Author List

Julie McCracken is a primary school teacher, whose passion for children and effective learning has led her to become a certified Clean Language facilitator and NLP Master Practitioner in addition to her busy day job. She believes in the simple but essential solutions this training provides in allowing her to ensure that her students are part of an inclusive, interactive and happy learning environment.

Emma McCrea is a senior lecturer at the University of Brighton, specialising in the design and delivery of evidence-informed teacher training for both trainee and experienced teachers. She has led professional development training for organisations such as the National Centre for Excellence in the Teaching of Mathematics (NCETM), Mathematics in Education and Industry (MEI) and the Maths Hubs. She is currently studying for a Fellowship in Education and is the founding director of an edtech start-up. Having started her career as a maths teacher at an innovative secondary school in East Sussex, Emma has since worked as a head of maths, qualified as an advanced skills teacher and led on teaching and learning and teacher professional development.

Ian McDermott specialises in giving people the skills to innovate their own collaborative leadership solutions. Much of his time is spent advising senior leaders worldwide and coaching the next generation to be innovative leaders.

Ian is an Honorary Fellow of Exeter University Business School where his focus is on leadership, innovation and entrepreneurship. He is Dean of Innovation & Learning for the Purposeful Planning Institute in the US and his work is featured in the Open University's MBA course Creativity, Innovation and Change'. Ian is External Faculty at Henley Business School where he helped create the MSc. in Coaching and Behavioral Change. He is also a UKCP registered psychotherapist.

Ian McDermott has pioneered Leadership and Innovation Coaching, has trained a generation of coaches, is a member of the Association for Coaching's Global Advisory Panel and is AC Global Ambassador for Innovation and Collaboration.

Based in the UK and the US, he is an acknowledged thought leader. A published authority, he has authored and co-authored fifteen books on systems thinking, NLP and coaching. Titles include The Art of Systems Thinking, Principles of NLP and The Coaching Bible.

Ian's primary focus is on delivering practical how-tos' to ensure that learning in leadership and change, innovation and collaboration really happen. That's why he set up International Teaching Seminars (ITS).

25+ years on ITS continues to pioneer the application of practical techniques which are grounded in sound neuroscience for individuals, teams and organizations.



For details of consultancy, coaching and training: www.itsnlp.com

Avril McDonald is the bestselling, award-winning author of the Feel Brave series of books and founder of Feel Brave, a company with a vision to give all children access to tools that help them manage tough emotions and reach their potential. Avril has a Diploma of Education from Wellington College of Education, New Zealand, where she trained as a primary school teacher majoring in music and dance. She then had a varied career in digital entertainment before launching Feel Brave to give teachers and parents simple and practical strategies to help children with their emotional well-being. Her free ‘1 Dose/Day’ emotional well-being programme for children is now used in more than 350 schools across ten countries. Avril is an official partner of the New Zealand Life Education Trust and Patron of Westminster Children’s University.

Click here to read a feature on Avril's Feel Brave series on New Zealand's Stuff' website.

Click here to listen to UKEdChats podcast with Avril McDonald.

'Emotional tools for kids taught through books and songs.'

'Teaching children empathy.'

'Empowering kids to feel brave and tackle tough emotions'

Dr Matthew McFall is an education consultant and practitioner with an interest in puzzles, games, mazes, labyrinths and escape rooms.

His work focuses on the uses of wonderment for learning and engagement within both formal and non-formal educational environments. His second doctorate explores the heritage of wonder and considers how ' and why ' it remains relevant to pupils, families and communities. Matthew believes that at the heart of valuable learning is curiosity and positivity, which leads to a lifelong love of finding out more about the universe.

He has championed the venerable tradition of the Cabinet of Curiosities as a boon for schools, helping to establish dedicated wonder spaces both in mainstream schools and in specialist settings for pupils with learning difficulties. He also collaborates with museums to help create spaces that are stimulating, nurturing and surprising.

His book The Little Book of Awe and Wonder: A cabinet of curiosities is a portable cornucopia of the weird and the wonderful, celebrating the joys of discovery, exploration and sharing. Between the covers is an entire world of brilliant strangeness: riddles and illusions; jokes and wisdoms; wasp eyes and kidney crystals. Open the book at random and be transported, delighted and enlightened.

Matthew as featured in The Guardian, 2011: A Wonder Room - every school should have one.

Ormond McGill was known as The Dean of American Hypnotists. He was a magician and hypnotist of international renown, and toured many parts of the world with his exciting stage shows: East Indian Miracles, The Seance of Wonders, Real Mental Magic, South Sea Island Magic and The Concert of Hypnotism, to name but a few. Ormond McGill was also a naturalist of prominence, his contributions to entomology and conchology being well known in those fields.

Professor Angus McLeod is pre-eminent in coaching technology and practice. His company Angus McLeod Associates trains coaching-skills for managers, leadership and management development learning journeys' and e-learning solutions as well as supplying 1-2-1 coaching. They also supply ASK MAX', the world's first e-mentoring service, a cost-effective way of getting top coaches into organizations for a whole day at a time, where they coach several people during each day. He is also Principal of the Coaching Foundation, an e-learning platform for practical learning of coaching skills. They cover both life- and executive-coaching as well as business development programmes for coaches as well. A wide range of blended-learning is offered including video-tutorials, webinars, series of small-group tutorials (online) and an e-learners community with monitoring and tutoring by professional coaches. Angus is also Visiting Professor of Coaching at Birmingham City University and a supervisor of PhD applied research in coaching and leadership.

Darren Mead is an experienced science teacher whohas been described as the 'Jimi Hendrix of teaching' and perhaps 'the most intellectually engaged of all British teachers'. Based in the north-east of England, he shares his classroom-based interpretations of research through his highly respected blog, Sharing Pedagogical Purposes.

Donald Meichenbaum, Ph.D. is a founder of Cognitive Behavioral Modification and has been voted one of the 10 most influential psychotherapists of the Century. Dr. Meichenbaum is Distinguished Professor Emeritus at the University of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, and maintains a private practice as a clinical psychologist. As an expert in the treatment of PTSD, Dr. Meichenbaum has presented throughout North and Central America, Israel, Japan, and the former Soviet Union. As a clinician and researcher, he has treated all age groups for traumas suffered from violence, abuse, accidents, and illness.

Dr. Meichenbaum is the author and co-author of numerous books including: A Clinical Handbook/Practical Therapist Manual for Assessing and Treating Adults with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, Stress Inoculation Training, Pain and Behavioral Medicine, Facilitating Treatment Adherence and Roadmap to Resilience. His book, Cognitive Behavior Modification: An Integrative Approach, is considered a classic in its field. He also serves as the editor of the Plenum Press Series on Stress and Coping.

Linda Metcalf, PhD is a former teacher, school counselor and coordinator for safe and drug free schools in Mansfield ISD, Texas, USA. She consults with schools throughout the USA, Canada, Australia and the UK. Linda Metcalf PhD is Director and Professor of the Graduate Counseling Program at Texas Wesleyan University in Fort Worth, TX. She can be reached at lmetcalf@txwes.edu for training invitations.

L. Michael Hall is a Cognitive Psychologist who through research into NLP and Self-Actualization Psychology is now a modeler of human excellence; he has completed 15 modeling projects from Resilience, Women in Leadership, Self-Actualization, Coaching, Self-Actualizing Leaders, Managers, and Companies, Selling, Defusing, Wealth Creation, etc. He has authored 50 NLP books and a series on Meta-Coaching. Michael co-founded the ISNS (International Society of Neuro-Semantics) and the MCF (Meta-Coaching Foundation) and is an internationally renowned trainer. For his free weekly newsletter, Neurons, go to www.neurosemantics.com to sign up.

Click here to visit L Michael Hall's site on Self-Actualization.

Gustav Milne studied archaeology at the University of Oxford and at Birkbeck College, University of London. He worked as a professional archaeologist with the Museum of London for 20 years before lecturing at the Institute of Archaeology, University College London (UCL). He now leads the national community based CITiZAN coastal archaeology project, hosted by the Museum of London Archaeology and featured in the Channel 4 series Britain at Low Tide.

Click here to read Gustav Milne's article, Stone Age Cities: What modern urbanites could learn from paleolithic humans', in The Guardian.

Click here to read Gustav Milne's article, How modern cities are killing our ancient bodies ' and what planners can do about it', in The Planner.

Click here to read Robert Scheer's New Age Journal including an article on Uncivilised Genes.

Katy Milne is Programme Manager at CCE (Creativity, Culture and Education). Katy has cultivated educational practice through an enquiry-based approach to creative learning and personal development, which has had a positive impact on learning outcomes across schools and networks internationally. Previously Cultural Programme Officer for South Tyneside Council and Director of Arts and Creativity at Greenfield Arts for 16 years, Katy has a Masters in Education and a PGC in Innovative Curriculum and Pedagogy which informs approaches to developing creative learning.

Fran Morgan founded Square Peg in 2019, following her own daughter’s struggles in the education system, having seen clear evidence that there were (and still are) a growing number of square pegs. After 14 years working in this field to support other parents and effect change, she has now retired to pick up the reins of her copywriting business.

Jacquelyne Morison is the Founder and Course Director of Jacquelyne Morison Hypnotherapy Training and is a therapeutic practitioner specialising in analytical hypnotherapy and psychotherapy as an adjunct to stress management and clinical hypnotherapy. Jacquelyne is Course Director of Jacquelyne Morison Hypnotherapy Training and is the author of Analytical Hypnotherapy Volumes 1 and 2 published by Crown House Publishing Ltd and The Truly Dynamic Therapist published by AuthorHouse Ltd.

Steve Munby has spent his whole career in education, first as a teacher and then as an adviser and inspector before moving into leadership. Between 2005 and 2017 he was chief executive first of the National College for School Leadership in England and then of Education Development Trust, an international education charity. He is now a self-employed consultant and speaker on leadership and on system reform.

Bruce Eimer, PhD, ABPP, is a licensed clinical psychologist in private practice in the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania area with over twenty-six years of experience using hypnosis as a tool in treating people with a variety of emotional and medical conditions. He is a Fellow of the American Society of Clinical Hypnosis and Board Certified in Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy with the American Board of Professional Psychology. Dr. Eimer is the author or co-author of a number of professional textbooks on hypnotherapy and psychotherapy and self-help books on the applications of self-hypnosis for managing chronic pain, anxiety and depression.

Claudio Naranjo, MD served his psychiatric residency under Matte-Blanco at the University of Chile Clinic and underwent training analysis at the Chilean Psychoanalytic Institute. He conducted extensive psychopharmacological and personality research and worked with Fritz Perls and Dr James Simkin in the early days of Gestalt therapy. Dr Naranjo authored many highly-esteemed therapy titles and was a keynote speaker for the American and European Associations for Humanistic Psychology, and at several national and international Gestalt conferences.