Record of Observation or Review of Teaching Practice
Session/artefact to be observed/reviewed: CCW FAD (Foundation Art and Design) Painting
Size of student group: 2 x 1:1 tutorials
Observer: John O’Reilly
Observee: Tommy Ramsay
Part One
What is the context of this session/artefact within the curriculum?
This is a one-to-one tutorial which happens weekly with students. The students have just had a week off to use as a reading week to prepare for writing their Project Plans and Action Plans for the Final Major Project. In the afternoon students will be partaking in a crit, so tutorials will not be focused on discussing studio-based work as per usual.
How long have you been working with this group and in what capacity?
I have been working with students in this group from the beginning of part 2, in November as their tutor.
What are the intended or expected learning outcomes?
The intended outcomes of these tutorials will be to discuss any new work by the students’ briefly, to take stock of the work that they have made up to this point and to discuss their plans for the Final Major Project. I will aim to offer up further references for them to work with and to respond to any concerns or points of discussion that the student brings up.
What are the anticipated outputs (anything students will make/do)?
Students to have a clear understanding of the timeline that they are working with for the FMP. For students to feel that whilst time is short, they do still have time to extend their current enquiries and not to feel pressured into making a final work immediately. Tutorials will be based around planning for the FMP and catching up with how their ideas are taking shape.
Are there potential difficulties or specific areas of concern?
Other students hammering in nails to put work up for the crit in the afternoon. Students feel pressured by the FMP timeline – they had received an incorrect email from another staff member saying they had ten weeks for FMP, instead of the five they have…
How will students be informed of the observation/review?
Students were told of the observation’s potential in the last week before the break in person and over email during the break.
What would you particularly like feedback on?
Any areas of improvement for engaging students, how I am holding space for students e.g. am I am being too vocal/how the balance is when discussing ideas.
Part Two
Observer observations, suggestions and questions:
A Pedagogy of the fluid
The studio workspace is really busy, fluid, full of sensory information: students painting and making, hammering nails in the wall to hang work, even the in-between spaces such as the corridors are busy with students at work too which is where Tommy meets his student for his first tutorial.
Tommy is responsive to the affective dimension of the reading-week break, the upcoming crit, the portfolio gathering for applications to art schools. There are different psychological time horizons that students often bring to the table, and Tommy is creative in responding to the student needs that emerge with each.
Tommy sits and chats with the student about the break, the student discloses she feels rushed about her work, and then there’s the Goldsmiths course she’s applied to. There is a lot of information being shared, factual and emotional. She shares work she had has made, it’s in images on her phone. Tommy reassures her about it, highlighting the atmospheric quality of the work, a judgement which hits the mark as she says, “funny, it is called About Atmosphere”. She talks about the action plan.
Tommy is skilful at sensing when different kinds of responses are being invited, from pastoral re-assurance, to clarifying deadline issues, to the inspiration of art historical references and he makes suggestions for artists who will generate creative input, such as Edward Hopper, “for the cinematic feel”, and some artists in a show opening at the Lisson Gallery. In a non-prescriptive way, Tommy is also practicing a loose form of creative direction. The show is only just opening, and that ‘on-trend’ quality excites the student and she follows up by telling him she is considering doing studies of places around CSM (Central St Martins) and King’s Cross. She is a very eloquent student and Tommy gives lots of space for her to try out her thinking in conversation.
The student says she is well prepared for the location drawing, has made notes to remind herself to document how she feels, writing keywords. Tommy follows up with specific examples of artists and writers to make and think with: De Chirico’s piazzas, “they have an uncanny quality”; Richard Diebenkorn’s Ocean Park series from California that are about light. Tommy sketches and describes the colour. Highlighting how her work is concerned with everyday spaces he directs her towards Michel De Certeau’s Practice of Everyday Life, and George Perec’s Species of Spaces. Great examples and Tommy also demystifies the mythologies of academic reading practices suggesting they might be read on the bus.
He brings the tutorial to a conclusion reminding the student of her strengths and the timeline – “You have lots of strings to your bow, and remember you do work quickly.”
The other student brings a different kind of makings, presence, and practices to the tutorial, and Tommy’s pedagogic practice shifts and flexes. The student is quieter, gives over the space more which can be difficult to know what to do with, and doesn’t think she has enough work to present for the crit. Tommy observes, “I don’t think that’s true, you have plenty of ideas and examples.” He notes the variety of her work, the painting, etching, ceramics and how to build a portfolio. Tommy’s intervention is a reminder that for students lacking confidence pedagogy is sometimes the skill of identifying and making visible the knowledges the student has produced. A potentially uncertain space becomes mutually constructed.
Admiring of the surreal rabbit sculpture the student has created, pointing out the markings, the detail, Tommy checks that she has taken photos which document the making process. He registers her creative process, “Just like your painting, you got into the making of this.” There is something really valuable for a student having guidance from someone who understands and recognises how you work. “Are you continuing with your painting?” She says yes. “Once the process is over you will be surprised…letting things just happen is part of the process.” There are so many lessons here about trusting a practice, about allowing the work to emerge, especially with a student who has done the research and arrived at an original take. There are so many different kinds of teaching interventions Tommy has to make in such a short time – it is dense, complex and shared with creative generosity.
#flexibility #activelistening #inspirations
FYI
Orr, S., & Shreeve, A. (2017) ‘Teaching practices for creative practitioners’, Art and design pedagogy in higher education: Knowledge, values and ambiguity in the creative curriculum. Taylor and Francis Group
Orr, S., & Shreeve, A. (2017) ‘Realising the curriculum in art and design: The role of the project’, Art and design pedagogy in higher education: Knowledge, values and ambiguity in the creative curriculum. Taylor and Francis Group
Part Three
Observee to reflect on the observer’s comments and describe how they will act on the feedback exchanged:
John’s feedback is very kind and very aware of all the details that go into these tutorials. It is really nice and helpful to see the unspoken and hidden exchanges that take place in tutorials written down and noticed.
The two students that John observed me with are two quite different characters that do ask for different spaces to be held for them. One is a very confident speaker and eloquent and excited when discussing her work, the other is quieter, less forthcoming, and less confident when discussing her work. One of my main concerns as a teacher is to be receptive to the different needs of each student and to be able to shift my energies as required. It is valuable and affirming for me to have this noticed by John.
Going forward, I feel that I can be more confident and, in some ways, more relaxed for tutorials with students. I want to work on allowing moments of pause in conversation with students to come up and to not feel the need to push the conversation. John’s observation gives me the confidence to continue holding space for students and to trust my own reading of what a student needs from me,