September 2017 – Megan Baines UWS ITE ePDP

It’s time to be creative!-Week 3

This was Week 3 in the Integrated Arts module and it was all about the importance of being creative and giving the children the opportunity to use their creative minds to make something wonderful.

“Every child is an artist. The problem is to remain an artist once he grows up” -Pablo Picasso. I read this quote and felt that it was very important and helped me to further explore the importance of the arts. It highlighted the fact that each and every child has an inner artist in them and it’s our job as educators to harness that skill and quality and continue their artistic learning throughout their school experience for them to keep their creative abilities as they grow older and develop into confident, responsible, succesful and effective individuals.

In the weeks seminar we we’re given the task of being creative ourselves, by putting ourselves in the shoes of the children we will soon be teaching. We were given a variety a materials, varying from different textures, sizes, colours in order to create our very own paintbrush. The whole idea of the this task was to show us, as educators, that it is extremely important to allow children to be creative and create something that is personal and meaningful to them.

As children grow older they begin to realise that everyone is different and unique and that their abilities and skills also vary from one another. In arts, children can often compare their work to their friends or the person sitting next to them, as they think their peers work is ‘better’ than theirs, which can have a huge impact on a child’s confidence and self-esteem (McAuliffe, 2007). Therefore, this is where the idea of children creating their own paintbrush came into practice. We noted the fact that when children are all given the same old standard paintbrush, is almost as if they are expected and think that they should all produce the same painting. It isn’t allowing for any creativity, uniqueness, speciality and for the children to create something that is all their own work. So, by the children greeting their own paintbrush to then create their own painting is allowing for an equal, fun and valuable learning experience.

Below I have attached images of the process of creating my paintbrush:

We were given a wooden stick to work as a base for the paintbrush.

I used these two colours of wool to tie around the paintbrush to give it texture and design.

This was my final product. I added feathers for some design and some thread to the bottom for design.

Once we created our paintbrushes it was time to create our paintings. I never anticipated how difficult it would be to paint a picture without the typical paint brush. However, it was a lot more fun and enjoyable and made me think less of how my painting didn’t look like everyone else’s, it was unique and a result of my paintbrush. I also learned that you don’t need a range of colours, you can use the four primary colours to create the majority of colours you would usually get on a palette.

The primary colours we were working with for our painting.

This was our sections finished paintings on the wall.

This seminar highlighted the importance of ensuring every child feels like they matter, they are of value and their creative abilities are appreciated, which is at the heart of the Curriculum for Excellence (Scottish Government, 2004).

In the second seminar of the day, we focused on the importance of music within the expressive arts. This was a very practical experience which I was initially very apprehensive about. When I was younger I used to love music and exploring different instruments, however my experience changed when I went to high school. I lost interest in music, it all became to serious and it was always highlighted if you weren’t as good as someone else at playin an instrument. Therefore, when it came to this seminar I felt very anxious and nervous about playing the glockenspiel but it actually turned into a very fun, interesting, informing and enjoyable learning experience.

We were introduced to a very effective learning tool called ‘Figurenotes’ (Figurenotes, 2017). Figurenotes is an intuitive way of reading music. It uses colour and shapes to represent key muss notation. This is an excellent tool to use in primary schools as it allows for the children to go through simple stages towards learning the basics of playing an instrument. We got to try a few songs, my favourite was ‘Frere Jacques’, which I managed to get the hang off after a few tries. It shows me how quickly you can learn a part of a song on an instrument using Figurenotes.

This shows how Figurenotes can be used on the glockenspiel.

To end, this seminar reminded me of why I liked music when I was a child and how it is crucial to allow children the opportunity of exploring music. It showed me that anyone can play music when they put their mind to it. It also highlighted how useful a tool like Figurenotes would be in the classroom. I want to ensure that when I become a teacher I make the arts an important subject in the classroom and it is explored to the best that I can for the children, as it is extremely important to their learning and development into young individuals.

Resources:

Figurenotes. (2017) An intuitive way of reading music. [Online] Available: https://www.figurenotes.org/ [Accessed 30th September 2017]

McAuliffe, D. (2007) Foundation and Primary Settings, In teaching Art and Design 3-11. (Edited by Sue Cox, Robert Watts, Judy Grahame, Steve Herne and Diarmuid McAuliffe) London: Continuum.

Scottish Government. (2004) Curriculum for Excellence: Expressive Arts. [Online] Available: https://education.gov.scot/parentzone/learning-in-scotland/curriculum-areas/Expressive%20arts [Accessed 30th September 2017]

Creating Minds. (n.d.) Creative Quotes on Children. [Online] Available: http://creatingminds.org/quotes/children.htm [Accessed 30th September 2017]

Child Development in the Arts- Week 2

“Children need the freedom to appreciate the infinite resources of their hand, their eyes and their ears, the resources of forms, materials, sounds and colours”- Loris Malaguzzi. For me, this quote highlights the importance of giving children the opportunity to harness their knowledge and skills as well as developing new skills and abilities in the arts.

This was our second week in the integrated arts module. The focus this week was on how a child’s artistic abilities develop in the arts, as they grow older and continue throughout school. Prior to the class, we were required to read two readings: Fleming (2012) and McAuliffe (2007). These readings were very insightful, useful and knowledgeable in helping our understanding of how a child’s cognitive development can grow and develop in the arts. It also highlighted ways in which we as educators should be aware of the importance of art and how we should interact with individual children.

Fleming’s “The Arts in Education” was insightful into the value of art and why it should be justified in the curriculum. It suggests that the arts can have a positive impact on the development of children. We looked further into the chapter “An introduction to aesthetics, theory and pedagogy”in our lecture. We were each given a page of the chapter we had already read and were asked to annotate it with visual drawings of the meaning behind the text. I was given page 8, the part of the text that i focused on was when a child asked why they were doing this task, and immediately the teacher sent him out of the room. I decided the best way to capture this point was by drawing doodles of the situation. I thought this was an excellent way of understanding deeper meanings throughout the text, it is an effective tool in developing contextual understanding, evaluation and analytic skills in children. As well as that it also allows the learners to develop skills that they might not be able to express with the written word. It is also an efficient way of connecting literacy with art, it allows for a more fun, interesting and effective lesson.

Throughout the lecture, we also looked at Elliot Eisner’s ’10 Lessons the Arts Teach’ looks at the importance of the arts and how it is a crucial lesson for allowing children to experience and evolve with the vast areas of the arts. Lesson 5 was one that stood out to us as a class as it basically suggests that we know more than we can say and the arts show that no words or numbers can stop on what we can know and that “the limits of our language do not define the limits of out cognition” (10 lessons the Arts Teach). I found that this resource will be crucial for me, as an educator, to ensure that i allow the children the best opportunity to experience the positive impact that the arts can have on their wellbeing.

In the workshop, we got the chance to analyse different pieces of art created by children at different stages of development. The article we read by McAuliffe connected very well with this part of the workshop, it allowed me to understand a child’s development in the arts a lot better as i had already researched it. Lowenfeld and Bittain (1987) suggested that artistic abilities grow and develop in 4 stages: scribble, pre-schematic, schematic and the gang stage. It was designed to help teachers engage and understand more about a child’s work. However, McAuliffe suggests that with time changing and advances in psychology and other factors that it is not as simple to just “slot” children into stages. It is important to remember that all children develop and grow differently and its not as easy to have each child in a stage as every child is unique.

Furthermore, as an educator we need to realise that with a young child’s drawing, it might just look like a series of random lines or marks to us but to them it could be their whole world, it could be a fire engine going down a road at 60 mph. Therefore, it is crucial that we always listen to what the child says about their drawing and show that we value their creation.

This picture was created by an early level child, where his pencil managed to stay in contact throughout the whole picture. This stage of development in art means his fine and gross motor skills are developing at a pace that is suitable to him.

As children grow older, they become more focused and pay more attention to detail and features. They begin to modify and refine shapes, focus on the placement and size of the objects. However, some children do have a fear of not being accurate with their work (McAuliffe, 2007). As educators, we should ensure that we give the children the appropriate resources and a wide range of media to develop the ability to make these marks.

The child has decided to draw two parrots, they have paid attention to detail and experimented with a range of bright colours.

Moreover, understanding that the arts is a subject that an be incorporated into various areas of the curriculum will make for a more meaningful and fun learning experience for the children. It is important that as teachers we don’t forget about the value and importance of art, even though in the majority of schools literacy and numeracy often take priority. However, if we incorporate both subjects into the one lesson then no subject is more important than the other. Activities such as reading a passage and taking key words or points but doodling an image can express and help a child understand the passage in a whole other light. Children are able to express a theme related to literature through a drawing and can express their understanding of literature through art.

This picture is a clear representation of interlinking literacy and art. These children have displayed a range of words but have drawn visual representations of how the words sound.

Overall, from today’s lecture and workshop i have gained more knowledge on ways to support the development of children through the arts. It is crucial that we allow the children the opportunity to develop their skills, knowledge and abilities in the arts. I want to continue to participate and learn more about this topic as i believe it is an important area that needs to be taught more throughout schools.

References:

National Arts Education Association. (n.d.) 10 Lessons the Arts Teach [Online] Available: https://www.arteducators.org/advocacy/articles/116-10-lessons-the-arts-teach [Accessed: 21st September 2017]

Fleming, M. (2012) The Arts in Education: an introduction to aesthetics, theory and pedagogy. London: Routledge.

McAuliffe, D. (2007) Foundation and Primary Settings. In Teaching Art and Design 3-11 [Edited by Sue Cox, Robert Watts, Judy Grahame, Steve Herne and Diarmuid McAuliffe] London: Continuum.

Early Learning HQ. (n.d.) Loris Malaguzzi [Online] Available: https://www.earlylearninghq.org.uk/latest-resources/inspirational-quotation-loris-malaguzzi/ [Accessed: 2oth September 2017]

Sustainable Development- Learning Log

This was our second week in the sustainable development module. We had a lecture outlining what this module involved and a short assessment briefing. We also discussed our natural and urban areas and how these areas can have an impact on our physical environment. It was a very informative and interesting lecture as it allowed me to learn the difference between both urban and natural areas as well as how the environment fits into the curriculum for excellence. It highlighted the learning outcomes for social sciences that we as educators will be using when we are out on placement, which was crucial information for us to consider and think of different activities we could do that would fit with these outcomes.

We also had two seminars to take part in. The first seminar involved us taking part in various activities outdoors. In a small group I participated in a sensory walk. It shocked me how our senses could see, smell and hear so many different things in our environment when you focus on it. There is a lot of green space around the university and through this walk we discovered areas that we had never seen before. We noticed various plants and wildlife on our walk which intertwined with the other activities we were to complete. Through doing this seminar, it gave me ideas on activities i could do with the children and how the outdoors is a very valuable and fun resource you could use with the children.

The second seminar of the day involved numerous work stations with tasks for us to complete. The one that stood out to me was when we had to go outdoors and take rubbings from tree bark and some leaves. This was not only a fun activity for us ourselves to take part in but it would be a very effective activity to try with the children on placement. It was interesting to see the various types of leaves and how you can see the differences even more so when you rub over it with a crayon. Another one of the activities we got to do was dissecting a flower and seeing the various parts that make up a flower. This was an interesting and more advanced activity, i feel like an activity like this would work better with the upper end of the school. Finally, we got to hold and feel snails. When i first saw the snails i was a bit apprehensive to actually holding one but once i did it was very fun and interesting to see how they move about and how they consume food. I thoroughly enjoyed this workshop as it wasn’t just an enjoyable experience but it also gave us ideas on how to apply this knowledge to the classroom.

We also had a directed study task to complete, the task was to create a blog post on our own urban environment (which can be read from my previous post). We were encouraged to look deeper into our environment and focus on essential areas that make up our environment. It was exciting and surprising to see how parts of my urban area can have an impact on the physical environment. Additionally, we also looked at ways we could develop a lesson on the environment with a Primary 5 class.

Through participating in the lecture and workshops i feel like i managed to develop a range of skills such as : observing, evaluating, analysing, listening and researching.

The environment, in my opinion, relates hugely to primary teaching. Prior to learning and researching more about the environment i never really had a huge opinion on it and the importance of teaching it to the younger generation. However, now i can see how crucial it is to develop the younger generation’s knowledge of how the areas in where they live can have both positive and negative effects on the physical environment. The Curriculum for Excellence highlights the importance of this through the Social Sciences learning and outcomes. Topics like the environment is an area that can also be interlinked with other areas of the curriculum such as literacy and mathematics, to make their learning more interesting, diverse and fun.

Like i mentioned above, beginning to to take part in this module has changed my thinking on areas such as the environment. Prior to this input, i never really had much opinion on the environment, i was never very interested in what happened in my area and the impacts that it can have on the environment. I always knew it was an area of the curriculum that i had to teach but i never had a particular interest or enjoyment for researching and looking more into it for me to teach to the children. However, now that i have taken part in the workshops, in particular, has changed my opinion in a very positive way. I am now very interested in how the area that i stay in can have a positive and negative impact on the environment. I also feel a lot more confident in teaching a topic like this in a school from the various activity ideas we were given throughout the workshops. I now realise the importance of teaching social sciences to the younger generation and how getting the children involved will make for a more positive and enjoyable learning experience. After all, children are the future.

Urban Environment

Since i was a child, i grew up in a small town called Erskine. Erskine is a town in the council area of Renfrewshire. The town lies on the southern bank of the River Clyde and connects the town to Old Kilpatrick in West Dunbartonshire. It is known for being a commuter town and it borders Bishopton to the north and Renfrew, Inchinnan, Paisley and Glasgow Airport to the south. Throughout the years, the town has expanded and developed. The population increased to over 15,000 and in 2014 it was rated one of the most attractive postcode areas to live in Scotland.

This task required me to go out and really focus on my urban environment. I was surprised to see how much there was in my environment when i really focused on it. I looked at the aspects of community spaces, transport, physical characteristics, recreation spaces as well as industry and work.

Even though Erskine is a small town, there are many community spaces. We have 4 primary schools in the area, one of them being a catholic primary school and we have 1 high school. We also have two community centres. There is Erskine Community Sports Centre which is a larger allotment and we also have Bargarran Community Centre. As a child, i spent the majority of my childhood in these centres. Erskine Community Sports Centre has a range of sport activities, play groups, extra-curricular clubs, a gym and a hall to hold parties. Me and my friends used to spend a lot of time here playing badminton, basketball, football and many other sport activies. Bargarran Community Centre holds many clubs for children to get involved in. I spent a lot of my time here for my dance and drama club that i was part of for 5 years. There is also many functions for the older generation such as bingo, tea and coffee events. There is also a small doctors office in this centre as well as a music room for any inspiring artists. On reflection, I never fully appreciated the use of these centres until i looked back at how much of my childhood was spent there and the fond memories i have at these places. As well as these centres we also have a community library which is located next to the community swimming pool. The library was used very much throughout my younger years as in school we often took trips down to the local library to explore the range of books on offer. The swimming centre was also a place where i spent a lot of my childhood. I would go every Friday night for ‘fun night’ with all my friends from school and it was a great way of making new friendships and it was a good form of exercise. Aswell as going in my free time, in Primary 6 we went every Tuesday to develop and enhance our swimming abilities.

In Erskine, there isn’t a lot of transport facilities. We have various bus stops located around Erskine, where the bus service Mcgills is used through the town. There is a range of buses to take us to various locations such as Glasgow, Paisley, Clydebank etc. The bus service in Erskine is effective nine times out of ten, although they do often run late and have a tendency to drive past a bus stop without stopping. We do not have a train station in Erskine, there is one nearby in Bishopton but its difficult to get to unless you drive. We have a taxi service that runs through Erskine and that is normally reliable unless you phone in a busy period. Apart from the services i mentioned there isn’t really any other transport services. The roads are planned out very well for if your a driver and it is easy to get to most of the areas in Erskine.

When it comes to the physical characteristics of my town, most of the houses in my area are semi-detached, they are quite run down houses as they were built around the 1960s. A lot of the houses in my street are getting done up to make them more modern and efficient. However, there are many areas of Erskine that have been recently built and so are more up market, nicer, better built and bigger. Around my area there is a lot of green space than what I originally thought. We have a big green field where i often go and walk my dog, we have a beach with a lot of green space around it and woodland walks to go on. There is numerous swing parks with grass all around where you can play ball games or even just games like hide n seek or even tig with your friends. The road conditions in Erskine are alright, they are often getting fixed and updated due to there being more cars on the road and bus routes being made.

The industry and work field in Erskine is quite good, there are numerous retail jobs as we have a Morrisons nearby with many job opportunities, play centres for children such as pandamonium, cafes, food shops and many others. We have an industrial estate nearby where there are various factories and offices. We have a community farm where that is an agricultural place for children to visit and see some of the animals, as well as volunteering opportunities.

From completing this task, it has opened my eyes to how important our urban environment is to the making of a community and how we as educators need to allow children the opportunity to experience and learn about their urban and natural areas and how they impact upon our physical environment. It is crucial that children are given the chance to learn about what their urban and natural environment and there is various ideas that us as educators could use to allow the children this opportunity. The Curriculum for Excellence (Scottish Government, 2004) can be used as a resource in order for a lesson plan to be devised. Teachers could take the children on a walk through either their urban or natural environment to allow the children to see the different community spaces that their area have (SOC 2-10a). When they return to the classroom they could create a poster or even a picture book of the different places to live, work and relax in their area. They could also even do a follow up lesson where they could take a trip to the local farm to see how they have an impact on the environment. If its an activity for the natural environment, a good idea would be to take the children through an area with a lot of green space and they could take rubbings from tree bark or even leaves that they have seen.

Therefore, it is important that we as educators take our knowledge of our environment and allow the children that we teach, the opportunity to gain the same knowledge of the environment that they live in and the elements that create an urban area.

References:

Scottish Government. (2004) Curriculum for Excellence [Online] Available: https://www.education.gov.scot/Documents/social-studies-eo.pdf [Accessed: 22nd September 2017].

Renfrewshire Leisure. (n.d.) Erskine Community Sports Centre [Online] Available: http://www.renfrewshireleisure.com/erskine-community-sports-centre/ [Accessed: 22nd Spetember 2017]

Erskine. (n.d.) Erskine [Online] Available:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erskine [Accessed: 22nd September 2017]

Integrated Arts

The Arts can be seen as a way of expressing yourself through various mediums. It can be seen to have a positive impact on your emotional, mental and physical health. I was keen to learn that throughout this module we will be extending our learning in vast areas of the arts such as: visual, music, dance and drama.

When I was a child I was very involved in creative arts. I was part of the junior choir at school which allowed me to increase my confidence and self-esteem. We often sang at church events, coffee mornings and also got to perform in Paisley Town Hall at Christmas time. It was such a fun experience that made school a more interesting and enjoyable time. I was also part of my local dance club which I found was a new, imaginative and creative way of expressing my feelings and emotions but in a beautiful, exciting and different way from what I was used to. I found that being part of the art of dancing allowed me to not only grow as a person but allowed me to flourish and learn more about being open-minded as well as developing my imaginative and creative skills.

In this weeks lecture we were introduced to ‘Tallis Habits Pedagogy Wheel’ (Thomas Tallis School, 2017). I had never heard or came across this tool before until we began this module. This wheel was created to enable educators to explore the arts and implement habits-related strategies into the classroom. Personally, I found that this wheel has provided me with information and ideas of how to implement the creative arts within an educational setting. It has made me feel more confident and open-minded in how with the arts there isn’t always a set answer like there is with subjects like maths, but how there is a sense of the unknown but that’s okay.

Finishing on this, I feel like already just after one lecture I feel more confident and able in teaching arts within the classroom. It has opened my mind to the many different areas of arts and how there is so many fun and interesting ways to teach it to children. Arts is such an important part of the curriculum that I feel is sometimes forgotten about but it’s crucial to a child’s development.

References:

Thomas Tallis School. (2017) The TALLIS Habits Pedagogy Wheel. [Online] Available: http://www.thomastallisschool.com/tallis-pedagogy-wheel-guide.html [Accessed: 16 September 2017]