning, and teacher support in the early years of schooling.

(Back to Top)

Importance and Impact

Project 1: ELSA Preschool (2016–2020)

A blended program combining digital and physical resources, ELSA Preschool centres on 16 children’s mobile apps organised into four pedagogical themes — Representations, Investigations, Locations, and Decoding — alongside books and physical classroom games (including the Australian Bird Game). An Educator Classroom App supports teaching practice, while a Families web app extends learning into the home through activities aligned with the curriculum.

Project 2: ELSA Schools Foundation to Year 2 (2021–2025)

Developed to increase participation and achievement in primary STEM education, this program focuses on spatial and logical reasoning capabilities linked to future success in STEM disciplines. At its core was a digital learning platform and a nationwide randomised controlled trial involving more than 7,500 students, making it one of the largest randomised controlled trials (RCT) in early years STEM education conducted in Australia.

Using ELSA Schools Foundation to Year 2 as an exemplar, I led the program from initial concept through to full deployment. I was responsible for its creative and strategic direction, spanning pedagogical framing, game ideation, production, testing, and national rollout.

My role covered the full design lifecycle: I developed curriculum-aligned game concepts grounded in learning theory, created paper prototypes for rapid iteration, and produced detailed digital prototypes that informed production-ready games. This end-to-end design process ensured the program remained anchored in educational purpose rather than technological novelty.

I managed two specialist external studios across parallel workstreams. I directed Mode Games (Sydney) — one of Australia’s leading educational game developers — in the design and build of 47 Unity-based web games for children. I provided interface concepts, creative briefs, and ongoing design direction, maintaining quality and pedagogical integrity across a complex, multi-year production pipeline.

In parallel, I oversaw Anomaly (Canberra) in developing the teacher-facing platform, a sophisticated system integrating structured lesson plans, professional learning resources, classroom management tools, and real-time student learning dashboards. Coordinating both studios required rigorous governance, clear communication of technical and pedagogical requirements, and stewardship of a coherent product vision across evolving workstreams.

Working collaboratively with colleagues and end users, our research team designed games that enable children to experience success through supported challenge — fostering persistence and resilience alongside STEM knowledge. We designed the Teacher Tool with equal care, equipping educators with the insight and structure needed to monitor progress and deliver the program with confidence.

The breadth of this project — spanning research design, UX and game design, curriculum development, multi-studio production management, and a national-scale RCT — reflects the integrated leadership and design thinking I bring to complex educational technology initiatives that cross interdisciplinary boundaries. This work demonstrates how design, research, and strategic implementation can translate educational theory into scalable classroom impact.

---

(Back to Top)

Augmented Reality in Education

ARstudio: Creating Opportunities for Multimodal Layered Learning through Augmented Reality

Go to the project website > https://sites.google.com/view/arstudio/home

I co-led ARstudio, a $224,000 Office for Learning and Teaching–funded research initiative that transformed how educators approached augmented reality in learning contexts. Working with colleagues from the University of Canberra, Australian National University, and Macquarie University, I established the project’s distinctive design-thinking methodology, positioning pedagogy and co-design at the heart of innovation rather than technology-first thinking.

I facilitated the development of practice models, educational frameworks, and capacity-building initiatives that enabled educators to design their own pedagogically grounded uses of AR. This human-centred approach moved beyond demonstrating technology to empowering educators as designers of their own augmented learning experiences. We developed workshop curricula using service design approaches, created resources that scaffolded educators’ journeys from novice to confident AR creators, and ensured every initiative remained anchored in pedagogical purpose rather than technological novelty.

This work was recognised with the 2014 University of Canberra Vice-Chancellor’s Excellence Award for Enhanced Learning Programs. ARstudio demonstrated that when educational technology innovation is led by design thinking, the result extends beyond tool adoption to transformation in how educators conceptualise learning.

---

(Back to Top)

Inspire Centre for Innovation in Education and Training

The Inspire Centre is a $7.2 million joint venture between the University of Canberra, the ACT Education Directorate, and the ACT Government. Established as an applied design–research hub, the Centre advances innovation in education and training through the integration of learning sciences, emerging technologies, and learning space design.

I contributed to the Centre’s design-led approach, supporting collaborative innovation processes and the development of technology-enabled learning environments aligned with contemporary pedagogical practice.

Grounded in the learning sciences, the Centre investigates how digital technologies and physical environments can improve learning in both formal and informal settings. Its mission is to support the research, development, and implementation of innovative ICT-enabled educational practices while strengthening system-wide capacity for pedagogical innovation.

Design thinking underpins the Centre’s methodology, providing a structured process for collaborative idea generation, co-design, and problem solving. This approach enables educators, researchers, and industry partners to work together to design solutions grounded in real educational contexts.

A hallmark of the Inspire Centre is its technology-enabled learning environments, purpose-built to support active learning, collaboration, and co-design. These flexible spaces allow educators and learners to experiment with new pedagogical approaches supported by advanced digital infrastructure.

Key themes

• Active participatory learning
• Collaborative knowledge building
• Mobile technologies and social software
• Agile learning spaces and educational design
• Professional learning communities
• Strategic partnerships

The Centre illustrates how design-led collaboration and purpose-built learning environments can support system-wide educational innovation.

---

(Back to Top)

NSW Police VR Simulation Design Thinking Workshop

I designed and facilitated a Design Thinking workshop for the New South Wales Police Force Training Centre in Goulburn to evaluate organisational needs and critical dependencies for virtual reality training and tactical simulation systems.

Using structured design thinking processes, the workshop engaged police trainers and operational staff in collaborative analysis and ideation to identify the behaviours, decision-making skills, and operational competencies most effectively developed through simulation-based training.

The project culminated in the adaptation of the Business Model Canvas into a specialised Gamification Model Canvas, enabling the organisation to clearly visualise training objectives, implementation requirements, cost implications, and strategic benefits across alternative simulation platforms.

This process provided a shared decision-making framework supporting evidence-informed planning for future simulation training investments.