Frequently as with previous sessions being able to digest and capture all of the ideas that I consider meaningful is challenging. My personality doesn’t allow for interjection in group conversations terribly well and I come away feeling I need to “redo” the session in my own time processing the ideas in a more open thinking space. During group conversations I find that members of the class frequently want to circle around the subject or topic in a flâneurist way, I feel I seek to get to the heart of the problem which is perhaps a problem, considering an openness is perhaps required to fully expand knowledge or embrace potential approaches. 

An idea that arose during the morning session was the professionalisation of the education. In my opinion this is a major problem with the course I teach on. A student paying for their design education expects to get results and orientate themselves around goals. This has killed the sprit of discovery and failure which is as important and success.

How do professional norms inform our practice? Should this change (could it?)

What are the professional norms? Is professional norms guided by policy, and if so which one, there are many. If we are discussing basic professional norm attributes such as: duty of care, empathy, setting learning expectations, teaching materials prepared and delivered on time to a satisfactory level. Then these things should not change. If the question is in relationship to a policy then that policy is dictated by a philosophy of the institution and the climate the institution is working in at a specific time.

How do our practices and our disciplinary knowledge interact with policy, or relate to other non-educational policies and practices? 

Communication design is required to engage with contemporary problems. These problems are either created by or shaped by policy. Communication design can be used to prop up, educate or respond against policy. Does communication design have to operate outside of policy to be forward thinking and innovative?    

How does your experiential, and embodied or identity – based knowledge relate to the ways in which we (could, or should!) work? 

My own politics, family background, life experience has shaped learning expectations. Some of these are positive such as learning through making, or curiosity through making. But some others negatively impact the teaching environment. As a tutor, you may have the tendency to promote your own teaching philosophy, social prejudices, and personal values, which I have frequently needed to address and correct.

Three things you learnt from today

The range of different polices UAL imposes 

Cross over between common teaching practices and UK professional standards

That it is the requirement of the individual tutor to interpret these standards in the context of my own teaching 

Two things you’s like to find out more

How could I apply sustainable practices in communication design with meaningful action. I don’t think an individual UAL associate lecturer has any power to significantly change the course of environmental destruction. In my opinion huge radical change needs to occur that would required a shift in power, wealth and roles in which we work and live. However by adopting small change into my teaching practice I could provide influence. This might for example take the form of writing a specific brief that responds to climate crisis. I can’t help but feel that this is a little tokenistic, but I am trying to shift my thinking.

One thing you are still unsure of

How an AL can honestly and in good faith influence policy in a big institution.

As a means to satisfy my own ideas what follows below is a few responses to the tasks we conducted.

What do we need to know in order to teach well? 

Relevant subject knowledge, agility or improvisation if the perception is that the learning activity is not working, a working environment that functions properly, expected learning outcomes, 

What values inform the ways we teach? 

Honesty, empathy, curiosity, engagement of subject matter, ambition, excitement,

Defining key terms 

Policy – a course of principle action

Frame work – the guided principles of policy? 

Strategy – A set of actions to deliver an aim

Code – a set of rule governed by policy 

Principle – a value system shaped by a policy, an identity? 

Guide – how to navigate with the policies, frameworks, strategies, codes and principles

This session was challenging. I found the room was noisy during the activity making it hard to focus on the tasks. This is something that uncontrollable to a certain level and is the nature of group work. I find the social aspects of group activities difficult, specifically putting my ideas forward and ensuring my “voice” is heard. All considerations for applied teaching practice on the foundation.

For the first learning activity, as a group working in a 3 I don’t think we successfully met the objectives set by the tutors. However that does not mean there was no learning accomplished. I think there is a resistance in me to be open considering I have been trained to find solutions to problems or identify answers quickly. The nature of the group I was in and the dynamic of the class seemed to feel like a ship that is out of control in stormy weather.

As such I have returned to the prompts set by the tutors as revision exercise.

Responding to the questions set during taught session from Friday.

The learning artefacts I brought to the session:

Monumental part 2 brief 

Part 2 scheme of work. 

Monumental project briefing session presentation.

For the sake of simplicity I will use the brief only.

What is it for (aims)?

To give context to the project, give an outline to what the students are expected to do, potential research sources to explore, and definitions to vocabulary some students may be unfamiliar with.

How is it used?

The brief is given to students digitally, during the first session we use the brief to point out key information pertinent to the project.

What is assessed? 

Sketchbook development work that should include idea visualisations, model making and testing, site visits, outcome photographed in context decided by student.

How is it assessed? 

The project is assessed with additional projects from part 2 of the course by 5 learning outcomes and a grading matrix from refer to pass excellent.

Considering the preparatory reading I don’t know what the limitations, successes, or opportunities are for this artefact. I found the reading difficult to grasp and I think the foundation course has given briefs like the above a good scaffold to ensure learning outcomes are met. 

Design workshop 2. 

This part of the session was chaos with little direction (this does not mean it was not successful or enjoyable). Eventually we came to a decision of sorts and made a response to the task. This decision was a result of just jumping in to making the poster despite my attempts to give it some structure. The poster we made explored the idea of “A place to play” with figures in a learning environment. although I think outcome didn’t quite meet the intentions of the task, for me it really was a “fuck it, lets see what happens” moment.

Teaching formats and strategies 

This task was helpful initially. However, the groups were mixed up part way through changing the dynamic. I felt I no longer had a voice and could not interject without it causing me stress. 

Assesment criteria 

The task of writing our own grading descriptions was very hard. I had to retreat from the group and write them individually. I found the middle ground of Good and Very good particularly difficult if not impossible to write a descriptor for. I felt that you’re restricted to numerical expectations or weak ambiguous language in these grading areas. 

Reflective writing on the foundation course is one way to measure a students learning. In part one and occasionally part 2 of the course we write questions that guide the students to effectively plot aims of the session, challenges they faced while making the work and possible future ideas and methods of working they might explore in the future. After reading the article “the reflection game: enacting the penitent self” I’m left considering how much I’m performing for this blog and the effectiveness of reflective writing for the foundation students. 

Reflective writing for myself and many of the foundations students is a displeasurable task. I convince myself that writing is essential in formulating ideas coherently and this maybe true for those who are talented at writing. When leaving education I did not continue to write reflection nor do I use it in my current illustration practice. But I do think and I talk to someone I trust. 

After reading the article, I think that reflective writing is a tick box exercise. But I cannot judge if that is accurate for the students. What, if anything do they “get” from the activity? Reflective writing appears to be completed for the sake of a criteria that uses flaccid language to assess learning competence. What can I change with my approach to the necessity of reflective writing? Skim over reflection during tutorials, get the students to explain what they think they learned?

The length of the session was quite tough and after presenting I felt psychically drained. The backgrounds, aims and intentions of the participants of the group was really overwhelming. Trying to absorb the variety of different ideas my peers were talking about in the presentations was hard to fully digest. 

During the session the “walls” of the teaching environment or the online teaching space was very apparent. Technical problems, hearing mics left on and the buzz of computer fans described the space. 

The self organisation of the breakout group, the order of play is fascinating. Is it our personality that dictates who puts themselves forward to present first? 

How can your personal emotional state or feeling effect your teaching? It seems obvious that this is inevitable. What was the role of setting the task of random breakout groups in pairs to introduce ourselves with a question “how I might feel”? Was this to encourage empathy? Did it meet the expected aims?

The person I was paired with in the beginning of the group asked how old I was. This made me reflect that it is some peoples aims to purely be teachers. It also made me consider does teaching design have a financial sustainable future for me? Will I eventually be priced out of London? Does that mean my job, my skills I have developed, the knowledge I have, and my albeit limited experience not have value or use in this city? However, does this ultimately help or support the class room activities I need to design? Is it really practical to use time to ask these questions?

Notes on second part of session:

Additional questions as a result of the online session – How to teach empathy?

Use of language critical in promoting empathy.

Telling stories, what stories do you tell?

Starting teaching sessions with who is in the space, the value and knowledge we all have.

This part of the session resulted in me considering did the question “how to teach empathy?” became to focused on the individual or the self. How would the question be suitable in a class.

Other questions brought up during session:

What is the politics of teaching? National and local?

How do you manage distractions in a learning environment?

How do you measure learning?  

How do you use a lack of knowledge to allow freedom of experimentation?

What is pedagogy – how educators can benefit from it?

Potential future sources for further reading:

Roman Krznaric – book on empathy

Design thinking has a problem.. and a way forward – paper

Museum of empathy – https://www.empathymuseum.com