The Global Goals
In 2015, UN member states agreed to 17 global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure prosperity for all. Dylan's work contributes towards the following SDG(s):
About Dylan
Professor of Immersive Storytelling, I am a researcher and artist specialising in play and storytelling for children. Having a doctorate in Education and MA degrees in Research Methods, Early Childhood Education and Japanese Semiotics my work crosses academia and industry.
My research sits at the intersection of experimental design and social sciences, focusing on digital storytelling, games and play on a range of platforms such as apps, augmented and virtual reality, as well as new content for television, all with an emphasis on media for children.
As an artist I use drawing, emerging technologies and game engines to explore experimental visual and multimodal methods as part of the research process. In this way I take an Experience Design approach to including participants in the research process, also to connect data findings [the information] to design and production [the experience].
Teaching
Current Teaching
My teaching approach is research informed with a pedagogical approach grounded in learning through doing, making and interacting with materials and technologies (Ingold, 2013). I am currently the lead for the MA in Experience Design.
Previous Teaching Experience
Between 2021 and 2023 I led and taught the interdisciplinary units that sat across the entire suite of MAs at the School of Digital Arts, MMU. Between 2016 and 2021 I was a Senior Tutor and then Acting Head of Programme for Information Experience Design, at the Royal College of Art. Between 2013 and 2016 I was the Director of the MA in Education: early Childhood at the University of Sheffield.
I take a research-led and interdisciplinary approach to teaching, specialising in (1) Interdisciplinary Practice, (2) Experimental Research Methods, (3) Game Design and (4) Storytelling and Narrative Design. Examples of how these have been taught across my teaching career can be found below.
Interdisciplinary Practice
In my previous role at the School of Digital Arts, I taught the Interdisciplinary Practice units that alternated between approaches to and methods for working across disciplines in the field of digital arts. A blog post that shows how MA students from photography, film, sound design, animation and games art applied this to conduct research that informed their final degree projects can be found here.
Experimental Research Methods
In my previous role at the Royal College of Art, I taught experimental research methods teaching. This was designed to support Information Experience Design student's collection of the “Information” part of their experience design work. Each taught session took a format of an introduction to an area of research theory followed by a practical workshops for students to explore this using hands-on techniques that they were free to experiment with and push further. A blog post that documents this work can be found here.
Game Design
Using examples from entertainment as well as serious gaming, I introduce students to the fundamentals of game design, from narrative development to user testing. Examples of this teaching can be found here.
Storytelling and Narrative Design
How can interactive storytelling change the way we perceive information? This work formed part of an elective for all MAs within the School of Communication at the Royal College of Art called Exploded Stories. Exploded Stories explored the multiple ways in which stories form the backbone of communication practices, including scripts, films, political protests, graphic narratives, play and more. Students were taught about using different modes of communication, media and materials individually and collectively to create and tell stories through representation, illusion and unlikely connections. They explored this in relation to a story, fiction or factual, of their choices to build in-depth knowledge of the narrative in their own work. A blog post that documents this work can be found here.
In addition I have been experimenting with how drawing and AI text-to-image generation can engage MA students in critical reading.
