Tom Benjamin

Dr Tom Benjamin

Ajunct Lecturer

Adelaide Medical School

Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences

Adelaide Medical School. Interest areas include social prescribing, gamification, and medical consumer advocacy. As part of social prescribing a focus on music-making activities for the general public.

I have continued to present data and archival material to relevant parliamentary and media inquiries based on my  investigations into the mental health sector as a NSW Government Research Officer. These can be found on Parliamentary sites, including submissions I prepared on behalf of the Medical Consumers Association.

I was later a senior research officer in Learning Innovation with NSW Education & Communities. In that and earlier roles I had developed multimedia techniques based on emerging digital resources and gamification, including an Australian Innovation Patent and a conference award, which have formed the basis for a Non-profit Association demonstrating these techniques for community groups  https://www.facebook.com/groups/playbyearassociation

I have subsequently presented to Singing for Health and Musicology - publications on a Play-by-Ear method, summarized for the Association in commons e-books 

The Play by Ear Music Curriculum: https://oercommons.org/courseware/lesson/113648/overview

  • Patents
    Year Citation
    2016 Benjamin, T. (2016). 2016101313 1, Australian Innovation Patent #2016101313 1 TITLE: MUSIC LEARNING SYSTEM BASED ON OPEN STRING AND ONE-FINGER CHORDS. Australia.

The Medical Consumers Association was founded by my University of NSW colleagues in 1976. Tom joined MCA in the 1990s, as a result of his commission by the NSW Government to investigate allegations about mental health services. I have served as MCA President in the 21st Century, at full arms-length from his university employments. The advocacy role that had dominated the MCA's activities in the 1990s was eventually taken over by the state and federal government complaints commissions and registration bodies. Tom and the remaining MCA Executive gradually transformed the MCA into a social media group, allowing it to continue uniquely independent of any funding, with the postal and administrative activities now handled by free social media such as Facebook and YouTube. Workshops are run with free Zoom resources and Parliamentary submissions are email exercises. The MCA maintains an extensive archive of correspondence unseen by the public, made available to appropriate media and government investigations. In addition to lobbying and advocacy the MCA organisation structure has been adapted to host a social participation arm demonstrating digital multimedia techniques useful to unfunded and non-profit community groups to spread their message with low-cost videos, documentaries, and online workshops. The Non-profit arm of MCA is now https://www.facebook.com/groups/playbyearassociation

To facilitate community participation in recreational and multimedia activities I have formed a Non-profit Association

The Association has a corresponding YouTube channel: www.youtube.com/@PlaybyEarAssociation-wp4jx

and a listing as a South Australian community organisation

https://sacommunity.org/org/238804-Play_by_Ear_Association

The methods are unique as they can be delivered online with low resource requirements. Free e-books have been published as resources for the Association and as detailed references to accompany live local Adelaide sessions and international Zoom sessions.  

The Magic of Play by Ear: https://hcommons.org/deposits/item/hc:65903/

https://hcommons.org/deposits/objects/hc:65904/datastreams/CONTENT/content

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