| Kevin McCarron is an academic who started
performing on the UK comedy circuit in 1997. He soon established himself as a regular
headlining act, as well as taking on the role of resident compere for several comedy clubs
in the Laughing Horse Comedy chain.  "Good Timing" - Arnold Brown; "Top London
Comic" - Liberty Radio
Kevin also performs across the UK as a headline act, and has
performed for the past four years at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, most recently in his
one-man improvised comedy show "Nuclear War: Followed by the complete extermination
of every living organism on the planet".
 "From the outset the
audience warmed to Kevin McCarron. His material [in an improvised show] was hilarious. He
covered a range of topics including facial tattoos and fatherhood; and even a mention of '
Brokeback Mountain' segued into some nice observations about old fashioned westerns."
- Three Weeks' review of 'Nuclear War...'
Kevin has recently been exploring ways in which teachers in
Higher Education might learn from some of the techniques employed by stand-up comedians:
"Only the teacher and the stand-up comedian rely on the continuous interaction of
their respective audiences". However, his Presentation will not focus
particularly on humour.
There will be no skilful use of PowerPoint (or even any
clumsy use of PowerPoint), no exhortatory mnemonics, no slides, tables, statistics or flip
charts. Instead there will be every opportunity to discuss the numerous implications
arising from his central premise: the over-emphasis on research in our universities has
created a culture of caution, but caution is not necessarily a desirable virtue in a
teacher. This presentation will offer techniques and strategies which can liberate
teachers from the tyranny of extensive and dutiful seminar preparation.
Kevin McCarron is Reader in American Literature at Roehampton
University, where he was awarded a Teaching Fellowship in 2005. He has been nominated
twice for a National Teaching Fellowship and in 2007 he received a UCU `Life Changers'
award in the category of `Inspiring Students'.
Quotes from previous sessions:
"We were delighted with the response to your
session" - Martin Watson, De Montfort
"Enjoyable and thought provoking - will be using some of your
ideas" - Ian Willis, Centre for Lifelong Learning
"One chap - new to lecturing, but an experienced
F.E. teacher, said yours was the most stimulating staff development session he'd ever been
to"
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