chaud

I decided to read, “Critiquing the Crit” & Crooks as these felt the most relevant to my role as a Visiting Tutor. It was helpful that on the online session with Lindsay we talked about the various ways students get feedback from Individual & Group tutorials to online and peer comments. It was therefore disappointing to read “The national student “ (NSS) survey has shown a higher than average level of dissatisfaction amongst art and design students with feedback on their work.” I wonder if its because student’s now pay fees, that they have higher expectations of their course that they will express dissatisfaction via online, social media & surveys?

As Crooks says about assessment – “It affects students in many different ways. For instance, it guides their judgment of what is important to learn, affects their motivation and self-perceptions of competence”. It also talked about short, medium and long-term effects of assessment. In my role as a VT, I often come in early into a project with the objective to help students improve their work through feedback and advise. I was pleased to read that students value external tutors coming in to give feedback. Sadler on p119 says students need to be able to possess appreciation of what high quality work is and be able to evaluate this and develop ways to modify their own work. I agree as often students may have settled for the 2^nd best outcome and with positive feedback and encouragement can be pushed to achieve more accomplished work. However Crooks offers this advise “ Praise should be used sparingly and where it should be task- specific, where criticism (other than simply identifying deficiencies) is usually counterproductive.

Reading through the paper about the Crits strengthens and Weaknesses, its clear that smaller groups were preferred by students over larger groups. As a VT I also feel smaller groups offer the best way to give feedback – it can be quite daunting to give feedback to a large group of students and there is a time pressure to give students equal time. Its interesting that in larger groups, students were often scared to be vocal and that its seen by them as “a rites of passage” or “tribal ritual.” It’s really clear as a VT that the success of a group crit is shaped by the dynamics of the student’s personality ranging from the articulate and confident to the shy and introverted. I have also found that international students whose English is weak will often stay quiet within a large group rather than struggle with the language. As Danvers (2003) P45 states “Creativity, a critical aspect in all learning but especially in design, thrives in an environment where the individual feels psychologically and physically comfortable, in an atmosphere of trust, security and openness.”

I believe for someone wanting a successful career in art and design. A key skill is being positive and articulate with clients (after all if your not positive about your work why should they be?) It is also important for students to be able to listen to feedback and offer solutions. I agree with the report that crit’s and feedback help students to become confident and used to critical evaluation which helps them long term getting prepared for the “real world”. A big issue at some colleges is the sheer number of students who often don’t have a desk at the college and do a lot of work from home. Therefore crits offer a real communal experience and allow students to see their peers work and benchmark themselves against other students and get critical analysis from students and staff, which all help offer a shared experience.

Being a VT I often only do a few days ‘teaching” on a project so it was pleasing to read that interim crit’s are seen as valuable by students as it gives them room to try out ideas/concepts and to get feedback within a “safe” non-profession and non summative assessed environment from both staff and other students” This feels the most valuable time to offer advise so students they have time to improve their work before final assessment. I really enjoy crits when I share with another member(s) of staff feedback. I think its invaluable for students to hear different views and perspectives and sometimes contradictory feedback as the report says this is important for students to realise there is just “not one true way”. Its always fascinating to see how students interrupt a brief and its good for students to understand that they are many different learning outcomes.

The staff and student guides are full of good advise. The section I found most useful was about how to maintain student engagement and here are a few of the most useful suggestions.

• Its useful to make sure that work is responded to thematically. By drawing out comparisons and contrasts between students it helps promote sustained student engagement.
• Manage timings of crits so students at the end aren’t rushed or left out.
• Keep attendance record & work assessed
• Vary crit routine ask students to present work which is not their own, the experience of ‘pitching someone else work can open up a new experience of evaluative feedback.
• Ask a student to chair the crit
• Link crit attendence to learning requirements to ensure good attendance.
• Make sure the centrality of the crit is signaled at induction. Explain the purpose of the crit to new students especially those who may not have experienced anything similar due to cultural differences.

To conclude I found this weeks really helpful and will try and take on board what I’ve learnt in regard to giving feedback in the future.

 

“Formal assessment is now so integral to mass education that any attempt to release education from the constrictions of assessment procedures would likely result in the collapse of the system itself” Jon Danver, University of Plymouth.

I have to admit that I’d not really appreciated how assessment is so crucial to the learning process before this course. As a visiting tutor this quote by Davis summed up how i’ve approached my teaching up to now.

“Only the course designers have a real understanding of how things fit together. New or part-time teachers, for instance, have to take the module outlines at face value and make sense of them in terms of their own professional experience.” 

It’s a complex subject so I decided to explore by starting with John Danver’s paper, he neatly puts it ‘assessment’ comes from the Latin root, assidere, meaning ‘to sit beside’ – in our case, ‘to sit beside the learner’ – observing, reflecting upon and commenting upon, what is done, how it is done and what is produced in the process of learning.” 

It might seem an obvious but  “to sit beside the learner” is core of what we do as tutors.  Danver helps by putting it into historical context, by saying that the need for assessment was due to competition in places and that employers needed to impose strict selection. As he says educators with their marking systems act as gatekeepers for entry into employment by the marks they give.

It struck me how complicated it is to attach a numerical score for assessment in an arts based subject compared to a subject like mathematics, technology, science and engineering etc. I’ve had little experience of setting learning outcomes or how to apply measurements, critical evaluation and interpretation. However it seems that in general the arts are assessed using both numerical scores / grades and these are usually accompanied by verbal reports and feedback. With arts subjects it has always struck me that this leaves the area of interpretation open to question, it’s hard as the report says to measure or quantify a process of learning. I also think it’s hard sometimes to separate personal taste when evaluating the work, with art being so subjective.

Raymond Briggs cynical statement ‘What and how students learn, depends to a major extent on how they think they will be assessed”. I immediately question whether students are strategically driven and what the impact is of quality classroom teaching?

I asked a full time tutor, why do we assess?

*Good testing ensures that objective-setting” assessment is aligned to the curriculum. *Assessment provides students with a “holistic’ gauge to the level of their achievement. *As educators, we learn through assessment: what was learnt/ understood and what was not. *Assessment is thought to be a key driver to learning, it provides students with incentive. * Assessment provides an “internal & external” accountable system of standards.* Self/Peer assessment develops confidence and self-reliance of students.*Grading criteria allows assessors to judge the depth of learning undertaken * Formative assessment allows “staged” learning, undertaken at the student’s own pace. *To identify students who apply learnt knowledge to new situations. She assessed her students using these 5 points 1) Analysis 2) Subject Matter 3) Technical Competence 4) PPD 5) Independent working and collaboration. Each of the 5 areas had detailed criteria for marking.

I read Davis report about learning outcomes and assessment as his report sets out to help new staff. It’s long but well written and he states that less than 43% of assessment of students are effective due to inconstancies in the clarity and use of the assessment criteria and their relationship to the learning outcomes. Davis talks about the lack of clarity in learning outcomes, however I think its often in tutorials, crits and feedback where students formulate their intentions and as tutors we have to try and encourage and help them understand what imagination, creativity and risk taking actually means. Its clear that students need to know what is expected of them in any given course or module, but I wonder if the more specific an outcome, the greater the constraint on the student. I feel with art and design students it’s not necessarily about literal interpretation of a learning outcome, for them it’s about being creative, exploring & discovering.

Davis says…..“If they are overly generic they become less meaningful and it is unclear how the outcomes and assessment criteria relate to each other. If they are overly specific it becomes difficult for judgments about performance to be meaningful.”

I discussed with the tutor about practical and interactive assessments which seem to motivate students and “arouse’ them when they explain or perform what they have learnt and they can assess one another at the same time. An example of this is the fact that she is asking her students to reflect on collaboration for instance, in a largely visual manner, cutting out the need for long-winded essay writing. She has inspired the students to perform and demonstrate what they have learnt which they prefer to more passive forms of assessment such as writing and talking in a tutorial what they know. She admits that performing this critical analysis in front of a client/ audience has extra merits.

To conclude, the easiest way for me to think about assessment is…. 1) letting the student knows what’s expected of them 2) as staff we have to delivery the content of the course 3) support the students work 4) and then judge their learning…..if only it was that simple!

 

 

 

NUS Liberation, Equality and Diversity

I was interested to read that 90% of disabled people /students have a hidden disability. During my college days a disability like dyslexia wasn’t acknowledged, so it was refreshing to see on the PG Cert introduction day that disability leaflets and help was available should it be needed. As a visiting lecturer I’m not involved in planning or structuring a course so it was interesting to read that equality, diversity and liberation should be embedded into a universities curriculum. However these are big words and I’m left wondering if it’s a tick the box exercise or can real change be made? What is Liberation after all? I was none less interested to read about Dr Charles setting up a course with diversity at its core and can see this is a positive way forward.

I’m pleased that diversity and sustainability are key topics on our PG Cert course, by reading and learning about these key topics we can help to bring them into the teaching practise, this is the sort of staff development, which  is recommended on page 14 of the report. Its hard no to disagree with the statement “ A curriculum which addresses issues of liberation, equality, and diversity and includes all students as equal participants is a vital part of improving the quality of learning and teaching in higher education.”

Commonplace Website

I wasn’t aware that UAL had a survival guide and I loved the diversity of subjects covered from the lonely hearts “ Long distance relationships, tips to make it work,” to “Making London cheap as chips” (with a pic of Lidl, as you might say ….priceless advise!) The 20 facts about UAL are an eye-opener….”Grayson Perry receiving a 2^nd year CSM dress each year!”

Amazing really that this site exists with all these top tips and lists of advise, particularly helpful with UAL’s student profile being 50% international. I imagine as well as reputation of the six art colleges, its coming to live in London which is a huge attraction so to have lots of great advise, all on one easy to navigate website much be hugely helpful for UK and International students. It was good that the site has tips on overcoming language barrier for international students. It was also pleasing to see that topics like being a shy student were placed at the top of the site, along with quite personal advise on “Beating Stress, Feeling Apprehensive about university”. In fact the whole site is jammed packed with personal advice and I liked that the stories were personalised with name and  photos. The overall design of the site has to be applauded, it’s welcoming and full of great advise and I would definitely recommend it to students as pretty much everything is covered!

Questions

Question one, I found hard to answer, as I’m not involved in induction, and the other two questions are quite big questions. Question two, What makes students feel included and excluded in my teaching? I would say I try and be open, honest and positive when discussing their work, offering advise and showing examples to encourage, inspire and make them reflect on the brief or lecture given. One of the downsides of part time teaching and giving lectures is the lack of oomph which some students display, passively watching and not interacting, it seems from watching other tutors that there is often little or no reaction given and getting students to be vocal can be tricky!

Question Three, Bringing students own life experiences into the learning of a course? …this often works best when a brief is set which involves a personal choice. For example I recently taught moving image designers on a brief “to make a 2 minute film on any subject” with the learning outcome to show creativity, organisation, planning and production. This led to interesting personal films, from a Bangladesh student talking about prejudice, a friends family member who had dementia and a film about the students father making a wedding ring, all these subjects enabled the students to draw on their own life experiences.

Sustainability is such a really important topic and if tutors think “ this is nothing to do with me and my subject area”. …Then they need to think again as Sustainability relates to just about everything.Unless you’re a climate denier its hard not to want to be concerned for the future. So how can we do are bit for Sustainability education?

The obvious thing is as Tutors we can help by introducing it into the curriculum, lectures, PDP, both within university and with work experience. As a part time teacher who lectures at various colleges it hard to influence or change a college or universities core ethos but it certainly something which I can try and bring into my film and moving graphic projects I teach on. Rather than talk about my teaching , I’ve looked at LCC  and general educational sustainability values.

The LCC is an excellent example of a university, which is striving to improve their sustainability. Two tutors have been behind “conscientious communicators”, which is a cross-disciplinary community at LCC established to develop practice-based research around environmental and social creativity. They have run a highly successful Green week at the university.
http://www.arts.ac.uk/research/researching-at-ual/research-infrastructure/research-groups-networks-and-collaborations/conscientious-communicators/

The Green week held Feb 2015 at LCC, was a packed week of events.

They have worked to increasing links between the LCC and the wider community to promote sustainability and environmental issues, I attended recently an outstanding talk from one of the founders of the Greenpeace who screened extracts from his documentary film, it was a thought provoking and a challenging evening which the packed audience of students hopefully left better informed and a bit more aware of environmental issues.

The two tutors running “conscientious communicators”, have a three year mission to make a difference. This link is their objectives:

http://workflow.arts.ac.uk/artefact/file/download.php?file=176758&view=30034

I decided the most useful thing was to try and learn more about sustainability so I read most of Future Fit Framework: An introductory guide to teaching and learning for sustainability. It was a fascinating and helpful guide and it sets out that: Education for sustainable development (ESD) is a vision of education that seeks to balance human and economic well-being with cultural traditions and respect for the earth’s natural resources. It makes helpful suggestions for tutors to develop the students knowledgeable and values and skills so that ESD can improve the quality of life and the quality of life of generations to come. It’s a positive message that most tutors within HE I’m sure would back. As tutors if we can help ingrain these values into students we can make a difference when they start work and also encourage students to be vocal amongst their peer group and work colleagues.

Page 9 quote” In a nutshell “ sustainability education prepares people to cope with manage and shape social, economic and ecological conditions shaped by change, uncertainty, risk and complexity. It’s clear therefore for ESD to succeed, as tutors we need to support and back ESD and make it part of an arts and designer students life and become embedded within the culture of a university like at the LCC. It seems obvious to me that we need to involve and educate students to create a better & more sustainable world. Universities have a strong and ethnical responsibility to commit to educating the students to take a positive role in ensuring society looks to lower carbon, waste, become resource efficient and possibly more localised economics.

All this of course has to fit within the bigger picture, “in Europe we face the challenges of the fall out of the economic and social consequences of the global financial crisis, climate change, declining water and energy resources, threats to food security and health risks.” The challenge clearly for art and design colleges is as tutors how can we make it relevant? How do we define ESD to our students? There is no easy booklet to refer to, no great library of resources, set lessons or obvious guest lecturers which makes it both challenging & rewarding if we can play our part in trying to make students think about ESD and want to be active.

An important and motivating factor for Student’s is that their employability will be more attractive as employers look for graduates with skills to address sustainability and to tackle developing into a low carbon economy. Its also clear that Universities who are huge business’s within their own right are marketing themselves as green universities as they recognise that this is an attractive proposition to students and for research funding. Students are going to want to attend a university where sustainability is the core of the ethos of the education.Today’s graduates face upwards of 50+ yrs of employment where unless there are major changes they will suffer the consequences of deadly rise of global temperatures, water and energy wars, credit fuelled financial crisis, encroaching peak of oil production and a growing refugee crisis’s. By making ESD at the core of their education we can arm them with the tools to make a difference.

P17 to quote “ The global challenges faced today cannot be solved in isolation and to ensure a sustainable future the sector must share good practice and collaborate within and across institutions work with staff and students, student unions and extended partners.

The report outlines what a sustainability graduate would aim to be and it falls in line with the UN’s decade of ESD which aims to “create citizens and leaders who have skills in critical & creative thinking, conflict management, problem solving, respectful of the Earths resources and biodiversity and committed to a peaceful and democratic society.”

As Tutor how can I make a difference?

Become better informed

Find like minded tutors

Find out what universities policy is, will they support me

Set projects, which build in ESD

Get students more involved, setting projects which well inspire and be thought provoking.

I need to be pro-active i.e. get involved with LCC Green Week, guest lectures, show films to inspire debate about global issues. I can also see the many obstacles in the way i.e. crowded curriculum, trying to force it into subject being taught, my limited knowledge – will the university help make me better informed if there is limited commitment from the university?

However I feel it’s a fundamentally important issues that all tutors need to get behind ESD.

 

 

This week’s topic on “Groups” has been really insightful, as with high student numbers, it’s such a vital aspect of learning and teaching in arts, design and filmaking. It is, of course how we spend our life’s, collaborating and negotiating in groups of friends, family, work colleagues and teaching partnerships. It’s a subject we can all relate to. During my working life the longest group I collaborated with was for 12 years working in a very tight group of designers in the BBC presentation department. We all had designated roles: a leader and subordinates. We were paired into creative teams, split and reformed by project and then worked collectively as a whole group.

In teaching I’ve taught students many times in groups and recently set a project where the students worked in groups on a film production project where the objective was to teach them the different roles required to work together in a professional group:

Together to be creative, organized, disciplined to deliver a film on time and on budget.The group were mainly international students so one of this weeks topics interested me especially: “HE academy.ac.uk on international groups”. I also wanted to understand more about the theory of groups so read “Learning in Groups” by David Jacques, Gilly Salmon.

On P5: “Individual people are the raw material that go to make up groups, not all collections of individuals will have a sense of belonging to a group, though outsiders may perceive them as such, the collective identity.” I have found this to be true when teaching a group project. Some students feel quite alienated within a group, it unsettles them and being “artist – creative” this rang true, “they often struggle to input they’re ideas into a group project and don’t feel motivated within a group dynamic”. In fact I would say it demotivates in some instances.

On Page 6: “Group exists with these qualities – Needs, shared aims, interdependence, social organization, interaction, cohesiveness, membership.” Not sure I agree that group members are interdependent in so far as they are affected by and respond to any event that affects any of the groups members. But I do agree – members influence and respond to each other in the process of communicating.

Freud claimed “ that people are drawn into and remain in, groups because of emotional ties between members, and that one of the principal mechanisms in the effecting of such ties is identification – the process by a person wants to be like his parents.”

I’m not sure I agree with wanting to be like ones parents but I do agree that working in groups, helps emotionally in sharing the responsibility working on creative briefs. The advertising model works, where a Creative Director leads a group of creatives, pairs of copywriter and art director, and creatives are bought together to form a group to “brainstorm – brain dump – blue sky think” ideas.

On Page 7 “Security and protection can derive from the designated leader or any member who is accepted in the role. The group unconsciously assumes that some sort of magic resides in the leader. I.e. way students defer to tutor remarks to exclusion of their colleagues contribution”

I don’t agree that students believe “magic” exists in a tutor / leader but they rightly assume that this person knows what they’re talking about and can impart knowledge and help the students in the task they’ve been set. In the advertising world – the creative director is paid handsomely as they have to produce “magic” and led their group to create “magic” although what is produced is often along way from Magic!

On Page 19 Jaques discussed the role of tutor within the group i.e. Authorative (leader is dominant, Directing, Informing, Confronting Versus Facilitative (less obstructive, releasing tension, eliciting, Supporting & more discreet) I found this interesting and would put myself in both camps.

I touched on the subject of internationalism in a response to a C1 group’s blog for Topic 1. It fascinates me the way the profile of the students has changed in art colleges over the last 30yrs. When I studied at LCP & RCA there were very few international students, which is very different to the Graphics and film courses I’ve taught on for example at LCC. I’ve been struck how much of the intake is made up of international students and how a significant percentage are Korean & Chinese. What I found relevant to this weeks topic is how the international students interact with UK students, tutors and participate in the classrooms. The Asian students seem to thrive and integrate very quickly and certainly the effort we go to integrate them into social groups from Day 1 seems to pay off.

Graphic from a Government paper

However, If left alone I’ve found in general that naturally international students tend to stick within their nationalities as the HE Academy paper says “ Majority of students, left to their own devices, are likely to with students they perceive as culturally similar to themselves…A minority …develop friendships, broaden their perspectives and learn skills suitable for a diverse and globalized world”

On the film project, the students were assigned groups; each group was 3-4 students mixed up with UK Nationals and Internationals, male and female. As tutors we socially engineered this to happen. It was interesting to see how international students performed within the group dynamic. I found that a number of the international students were quieter, as they we either not confident with the English Language, and as people naturally quieter and not used to being so vocal and opinionated. To quote HE paper “ Cross cultural work, conducted in a language where everyone is not equally comfortable, requires resilience, effort and additional time.” I’m also mindful that one needs to be really careful not to make sweeping statements and generalizations of particular nationalities and not fall into stereotypes.

I see huge benefits for the current generation of students studying in HE Arts, Design and Film, to quote the vice chancellor of Liverpool, “ the main benefit of the globalization of HE are not financial but intellectual and cultural. The HE paper also challenges the metaphors of international students which discusses whether international students work in “ global villages” or ‘silos” (containing those from the same country or region of the world & or speaking a similar language.)

I was interested in the suggestions the HE paper makes to help international students mix within the classroom and on courses.

• Teachers re-designing group based coursework – requiring co-operation and collaboration.
• Teachers mixing up students so they understand this is normal.
• Student support specialists, induction activities, staff developers – who collectively can help international students.

Running the group film project it forced students to work together and as it was over a number of months involved them spending time often socially or weekends which bought them together and helped them. Talking to international students they were able to reflect that it was meaningful and authentic project and had enjoyed working in a group. As the HE paper says, “It’s a mix of formal curriculum with informal curriculum which helps break barriers.”

Finally I asked a tutor at UAL a few Q+A’s on teaching International students.

Q How do you find teaching International students?

I find teaching international students may need a little extra work at the start but it does pay off. International students need help in identifying cultural places in London (for instance) that will reassure them and assist with their research processes which can really help in the development of a project. This is often practical advice but showing that extra care and level of help starts to create trust between student and tutor. For instance I have a Brazilian design student. Another Brazilian photography student needed a designer to work with. I introduced the two and it was that act of care and thoughtfulness, which made a difference to both student’s attitudes and trust of me –It was the facilitation of an opportunity, which they appreciated rather than the practical act of twinning.They have been excellent students since.

Q What are the positives and negatives?

The negatives are isolated international students. We tell all our students from Day 1 that being ‘global citizens’ is vital to their progress as professionals. The opportunity to understand different cultures is an enormous advantage. They have a ready-made team of people who understand regional semiotics. They are surrounded by students who may be their life long professional network – this is an enormous opportunity. Good projects should prioritise and highlight this in the brief. International insight is very valuable.

Q What are the challenges as a tutor?

The challenges for a tutor are finding that extra time for international students without affecting the parity of care given to the group as a whole.

Q How will UAL adapt over next 10yrs to the globalization & internationalism of HE education.

There are many ways to adapt but it is important that UK Education is unique and distinctive – adaption to fit the ‘perceived’ needs of international students could be a mistake.

Care with induction, brief writing and explantation and terminoilogy used in assessment are key initiatives, which would be very useful as we adapt.

Shreeve “ Analysing the experience of practioner tutors in Art and Design”

I found my first task to read Shreeve, a hugely insightful and a wonderful introduction to the PG Cert course.

Shreeve explores and describes 5 different approaches to teaching; from being a ‘practitioner’ passing on knowledge to students to a more inclusive teacher in which teaching and learning roles merge between student and teacher. I found the interviews with tutors honest & helpful in understanding the subtle differences and dynamics between being a practioner and tutor. Working as a part time lecturer and tutor myself and not being attached to one university, Shreeve prompted me into self-analysis, encouraging me to consider my own personal journey as a learner, a tutor and a practitioner.

I initially thought that I fitted into category one: an asymmetrical relationship between practice and teaching with the focus on practice. I quote some of the tutors who fitted into category one:

P76 “I would rather they saw me as a professional working in the industry passing on some of his knowledge

P77 “ I just enjoy working with lots of different young people, with students, teaching them how to do it, passing on the knowledge”

Figure 1. Asymmetrical rocks that don’t roll – does asymmetry imply an
inability to understand other perspectives as a teacher I wonder?

I did relate to category one, but felt on reflection that perhaps I fitted more into category three, in which a ‘symmetrical relationship’ exists between practice and teaching (where practice and teaching are seen as two different things and a tension exists between them.) I feel I currently have my foot in two camps as I also related to these tutor quotes:

P80 “ It’s quite interesting, which camp do you put yourself in, are you in the camp of education/teacher or are you in the camp of a more independent artist`’

P92 “ It’s about helping students to understand the processes and thinking what goes into practice”.

Figure 2. These patterns suggest to me different ways of presenting the same material – either to different learners or in different contexts.

I was very interested in the section where Shreeve explored how productive it can be to relate teaching to ones own practice. Recently I taught on the LCC MA Moving Image course and found that the best way to communicate “How to pitch a project”, was to demonstrate examples of my own pitches relating my experiences and explaining the importance of presentation skills in a pitch. I felt I communicated this effectively to the students who could see current projects explained and processes revealed, which they found useful and related to their own forthcoming pitch.

P92” When you talk about your own work you can talk about it much more specifically as you know, what you did and why you
did things”

P93 “ This understanding is bought about through the tutors own experiences as well as using artifacts they have created through practice.”

It was also a good icebreaker and introduction to my peer group to hear their views about what they had read: Brookfield, Ramsden and Dall’Arba, It inspired an interesting group discussion which lead to my peers sharing their teaching experiences, which I found very useful. It also inspired me to read D’Alba’’s ”Improving teaching: Enhancing ways of being a University teacher”

I found D’Alba’s paper on Martin Heideggar’s views relevant:

“Our very ‘being-in- the world” is shaped by the knowledge we pursue, uncover, and embody. (There is) a troubling sense in which it seems that we cannot help practicing what we know, since we are “always already’ implicitly shaped by our guiding metaphysical presuppositions”

I found Shreeve’s phenomenographic analysis of the different ways in which practice/teaching relationships can be experienced, fascinating and there seems no limit to the amount of variations. To quote Shreeve:

P99 “ there are different ways in which practice/teaching relations can be experienced. These are more complex than simply melding or gluing practice and teaching together or making simple transition from practice to teaching.”

To conclude, the quote which gave me the most encouragement and illuminated why I have embarked upon the PGCert course was taken from Dall’ Alba-I hope for similar insight and inspiring outcomes.

P9 “This year has been both an interesting and surprising journey for me…and learning about educational practice, the educational literature and my own teaching practice has been a revelation.”

I hope for a similar inspiring outcome.

Figure 3. These images, which have differing symmetry, remind me that different perspectives are fascinating and that there is no singular way to interpret the world and teaching.

I’m a freelance director of commercials and short form content. I studied BA Graphic Design at the London College of Printing & MA Graphic Design at the Royal College of Art. I joined the BBC Television presentation design department working on the on screen promotion of the BBC,  producing for example the BBC2 Idents, Christmas & major sports events. At the BBC and then at Red Bee Media I moved into directing high profile live action campaigns. Highlights included directing the BBC News Correspondents in numerous foreign locations & the Beijing Olympics film for BOCOG with an all Chinese crew completing all the post in Beijing.

Having held a full time jobs for over 22years, I decided in 2009 to go freelance to divided my time between directing and part time teaching: moving image & film. Throughout my career I’ve lectured, taught & given work experience to students on BA & MA courses including LCC, Kingston, University of South Wales, Falmouth & Ravensbourne. I’ve set projects to both small & large groups of students, teaching and giving feedback on a range of moving image projects. For example on MA Graphic course at LCC setting a project where the students had to make a film using a recording of spoken words / poetry, working with them on their pitches, storyboards and to the final film(s)

What I hope to gain from the Learning and Teaching for Art & Design course is a clearer knowledge of contemporary professional teaching practices. My experience to date has been through instinct rather than through any formal academic training. By the end of this course I hope to have better skills and understanding of teaching methods, which I can put into practice to help teach students and the next generation of Moving image Designers and Film makers. I also want to explore contemporary experiential learning practices to help recreate more authentic real life working experiences for students in and outside the university.