In 2016 I was a part of a small team from the University of Newcastle, Australia that developed and delivered a MOOC on the Edx platform. Working with my colleague Dr Bernadette Drabsch and the talented team from the University’s teaching and learning team, we set about developing a short online course focused on teaching the principles of Natural History Illustration practice. Focused on observing and drawing the natural world, this MOOC had a practical focus with six weeks of modules focused on developing skills and experience with observational drawing and tonal rendering. Participants joined global cohorts who simultaneously undertook the practical tasks and shared their creative works online with other participants.

This course was a great success with over 180,000 people from 149 different countries participating in the course since 2016. In 2017, we were awarded the prestigious edX Prize for exceptional contributions in Online Learning and Teaching.

https://www.newcastle.edu.au/newsroom/featured/world-first-uon-course-draws-international-recognition