Key Blog Post One

Whilst working within the professional confinements of the Darwen Aldridge Community Academy (DACA) there has been some surprises and unexpected aspects for me. For example I was so shocked to see how the way in which the teacher acts in the first few minutes of class set a tone for the entirety of the Lesson. I saw this in both positive and negative aspects; when a teacher came in and walked to the front of the class room. Then stood straight up and raised her voice level to address the class, she automatically gained respect and the class were well behaved throughout. Whereas I experienced a supply teacher come into the lesson and go straight to her chair, sitting down simply telling the pupils to take a work sheet. Needless to say the class were disrupted from start to finish. Body language is extremely important, this is something that I plan to look more into.     

Another thing that sadly surprised me and I have seen throughout me time at DACA is the lack of creative independence within the years 7-9. Each of the sketchbooks are exactly the same and the only media that seems to be used is acrylic paint and occasionally water colour paint.

Year 7s work

This has been a key factor within my ideas and ha strongly influenced my plans for the DACA workshop. I personally want to work with the younger years to give them some independence within their work and allow them to use a variety of media. I understand that there has to be some sort of control as there are large classes but I feel that we could for example give them each a canvas and let them individually express themselves on it. This made me think about involving emotions within the DACA workshop maybe through colour semiotics but making it relevant to the age group. I thought that we could look for inspiration from artists such as Jackson Pollark and Ian Davenport, as these artist work abstractly which I think would be quite refreshing for the year 7’s because they are used to working within strict guidelines.              

 

Jackson Pollark

Ian Davenport

Another influential factor I found at DACA was the way in which the work is made relevant to the pupils. As a group we were discussing about making our workshop based on the Holi festival, which is a great starting point but I don’t actually think it should solely be based on that. We were planning on having a powder paint colour fight at the end of the day, which I do feel is a great idea. However even I would think “paint fight” without thinking about the Holi festival. So I feel we need to bring in something that will engage and interest the pupils. I plan to discuss this within my group how I feel that we should make the themes behind the paint fight relevant to the pupils and their age group. I am really looking forward to this collaborative group, and combining all of our different art disciplines into one hopefully amazing workshop for the year 7’s.

This week has strongly impacted on my personal future in a professional aspect. I have enjoyed pushing myself into situations that are out of my comfort zone, both in terms of teaching and learning. I have been in classes such as Fine Art and Art A-level and have learnt new processes such as dry brush cover, and the amounts and order in which paint should be added when mixing acrylic paint. These are both techniques that I will be taking through and experimenting with in my own practice. I have also taught some pupils techniques from my Textiles background such as pleating and cording. This process or learning while teaching is something I have really enjoyed and I plan to incorporate this somehow in the workshop.

Dry brushing

As there is a general election coming soon I have looked into the political policies surrounding education within the main political parties as this is something that will impact on me.

Overall this placement has proved to me that this is exactly what I want to do with my future. Due to this I have wrote a relevant CV and wrote to All Hallows high school with a cover letter to try and get some experience in another school.

Cover letter to which I attached my CV

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/general-election-2015/11474579/education-policies.html

CV and Cover letter

I have enjoyed the placement so much. I know it is exactly what i want to do so I have made a CV and cover letter to send out for more experience.

cover letter

CV

CV

CV

DACA: Day Six

So Today is our final day at DACA before we come back in may to do our workshop. I have year 8 textiles in the morning and year 10 photography in the afternoon aslso we are meeting to talk about our workshops at the end of the day.

This morning after talking with Louise Klink she said that we could go to the lessons that we feel will benifit us the most and so for that reason I am going to stay in textiles for the day.

Morning Lessons (year 8 textiles first half)

This morning has been a shambles in terms of MMU pupils to be honest due to the lack of communication. To be frank I feel quite embarrass. There was quite a few of us in this lesson today and we were all assigned to three pupils and we were making tye dye string bags. There were 3 colours yellow red and blue and a child asked could they use black the teacher said we have no black.
She then told me personally that she didn't want them using black because she didn't have a lot so it wouldn't be fair and also because it will cover and not blend with the other colours. Also in DACA the pupil aren't aloud to the toilets during lesson time.

During the lesson one of the MMU student started rummaging through the cupboards and finding black ink and started just painting the bags without tye dye and without asking the teacher. She then started painting white designs and using fabric pen to write on them resulting in her getting fabric pen on the smart board.She then told the pupils to go to the toilet to use the hand dryers on their work because the hair dryers weren't good enough which resulted in ink being dripped around the corridors. This could have been a safety hazard and anyone could have slipped.
The teacher is quite young herself and she pulled me aside and told me what was happening and how she couldn't believe that someone would do that without asking her. She said that she didn't want to say anything to her because she felt patronized and like the MMU student knew more then her.
I was appalled. I politely told the MMU student that the kids weren't aloud out of class during class time.

This has however taught me how vital communication is within a group, and how everyone need to work together .
The second half of the lesson calmed down, most MMU students left to go to year 10 photography. Miss Coffee took the blag material off the students and got them to start again with tye dye. However the elastic bands ran out but th teacher had a back up plan of tightly wrapped cotton. Another downfall was gloves as the there weren't enough and so most kids hand became full of ink. This has showed me that when it comes to our DACA workshop we need to make sure that we have fully planed and have enough resources for every child.

DACA Workshop Chat

At the end of the day we all had a group chat about ideas for the DACA workshop we got into 2 group this was voluntary as it would be unfair to make people work together if they didn't want to. In our finalized group we through ideas about what we could do personally i wanted something textile based as this was something I thought was lacking but I do understand that we have to work together and compromise with ideas. We spoke about in our group the Holi festival and how they throw powder paint to signify positivity. Miss Klink however thought that the workshop itself should be based on the Holi festival and we should just incorporate it somehow. So I plan to create a group chat between our group and so I asked all the people to write there name on a piece of paper everyone did except one girl and I feel terrible but I had only just met her and didn't know her name at all..

DACA: Day Five

Coming towards the end of the placement now and i feel like the is most defiantly the career path I want to take with my life. This morning I have year 10 art again so I think I'll be one on one with Sophie again and this afternoon I have a year 7 textiles class. I'm looking forward to seeing what Miss Coffee actually teaches in textiles as from talking to other students they don't learn many practical techniques.

The first half of the day was the same as last week nothing to report just helped Sophie with her work and sketchbook and the teach was there to get their work out an then left.

Afternoon Lessons

I went into the year 7 textiles class which was a turn over lesson. Louise Klink told me that the art department works where each year the Arts as a whole works on one topic this year being environment. However I feel there needs to be more communication as in the textiles class we made sock monsters, Miss Coffee told me this is something she does every year and so clearly doesn't run with the theme for the whole art department.

Although this afternoon was extremely enjoyable I do feel there is a lack of textiles as the children arn't learning anything new they were picking decorations and gluing them on. Very few could thread a needle ad I found myself doing it for them.

DACA: Day Four

So after our first week at DACA I'm feeling very hopeful for this week. It was really interesting to see how just 3 days at the school has pushed each of us to either loving or hating the prospect of being a teacher.

Today I was in the same lessons as last week and so for the morning especially there is nothing to report apart from my disappointment in how each child's work is made to look the same. To the point where the kids were doing a title for a pages and they each had to do this in eight boxes along the top left of the double page spread and if it only fitted six then they had to rub it out and draw smaller boxes. Each letter had to be bubble writing and had to blend either orange and blue or yellow and green. One child added purple with orange and they had to start again. At the pupils were gathered to pick the best one when in fact more or less in my opinion they were all the same. The year seven art lesson was yet again heavily disciplined.

The second half I was back with Ellouise and it was gratifying when Ella showed me that she had carried on and finished what we started last week. There are two trains we could get leave 5 minutes early or wait an hour and get the next one the whole MMU students left and I stayed because I wanted to make sure Ella go the work done for her exam. I feel like in the future if I was to become a teacher I would have to learn when to switch off.

DACA: About the School (School and Government Policy Impact)

After firstly researching the school independently and with the help of Louise I found out some things about DACA. Dawen for Aldridge Academy was a social experiment. It was about having not just a school but a social building for the deprived area of Darwen. It was about bringing Darwen together. Examples of this are the Entrepreneur pods. Small offices within the school that can be rented out for free to young people to start up their own business. Another example of this is the foyer which can be rented out for weddings and social events.This is a great thing for the academy and the society.

A wedding taking place at the Academy

 However in the school especially within the art sector its a different story in my opinion. Music, Dance, Art and Drama all work on an 8 week rota throughout key stage stage 3. An example of this is the year 7's; Art- Why is landscape painting still relevant in the world we live in? Dance- Contemporary dance based around the theme of natural disasters. Music-Making music of the environment e.g. garbage.

Although this sounds great it isn't working within the school.Pupils are only getting 8 weeks out of the year to learn each subject and so are not gaining substantial knowledge. When the pupils have turn over they have had different teachers so the quality of work is off and the teacher has to bring them up. So if Offstead come in and a good teacher has just had turnover and now has a class with poor quality of work they will be penalized when it wasn't them ho taught the work. Next year the school are scrapping the 8 week system in preference to three 50 minute lessons of different art subjects each week. This way the teachers will keep the same pupils throughout the year.

Another thing I found bizarre in DACA was that fact that a child does art in year 7,8,9 and 10 and even i this child wants to do art at A-level they have to stop for year 11. This is due to early entry a government policy that will be scraped next year. The children are made to do their Art exam in year 9 and 10. You can argue that it isn't fair that some kids around the county are 14 while others are 16 when taking their art GCSE. Also to make them stop Art so that they get their English and Maths I find slightly off putting as anyone who is creative knows that taking a year out and trying to get back into it would be extremely hard. Especially when other kids around the country who are also taking the same courses have had that year to refine their creative work.

I feel that once these government and school policies are scraped the school in terms of Art will run much more fluently. However that does put added pressure on the core subjects as now in DACA they have 2 years to try and get those GCSE's. Next year they will only have one shot at it, and DACA is an academy so to keep funding it needs to get the grades and reach its targets.

Manchester Art Gallery Workshop

Today we went to the Manchester art gallery to have a workshop I found this whole day extremely useful we started the day with an "In, Out" activity this involved the teacher saying two contrasting words and us choosing a side. This was a great activity to start us going and get everyone involved and ready for the day. I feel that this is useful in our own workshops as it would help the kids get up and ready for the day.

We did an activity of choosing a line on a painting and following it through the painting, we then had to make a story for the painting based on a sense ours being feel. Wee made "It was full of lonely hope". This was a mindfulness activity and was there to calm us down after the in out game. This really worked with our group however I found it a little monotonous, and to be honest quit tricky. So I don't think this activity would work great with year 7's. However I do feel that some type of calming down activity would be good even if it is just getting them to sit down and watch a video, or a powerpoint presentation.

The final activity involved us working in small groups. We each had a painting and based on that we had to draw part of an island. The were 4 groups and each group had either North, West, South or East. The one person from each group went around the room explaining their part of the island. It was interesting to see how differently each of our islands came out. Although I don't feel this would be suitable for DACA it was a great team building activity and has brought us closer. 

Throughout the day at the art gallery there has been an overriding ttheme of landscape and enviroment. Now we need to go back to our workshop and make sure that we have a claer theme throughout each activity in the day.

DACA: Day Three

Today was the day of shadowing. we were told that we would be assigned a child from year 7,8 or 9 and we were to shadow them the whole day. I was looking forward to seeing the other teaching styles throughout the schools and subject areas.
As it turned out when we got to the school many of the children were in exams so instead of shadowing a specific child we would shadow a science and maths class.

Morning Classes

I was told and presumed I would be joining a low set year 9 science class however the whole group. However that class was in an exam so I was placed into a top set year 9 physics class and assigned to a very chatty funny young boy as the teacher said he wanted to give me a challenge with the pupil I got put with. I really did enjoy this lesson, it pushed me to get involved and also triggered out memories from when I was in my science classes. The teacher set up a group quiz and we were in groups the winner got a bag of minstrels. This got everyone including myself into a competitive spirit and everyone wanted to win for the insensitive. As we were quickly answering the questions the kids used a calculator and I did the calculations in my head. The teacher came round and said is your background mathematics I told him it was textiles to which his reply was I think you should get back into maths.This left me confused as i could see two sides. Maths was something I always as a child loved doing but let slide during A-level because I didn't put the time in. Also it made me think that the teacher must be one of many people that don't think any type of art is a "proper" or real degree. It left me second guessing what I personally felt about art as a whole.

Teaching Style

The teacher was very respectful of the kids and as he was quite young himself i seem as though the children got on well and we respectful to him.
He used incentives to get the kids to do the work which really did work this something I plan to take forward and think about when planning our DACA workshop.
The teacher was taking over after six weeks and so he wasn't sure about what they knew.
Gave out worksheets so that everyone could do the ones thy felt they needed work on.
Got quite class by asking them simply come on now class enough instead of the 5 step which worked and much more relevant to the year nine 14/15 year olds



Afternoon Lessons

This afternoon I was placed in a year 8 maths class what was really interesting was that in the first half of the afternoon there was a supply teacher and the second half was the actual teacher.

The first half was a wreck so much that we stayed there half the lesson and then went because there was nothing else to comment on. The supply came in and the kids asked have we got you today miss to which her answer was yes she then sat down and told them to come and get a work sheet that was pretty much the lesson in a nutshell. The school in my opinion needs more sub teachers as the one that was in maths was also in art the previous day. They need to put a sub teaching in that actually knows about the subject and can teach it or it is just a waste of the pupils and sub teachers time.

Teaching Style (1st half year 8)

She never introduced herself and so it almost implied that she had no authority she just sat down on the chair. Showed me that there should definitely be a period of time where we introduce ourselves in our DACA workshop.
She attempted to calm the extremely loud class once by saying quietly "shh now class" when with year 8 I have seen that the 5 step is more likely to work.
When a child asked miss how do I do this her reply was"I don't no ask Sir in the afternoon"
She never checked to see if the work was being done which on the whole it wasn't.


Afternoon Lesson (year 8 maths)

The actual teacher came back and there was such a turn around in the class, the noise level dropped significantly. I wasn't shocked by this and was just hoping that the kids would actually learn something in this half of the lesson, and get there questions answered They were learning about how to convert fractions to decimal points.He used the board and got the whole class involved with a maths quiz.and did question and answer which involved the whole class.

Teaching Styles (2nd half year 8)

Group question and answer got everyone involved. When it was the same people answering her chose someone who didn't have their hand up. This involved everything and is something I plan to take forward.
Used white board for visual learners.
Bad point was when a child asked what he said his reply was I'm not repeating my self so the kids
would have to ask each other I personally felt that was a bit harsh.
5 step countdown.

DACA: Day Two

After the first day and Another extremely early morning I was feeling great about the day to yesterday we were given time tables by Louise and this afternoon I was scheduled in with year 7 textiles. After having them yesterday I realized that I really enjoy working with the younger children and was looking forward to it again in my specialism of textiles.

Morning Classes

This morning I was in with a year 10 fine art group and this was quite simply a fake it until you make it type of situation it was clear to me that every pupil in this class knew more about paint then I did yet I had to find a way to help out. The teacher assigned us to a pupil each.
The group of year tens all looked very apprehensive about us being there and whilst they were in a group it was clear they didn't want us especially with one girl Sophie who was saying "why are yous even here". All the MMU students looked at each other thinking please don't let me have Sophie and lucky me I did.
What I found so interesting is that once the group split up and it was just me and Sophie working one on one she changed. She said "so miss how do I do this?" and I thought back to when I was 15 if someone who wasn't much older then me came in and tried to tell me what to do with my work I was of been a pain to deal with. I told her to call me Lucy if she wanted which automatically calmed her down then we spoke about Manchester and Darwen and University as she had never been outside of Darwen. We built up a great rapor and by the end of the morning she had said that I convinced her to think about going to university because before that she thought only "posh and weird people" went and now she knows there's some "normal" people that go.
From when Sophie came into the class she was treated differently like a naughty kid which I myself was guilty of by not wanting to work with her. She was ignored by the teacher and some of the other pupils when she tried to talk, it seemed like she had been labeled a naughty child and everyone was just treating her like that. After working with Sophie I felt extremely guilty, she was a nice polite young girl who just needed someone to give her a chance and treat her equally to those around her.Whilst we were talking she said that she wished all the teachers were nice like me when honestly I was simply being respectful. This is something that I will keep with me that no child is naughty each child just needs to be thought individually and with respect.

The teacher was in and out of this lesson as it was their exam so theres not much I could say about the teachers style.

Afternoon Lessons

This afternoon I was in with year 7 textiles. As the solar eclipse is coming up, throughout the school they have chosen lessons so that each child can create a pin whole camera to watch the eclipse. I think is a great idea that every child makes one and for some its in the middle of exam week so is a well earned break, and is something that they can actually use outside of school. However the teacher had no clue that this was happening so clearly there needs to more communication within the school. We helped quickly set out some materials such as feathers coloured pencils etc.
It was clear that making the pin whole cameras would not take the whole entire afternoon so the teacher thought on her feet and got them to firstly design the cameras.

During the second half of the lesson the teacher got each one of the MMU students to stand up and address the class using firstly the 5 step countdown. I had to address the class and tell them they had 10 minutes to clean away and put all the folders in the box. However after 5 very little had happened so she asked me to tell them again and be stern. I felt extremely apprehensive about this because ide been gettin on well with the kids the whole lesson and now i had to basically shout at them. I used the 5 step method and told them I had been standing and waiting for 5 minutes and nothing had happened now everyone get up out of your chairs and put your folders in the box. One girl threw a folder on the floor and so I asked her to pick it up which her answer was to tell another boy to. I told the boy to put the folder back and for th girl who pushed it to pick it up she was not best pleased but she did it anyway.

Teaching Style (year 7 textiles)

The teacher was great at thinking on her feet, she has activities ready so that the children didn't get bored for example every twenty minutes she would stop and get the whole class back together to work on a short group game.
Music was played throughout the time they were working but when the teacher was talking she would turn the music off this was great at getting the children attention.

DACA: Day One

This week we started our placement at Darwen Aldridge Community Academy  (DACA). I went to Newyork with university and so I missed the previous weeks build up and had to go straight into the placement. This was quite a scary thought as all I could think about was what have I missed? Am I prepared enough for this? On top of the nerves about the placement I was also thinking about the collaborative aspect of Unit x after all, apart from the three of us hat went to Newyork the rest of the group had already met and been together for a week. I felt like I might get there and feel like an outsider.

The first time I met the rest of the group was at the train station as we were all there to go to the school. I was quite glad that this placement was a first for everyone and not just for the people who went to America. It was nice to have the forty minutes or so, on the train getting to know the educating group before we started at DACA. Getting to know the group settled my nerves for the placement and I was completely over-thinking what it would be like to join the group. Although I was apprehensive the overriding emotion I had was excitement for the placement.

Morning Classes

My first class I was placed was a year 7 top set art class the nerves hit me at this point and honestly I felt completely overwhelmed. Louise Klink the teacher introduced the MMU student to the class as miss and then began to teach the lesson. To the year 7 class I was in their eyes a new teachers helper, they wanted alot of attention and help and I wasn't sure what I could and couldn't do to help them. I felt pressured in the moment and found myself at the back of the classroom with my notebook taking notes. I looked at the other MMU students and they were doing the same. There was a student Demi who was on her PGCE year and she was just helping teach the students. It was at this point that I thought to myself, if this is the career I wasn't to pursue in the future then I need to bite the bullet and just push myself to get hands on experience and leave the note taking for dinner and breaks. After getting myself involved with the class I felt a lot more confident and ready to take on the day.

Year Sevens Work

Kurt Jacksons Painting

After the first lesson I had another year 7 art class, this aloud me to fully settle into the classroom and school as from the last lesson I had become familiar and comfortable with the age group. The second class also had the same lesson plan and objectives as the first and so I knew exactly how to join in and help the children. The lesson involved the children taking an artist painting of a landscape and recreating or drawing inspiration from it to create their own.

Louise Klink's Teaching Style (Year 7's)

One thing I thought was great about Louise Klink's teaching style was the way she gained the attention of the class. From when the children first came in it was clear there was a level of respect there. She used the 5 step countdown method in which involved her asking for a quality audience and then counting from 5 for the class to be silent. However there were a few times in which a child would talk or walk in slightly late to which Louis would automatically give them a detention. I personally felt this was quite harsh considering their age and to be quite honest I don't feel a child speaking for one second over the countdown should be punished with a detention. On the whole the method worked really well with this age group and I am looking forward to seeing how the other teachers discipline the classes. Another great thing about Louise's teaching method is that she made the work relevant to the 11 and 12 year old children as she asked them the question why are landscape paintings still relevant today? She brought in aspects of climate change and global warming and how that would or could change the landscape for the children as they grow up. This straight away grabs the children attention and  aloud them to think and put their thoughts into the paintings. They were creating personal paintings with thoughts and opinions behind them and not just because they had to.This was something that I found extremely useful and is something that I plan to incorporate when it comes to planning our own workshops.
However what i did notice that weren't great was that every child's sketchbook was exactly the same they were told how big and what colour to do the titles etc. There was no sign of any individual's artist hand print within their sketchbooks. Louise told me about a year 7 who was in her words amazingly talented she showed me her sketchbook and to be quite frank I couldn't tell it apart from any other sketchbook. I feel this is a big downfall of the art department and needs looking at.



Afternoon Classes

For the Afternoon I worked with Alevel Art and was assigned to a pupil being Ellouise. This was a nice change as the pupils all had different work and their own style of working. Louise Klink had a much more laid back attitude with this class and was hardly in the room at ll through the lesson.She had some problems linking her sketchbook work to her art pieces and so e spent the afternoon going back into her sketchbook making clear links. I also took inspiration from her work and told her what I would personally do within my field of textiles she wanted to have a go and so I taught Ella and Demi the TA some new techniques including cording an pleating both quite simple techniques yet in her years of textiles she hadn't been familiar with these. This was a shock to me and I am quite interested to see the textiles lessons and what they do actually learn.
The feeling I got after teaching someone something they hadn't learnt before was great and when miss Klink told Ella that she would be able to go for a merit now instead of pass because of the help she had been given was amazing. I definitely know that teaching is something that I want to go into now.

Unit X: Newyork

During the New York visits there was points from which I could pick out of all three of my visits. However two companies stood out to me due to their differences. Cherry a surface design company that sells all over the world including; USA, Japan, Australia, France etc. And Ross Textiles that also is about surface design but deals primarily in soft furnishings, heavily concentrating on pillows.

Cherry

Judy Ross Textile

Cherry is a company of two co-owner and in their own words will sell where they can make the most profit. They are all about mass producing their prints because more quantity is more profit. They work within swimwear, women’s wear and children’s wear and stationary. They sell their designs to companies such as Wall Mart and other smaller companies. In contrast Ross textiles creates its surface pattern through pain staking hand embroidery. She sells her work to designers and hotels including doing one off pieces like her staircase for the Ritz Carlton. She has all the hand embroider done in India by men and so the quality control is hard firstly because they are all one off pieces but also because they are made half way across the world and made by hand. This is in contrast to Cherry’s mass produce machine prints.

Judy Ross Staircase

I have learnt a lot about the industry from these visits for example how important copyright I as an artist and designer ad how it is generally 20/30% difference. I have also learnt about the cultural differences and how in the western wold embroidery is seen as a women’s job whereas in India it is mans.

Ross textiles really influenced me as it relates to my own practice of embroidery. After seeing how much importance she puts on hand embroidery I want to relate this back to me own work. This has given me a different approach when looking at my own work and how I might want to concentrate more on hand embroidery because I don’t do much of that. Also it is that there is a lot of demand and work in the industry when it comes to prints so I plan to take a new approach in my own practice and try to work more into printing and using illustrator and Photoshop in my work.

I have always had my mind set on wanting to teach but these visits have opened my eyes to other career options I could take. I always thought of it like I could never do that, but I could if I wanted for example in the rug company another place I visited. One of their designers was from Manchester metropolitan. These visits have showed me to always aim big and have high aspirations. Although I do still feel like I want to teach, I would love some work experience for a year or so in the industry to get a feel for it.