About

I am a Lecturer in Digital Education within the Centre for Research in Digital Education at the University of Edinburgh, working with the MSc in Digital Education and the Edinburgh Futures Institute.  I am a visionary for the Una Europa Future University Lab and a co-author of the Manifesto for Teaching Online.

My published research has argued the case for multimodal feedback around assessment, and explored the potential for digital technologies to combine with walking ethnography as a method for understanding our urban surroundings. I have also written about the ways that online distance students conceptualise the university and how learners use sound to negotiate space for learning. At the current time (winter 2020) I am researching how learning technologies affect the spatial and temporal arrangements of higher education, and am also exploring student experiences of innovative digital assessment.

In August 2019 I completed my ESRC-funded PhD which investigated how the learning spaces of higher education are affected by the pedagogic and societal shift to the digital. My thesis was presented in multimodal form where written discussion was juxtaposed with sound maps, playlists, field recordings and photographs.

Within the MSc in Digital Education I lead the Education and Digital Culture and dissertation courses, as well as teaching on Introduction to Digital Environments for Learning and Social Research Methods. For the Edinburgh Futures Institute meanwhile I am a co-lead for the Education Future pathways where I am developing a postgraduate course exploring the future of learning organisations. Details of other teaching, seminars and workshops can be found on my publications page. I also run the Elektronisches Lernen Muzik project where the relationship between  music and learning is explored through playlists.

Before all of this I was assistant director at Lothians Equal Access Programme for Schools where I helped young people from non-traditional backgrounds to gain entry to higher education.

Dr James Lamb
james.lamb@ed.ac.uk 
@james858499​