Key Blog Post 1

What are the Key points? What surprising aspects have you discovered?

A key point for me has to be the way I present myself in a classroom, my body language. The reason that this is one of my key points is because of the English class experience I had. The first of the lesson was with the pupil’s usual teacher and a teacher in training was teaching the second half of it. The fully qualified, experienced teacher had a good posture, body language and certainly seemed to be more in control of the class from start to finish. This is something that massively contributes to whether that class of students respect you as a teacher, workshop deliverer or lecturer, in experience if I have a lecturer who is hunched down, fiddling with pieces of paper, quiet, unclear, monotone and stood still it gets extremely tedious and makes it very difficult to find the most interesting lecture interesting or enjoyable. If however, someone is stood there with a good posture, good authority, speaking clearly, loud (but not shouting) and moving around makes you more eager to listen to what they are saying and speaking about. This is definitely something I have learnt and taken away from my time at DACA. As well as using this skill to teach our workshop it can be applied for any presentations I may have to do or any public speaking, this is a life long skill which being at DACA has given me and I hope I succeed when I put it into action.  

Something that surprised me was how small the group of A-Level students that did textiles, as it’s the industry I’m training in and I know its potential if it was pushed further at DACA, it’s a great let down and disappointment that not many of the students are discovering the endless possibilities and interesting aspects of it. I do feel that this is because the school is more focused on art and painting. At one point textiles was seen as a design and technology subject making it difficult for a school like DACA to make that link and explore further into textiles as an art subject not a tech. Whether its just DACA or not it seems to be something that should be addressed as many students are missing out on something with such a massive potential in schools.

 

What has strongly influenced your ideas and their development?

The main thing that strongly influenced my ideas for this workshop was the lack of textiles in the school so I wanted to focus on using textiles in it. My first quick spider chart is below and this clearly shows that I wanted to include destroying a piece of fabric with colour and design to make a pillow, scarf, t-shirt, hat or bag. We could introduce them to so many new skills and materials like bondaweb, it’s so easy to use and opens doors to completely new opportunities with their work. If we were to use these, their development in just one day would be massive and would mean we would have the chance influence them to maybe give textiles a second thought and not just think of art as an art and design option but to make them aware that textiles is as well and it is as fun and inspiring as art.

Identify the area(s) or process(es) you tend to explore – and why. How do they relate to your own practice, and the professional context of your work?

I intend on using the use of pattern as I specialise in print, not necessarily a repeat pattern but just patterns using different tools to pant with. When the colour fight is over, patterns will emerge and this is what I will be looking at and the way I will interpret the line making and patterns on the paper. The use of paint is apparent in DACA but we as a group would like to apply it in many different ways something I learnt at my foundation course, we will be using mops, water guns, twigs, anything we or they can find to apply paint on to the massive piece of paper. In my work as you can see below a lot of my work surfaces from the process of visual research, then mark making, drawing from my own photographs and exploring different techniques one of the being tie dying. So if I introduce to them the way I go about mark making this may influence them to make some amazing images.

 

 

Reflect and discuss a key discovery/interest. Discuss within a professional aspect.

One thing that really stuck out to me was the difference in a class’s usual teacher and the teacher in training. They did not seem to have much respect for her and most of the pupils were quite disruptive, even though we are MMU students and they may be more interested in our workshop we still have to gain order and control of the class and having this experience it is definitely harder than what I originally thought. After this, I will take into consideration that we are not their usual teacher and they might try to test how far they can go with us. This is meant to be a fun filled day for them to enjoy as a one off, if they misbehave then we will not be able to give them the experience we hope we can.

 

Saying this, I will be opting for the right body language to conduct the class from the word go and I shall pass on my experience to my piers so they can opt for this strategy as well. I will have a good posture, controlled and firm stance throughout. The ‘wonder women’ approach springs to mind but on a level that agrees with the class and school. We may have a really well behaved class who give us no problems but as a team we have to prepare for any type of child from quiet and shy to disruptive and loud in order for our day and our workshop to be successful.

 

Disabled Teaching Talk and Tutorial

Before this talk I had always thought that working with people with learning difficulties would be extremely difficult and have no experience in this, after the talk I still think it sounds difficult but a bit more realistic for me. Its clear and pretty obvious that children with learning difficulties learn a lot slower than children without, therefore if I was ever to have any one with learning difficulties in any workshop I did I would be sure to take it slow and help that person.

Day Six - Textiles, Photography and Group Work

Today we were in the textiles class again with the year sevens. Their tasks for the day were to tie-dye some material for a drawstring bag and make the drawstring for the bag they had already designed in a lesson previously. The teacher started off with some information on tie dying and different techniques to make different effects, each pupil was then asked to decide which process they wanted to do. As there was minimal resources and not much space they had to go up 4 at a time even though it did still get a bit chaotic, before they were allowed to do the dying they had to cut out felt piece that were to go on the bags using the appliqué technique.

All the students seemed to really enjoy this lesson as it was fun and exciting and they were learning some new techniques! One child rushed into it and dipped his hands straight into a bowl of red dye, dying both hands red. My friend was worried in case she would get told off for not stopping it but she didn’t phew! The image below is one of the tie-dye's from a student.

My next lesson was in a class of GCSE photography students, it was explained that we would be paired with a student so we could help them with their coursework even though I have no experience in this I was looking forward to it hoping I would get a student who was willing to work with me. Well I certainly got a student but she wasn’t very keen on working with me, I did ask her loads of questions and ask if she needed any help and I got all one word answers and that she needed no help.

That was a bit disappointing but I did like seeing her work, it was very interesting! I saw an A-Level student with some huge prints of some very interesting garments he had designed so I went over to talk to him about them he was a lot more interested in talking to me and seemed to enjoy our chat about university, his work, what he wants to do. It turns out he had been to MMU the day before and done his prints there which was a proud moment knowing my University had helped a student from outside and the prints looked amazing as well!

The last thing we did was have a chat on our days at DACA which was really nice sharing each others pro’s and con’s. We split up into the two groups of nine we decided to be in for our workshops and brain stormed some ideas. The initial idea that we have come up with is to base the workshop on the Holi Festival in India but that could change!

 

Day Five At DACA - Textiles

 

For this lesson, I was in with year seven textiles along with a few other MMU students. They were carrying on with a previous project, which was interrupted by the making of the cameras for the eclipse. At the start of the lesson they were told to carry on with their sock monsters they had been making and they seemed to know where to find everything and what to do. I was with a boy who had made his sock monster with a yellow and black sock; he had already stuffed and sewn the head and body of the monster which was one piece so I had to help him with the arms, legs and the features on the face.

We cut out the shapes for the legs and arms and stuffed them with polystyrene stuffing, sewed them together and sewed them on. We then made a nose, eyes and a mouth for the face making a new colour scheme for these, he decided on yellow, green, blue and brown , we then designed it and put a large shape on the outside with a different colour, same shape but smaller on the inside like the image below.

 

Whilst we were all helping our designated pupil, we were asked by the teacher to make the class quiet by using the 5-1 system and just announcing something like the felt is on the table with the sewing machines. She asked us to do this because she was asked to do it by the teacher of the class she was observing and it really built her confidence. I had to explain a diagram that was drawn on the board, which showed which lines they had to follow to sew their arms and legs together. She was right, this really built my confidence, which then helped me to collect the needles, I did this by making the class quiet and saying I needed 24 needles back and I only had 10. They all listened and soon found them all, this has really grown my confidence and has helped me use a method I had observed during the week before and liked!

Day Five At DACA - Fine Art

 This morning we have been in year ten fine art and we were asked to help with exam final pieces and sketch bookwork, as they did not have much time left.

I helped with the clay again but with the broken ketchup bottle, the together bottle and his sketchbook as well. All that needed doing with the clay models was finishing off painting them so I just did that and did a couple of paintings in the sketchbook, there want much to go off for this lesson as they all knew what they were doing and didn’t need teaching. All I could gather from this lesson was that Mr.Eplett was very approachable and friendly with the class, but he also maintained respect because they seemed to know that they needed to do their work and not mess around and talk. The fact they had a deadline probably contributed to this massively, although one girl did have to be told to carry on with her work a couple of times. But like last week this class was quiet, engaged and focused. I loved painting these bottles because for me it was just painting and enjoying it without having to have a reason behind it!

 These are some images of the finished broken ketchup bottle.

 

Week Two - Day Four At DACA - Fine Art

Today we were in Miss Klinck's class with some Year Seven's, they were starting a new project on 'zoomorphia'. She explained it all to the children and explained what they would have to do in the eight week period, they all were quiet and focused at this point. 

I feel Miss Klinck conducts and controls the class very well and it is clear every class she teaches has respect for her, as she is strict with lower classes but less strict with sixth formers. 

Even though this is a good thing in my opinion during the year seven class she went round giving them grades on a piece of their work and I don't agree with that. The reason I don't is because I feel that when she was doing this going round the whole class it was disrupting their good work ethic and some of the pupils were turning around asking each other what they got. Some of them looked disappointed and other children were still asking them what they got, if I felt let down and embarrassed by my grade I wouldn't want people to hear Miss tell me and I wouldn't want to tell anyone but this put them into a position where pupils were very aware of what each other got.  

Having said that when they were set a task with a time limit of ten minutes she went around the class and was very positive towards what they were all doing and was being very encouraging. Having them do a task for a certain amount of time, in silence and independently made them very focused in the lesson and they got the work done unlike some other classes I had been in and they had failed to do so. 

How is the Government Involved in Education in Schools?

'Not surprising few head teachers are backing any political party. Education is hugely important but all too often is used as a political tool.

I remember toying with the idea of going into teaching but upon my viewpoint nearly 20 years ago was that teaching had become more of a managerial post following a set national rule thus stifling individuality.

Upon speaking with teachers as I do regularly the red tape has got progressively worse in those 20 years.'

http://www.theguardian.com/education/2015/apr/24/headteachers-parties-education-policies-school-labour-tories-lib-dems#comments

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'I'm coming to the end of my second year as a (part time) teacher. I love my job, and really enjoy interacting with my students and passing on the knowledge that I've gained over my working life. What I don't like is the constant politically-inspired interference that gets in the way of getting the job done. This year, for example, we were told that we had to embed English and Maths into everything we teach, to keep OFSTED happy. For myself the Maths wasn't a problem, as there's plenty of opportunities to use that subject naturally in what I teach, but it's been a massive struggle to shoehorn English in there.

I've been told recently that, next academic year, we'll be expected to 'promote British values' in our lessons . . .'

http://www.theguardian.com/education/2015/apr/24/headteachers-parties-education-policies-school-labour-tories-lib-dems#comments

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These two quotes are of some people commenting on the governments influence on education. It is clear that some people are not very happy with what has been going on in recent years and that it is and will be an on going battle for many years. Whether what they are doing is right or wrong it is of deep influence of peoples decision to which political party they will support, more schools in England are to be taken out of local council control and given new leadership as academies, under powers to be outlined in the Queen's Speech.

The Education Secretary, Nicky Morgan, says schools classed as "coasting" will face quicker direct intervention by the government.
Speaking on the Andrew Marr Show, Ms Morgan said where schools do not have a plan to help students progress, the government would intervene.

bbcpolitics.com

Tutorial and Manchester Art Gallery Visit

Today was our first tutorial with Anna and we discussed our first three days at DACA. Each of us told her about our positives and negatives in the school, we discussed how we feel that art in that school is like a check list to make sure the pupils pass and not letting them to be completely creative and free with their work, but not to let that put us off as it isn't like that in all schools. 

Another thing we discussed was that we need to look at external sources as well and see how involved the government is involved with art in schools. One teacher told us that it's really hard to get an art job in schools as if one retires then sometimes they are just replaced with a maths or science teacher. So I will be looking into that and blogging about it.

After our tutorial we went to Manchester Art Gallery and had a workshop with a lady who worked there. She started by telling us the different roles in the gallery for workshops, they have a large educating team with different rolls for instance a family manager, community manager, volunteers manager, health and well being manager. All these people are trying to help others that don't find it natural to be creative and find it is better to take small steps slowly to work towards a more creative mind and building creative skills. 

She went on to explain more about how creative isn't big in schools and how tories would prefer everyone to take maths or science or something more academic. Bringing children to an art gallery to do workshops is fun and more exciting than sitting in a classroom everyday all day so the M.A.G. is trying to encourage schools to bring classes in more often and they are also training teachers so they can be more creative and do their own classes at school. 

https://twitter.com/AQA/status/578565376449122304

https://twitter.com/AQA/status/578582226939568128

Above are some links to the AQA twitter page who coincidentally had a conference today about creative study in schools, discussing the future of the involvement of creative arts in schools all over England.

After we had that discussion it was time for us to do a workshop but we had to remember even though we were doing this we had to also examine how she was teaching, what approach she took, did it flow well, was everyone engaged?

Our first task was to simply choose between two options and move over to the left side or the right side of the room depending on what we liked but we were not allowed in the middle. Some of the options were flat or hills, country or city and the last one grey or green. We then discussed why the green side chose that and the grey side chose grey and what different colours and things in general mean to different people. I chose green and I chose it because even though I like grey I associate green with traffic lights, go, moving forward and energy so in my eyes green is a much more positive colour than grey and that is my mind set.

We were then asked to look at this painting below and follow a continuous line with our eyes for one minute. We then had to squint our eyes and dignify the light shades from the dark shades in the painting, after we did this she then asked us where they were and what we saw. After doing this she pointed out how she gave everyone the opportunity to get involved and express their opinions in booth tasks, we were calm, the tasks were simple, we were also up doing something and had good energy when doing this.

It is important to help people gather their own information in their own minds so sitting in silence and examining a painting yourself prevents people latching onto louder peoples opinion and lacking in their own. It was also pointed out that she asked us what we saw and not many people volunteered their opinion but she added that it is important not to push people and demand more answers.

After being a bit more active we then settled down into groups of three and write down in one minute what we smell/taste, see, hear in the painting within a minute and then each sense was moved along to the next group. 

This is our spider gram after it was given to every group. 

We were then asked to make a sentence with our favourite phrase or word on ours and our sentence was 'On a damp, wintery January day, when the after storm fresh feeling was upon us,I went for a walk in the country and regrettably stood in cow poo'. That was the sentence we wrote and the red text are the phrases and words we liked the most. The involvement of every group on each piece of paper made sure everyone was part of everyones sentence. Different colour pens were used for each group to ensure everyone knew who had put what, the rules and boundaries were strict but clear, everyone was engaged and enjoyed group work. Group work is a very positive thing as explained it helps people with confidence. This kind of approach to teaching ensures that everyone who is even shy has a role and takes part maybe writing out the points which gives them confidence in their group. 

We then went into another gallery space, were put into the same groups, and were named north, south, east and west. We were asked to look at a given painting and see what atmosphere that painting had and what was beyond the frame of it in our opinions. I don't have an image of our painting but we decided our painting look dull, depressing, cold, a heavy atmosphere, lots of pollution. We though it was a small town that could have been lovely in its day as it was a very industrial place but as everything has closed down there are no jobs, some derelict properties and full of drunks as they have nothing else to do, very run down. One person from each group had to go to the other groups and tell them the key words of our village for them to draw. 

It was really interesting to see how other people perceived words in a different way as everyones was different. I really enjoyed this workshop and really value the teachers method of teaching, I learnt a lot in an hour and a half because she knew what she was talking about and gave us so much info into how to deliver a workshop and how to keep people of all ages engaged. Her workshop was fun,relaxed, we were all involved, a very strong idea though out and it had a good pace going slow and fast at different points.