Role
Diana is an Educational Developer within the Academic Development team in CADQ. She works collaboratively with academic colleagues to explore and adopt innovative, inclusive and evidence-based learning and teaching practices, supporting excellent learning opportunities and outcomes for all students.
Diana leads both the Curriculum Design and the Assessment and Feedback workstreams, delivering workshops for academic colleagues. She works with Nottingham Law School on the implementation and review of their Success for All Plan. Diana works collaboratively in Design Sprints with course teams and other Professional Services colleagues on the design of new courses and major course changes.
Career overview
Diana has an NTU degree in Psychology and Social Sciences.
Beginning her NTU career in the Quality Management Team, Diana is now an Educational Developer within the Centre for Academic Development and Quality (CADQ). In this role she applies her knowledge of educational theory and practice developed through a Primary PGCE and three years in the primary classroom responsively developing inclusive learning, teaching and assessment activities.
She also has experience of inter-department delivery and facilitation, developed over five years in Local Government. Here she worked on a multi-organisation programme addressing cycles of disadvantage through targeted funding, the trialling of innovative delivery models and improving the collection and monitoring of impact evidence. This experience also provided a broad contextual understanding of our Success for All agenda.
Research areas
Diana has a keen interest in the use of educational interventions and active collaborative delivery models, and has undertaken first-hand research into the impact of educational interventions in the primary classroom.
One research piece explored the potential value of the 100 square as a visual learning method in mathematics. Findings highlighted the potential positive impact of promoting dialogue around metacognition in supporting relational understanding, and careful and responsive structuring of visual and auditory scaffolding.
A second study looked into the promotion of scientific talk in the primary classroom through the use of concept cartoons in groups. Findings highlighted that the opportunity to engage in scientific peer dialogue encouraged the development of scientific thought processes. This promoted justification, rationalisation, discussion of personal experience, application and generalisation of ideas more broadly.
Another study looked at the effectiveness of paired formative peer assessment in facilitating improvement in literacy performance. Findings highlighted the opportunity for increased motivation through ownership and presentation of work to a peer, as well as the opportunity to develop metacognition through consideration and discussion of the nature of quality of work. Also highlighted was the need for personalised, targeted and responsive feedback to support progression in the primary literacy classroom.