Reflection on Pedagogy (PP1)
ENTRY i
My background is in the creative arts, specifically photography, so to that end the keeping of a learning Journal is something that I'm very familiar with. In this case I will make my journal on this e-format.
My first entry
considered my own teaching background as I had to make a micro
presentation on the first day to my peers. It went something like this..
I presented my first workshop on the 4x5 Camera at the gallery of
photography some 20 years ago. This was the start of the 17 year
relationship with the Gallery during which I facilitated courses in
studio portraiture, documentation for artists, and the above-mentioned 4
x 5 Camera workshop. For the past eight years I have been involved in
presenting a module of the photography and digital imaging course at
NCAD, (Continuing Education in Art and Design CEAD). This was my first
exposure to formal teaching/lecturing. During this time I've encountered
many Learning situations, Learning environments, many types of
learners. Over this time I have organically assembled the tools of my
teaching practice whilst becoming comfortable and confident within the
classroom environment. During this presentation I talked specifically
about the use of YouTube clips as a tool which helped students come down
after practical exercise. The clips also introduce an abstract concept
into the session, and asked the students to source clips that could
inform and provide a space for cool down after practical sessions or
technical presentations. I also talked about the different methods
employed in my other teaching role. In myposition as lecturer at NCAD
students learn through a combination of presentations, assignments,
group tutorials, and crits.
At
our table of six there were many different teaching types, there were
two involved in teaching English as a foreign language, a person
involved in sound production education, another involved in training for
catering at hospitality industries, one involved in creating
educational experiences for people with learning difficulties, and
myself the photography tutor.
We talked and described each others pedagogy's and as we spoke we
developed a vocabulary around our professions. What surprised me is that
as concepts were introduced, although I did not know them by name I
knew them by character, and I feel going forward that my experience will
provide me with a solid base to take on board concepts and develop my
practice to become the better lecturer.
ENTRY ii
For prep work I looked at an article from the AISHE Journal entitled
The Influence of Teaching Satisfaction on Student Persistence
The piece written by Thomas Dwyer aims to further evaluate conditions which encourage persistence of third level students. The paper gave a good overview on the literature to-date highlighting the already understood concepts in and around persistence, It reinforced the theories and concepts discussed in the literature review with out adding too much to the debate. The qualatative sections of the study made the study very relative and personable but the author admitted that the fact that the work was a single institution study meant that is was not possible to draw any general conclusions from the study that could be applied to the general mass of students in Ireland or elsewhere.
The conclusion I drew from this was that the paper was more informative what was currently understood about persistence in third level education, but not a study which threw any new light on this important area of education.
ENTRY iv items around pp1 one presentation
Active and Passive Learner Perspectives,
In my practise all passive events ( powerpoint, or instruction) are reinforced by take away in the form of pdf where the powerpoint is concerned, and practical excercises involving the doing whatever was instructed or demonstrated. I try hard to give assignments which are solve-able through re-immersion in the course material. So I could say that my practise considering I do a lot of instruction, is active, but wherever it becomes passive I should try to bring these sessions to life later in the form of related task based exercises.
Content Driven or Student Driven
I suppose there has to be a balance struck between being content driven and student driven as a lecturer/facilitator/educator.To be successful with all or most of our students we need to be strike a balance between delivery of information in a way that resonates with students in order to allow them the space to use information provided to move their knowledge forward. Our content is finite and quantifiable for sure so we need to deliver it in some way. If we are student focused we can assess the success of our delivery methods and not be afraid to try new ways to deliver more effectively, to enrich the learning experience, and to facilitate a greater transfer of knowledge.
What are the Basic Factors Needed to Create a Learning Environment
Before Motivation kicks in ( Motivation Theory)
Herzberg Motivation theory dictates that there are certain "Hygiene factors" which must be present before motivation takes place and students can be elevated to higher learning.
for example there must first be a desk on which to learn in a space or a learning virtual space like moodle, a knowledgeable and motivated tutor, Good well structured notes and other resources.
All of these should be a given, and only when those needs are provided for can we move on to using innovative tools and techniques to enhance the learning experience and outcomes.
How Do We Encode Learning
In my case if information is given in power point presentations I try to use language that is easily understood explaining any new terms or concepts in terms of what is already known. As a means of further decoding all presentations are followed up with a pdf with or without presenter notes. I have never considered making a video of the presentation for follow up and as an exta channel of communication and as an assist to decoding, but now I see how this can be a major benefit to learners who need to get the info presented to them more than once, or indeed learners who had become saturated with information during previous learning that day. I always welcome questions via email and discussion forum especially as I generally only see my students once a week during a module. Although my assessment strategy combines formative and summative assessment I would be better served to give feedback on the formative assessments as soon as is possible to facilitate improved outcomes.
Learning Paradigm's -- Behaviorism -- Cognitivism -- Constructivism
In my teaching experience behaviourism is not fully employed however when explaining at first to students how to use specific tools, for example, a scanner, ( used for bringing images from film into the digital realm) I will start with a powerpoint, then a demonstration- then I give the group a list of instructions on how to use the scanner - I set them a scanning assignment to scan their own work - they scan submit the work and receive a grade - as a consequence of this they can now scan. ( if there are any who encounter difficulty I can give further instruction - all go forward with the work done.
Although this at first looks like a behaviouristic pattern it turns cognitivist once the instruction list is provided and then the student relies on what they retained from the presentation, the list of instructions, and the practical assignment to assemble new learning. If difficulty is encountered with the exercise I will give extra assistance and support on site to fill the gaps in the students learning thus scaffolding the experience for them in a constructivist way. With timely formative feedback following as soon as is practicable. Furthermore, in my module( digital photography, year 1 B.A. in photography) I aim to logically explain the established workflow of digital photography. To do this i take the approach as outlined above. The success of this approach is explained by the theory of constructivism. When structure is logical this allows the learner to process and relate each element in the work flow to what has gone before and thus create an understanding of the whole. Some times repetition is necessary to before the pieces start to fit and I feel I should point out that all pieces will fit together into a whole, right from the very start. So a good thing to do going forward is to roadmap the workflow from the beginning in a chart which shows the relatables as a structure before fleshing these out logically and allowing the learner to assemble the workflow in their own consciousness.
A series of three in line assignments built around a series of presentations and discussion and practical exercises are in place to give structure to this learning all of this backed up with notes, occasional instructional videos, and moodle resources. All of these pieces in place scaffold the learning, being now more aware of these concepts should mean I can closely monitor the success/failure of my teaching methods.
Reflection on toolbox!
some resources from my toolbox at present are, Traditional lectures /tutorials, discussion sessions, Lab work, videos, Guest speaker, Site Visits. Things I would like to include in the future are Games, Brainstorming, jigsaw methods, clear goals and Guidelines.
How does all of this impact on pp1 observation exercise design?
Obviously this all feeds into the process and I had an opportunity to try something really new with 3rd yr students in the photography BA inGriffith College. For the observation I had the opportunity of running a hands on workshop for final year photography students as part of lecturer Sinead Murphys' 'People Photography' Module.
I have run a workshop here before, 3 times in fact. Here students listened to a presentation about my work and philosophy, and then they observed me work and asked questions and made some comments on the process. After the first PP1 day classroom, I could see the possibility of doing something really different with this process. So, I flipped it, Gave the students an advance briefing on moodle, had them choose a role, had them inform themselves of this role and reflect on the knowledge they had gained on their course to make an informed decision on the role they would choose. Then in class I outlined my practice described how it related to the session we were about to have and let the students inform each other about the roles they would perform.
Below is the documentation I posted for the students it should inform you the reader of this post of the process I will also post here, for your understanding, details of the research and literature I have engaged with in preparation for the session which took place on Thursday Nov 30th 2017.
Portrait workshop with David Monahan
2pm till 5pm Thursday Nov x
The purpose of this workshop is to make a new version of the image above, whilst investigating the dynamics of being involved in a team making photographic work for a particular use.( on completion of this workshop you will be able to etc…..) To this end I will take the role of Art director and all other roles will be assigned to the group. Collectively the group will be given the responsibility of creating a work together that satisfies my needs to update this work for my client Sinead, who may use this photograph to promote the B.A. and Cert in Photography along with other works created on the course.
Each student according to their roles will be given a series of tasks to perform. Some of these will be carried out independently prior to the workshop, some during the course of the prep and shoot.
These roles are as follows.
1. equipment Manager, (cameras)
2. equipment manager, ( lighting)
3. casting and talent management.
4. production/ site management.
5. photographer.
6. post production. (photoshop editing)
Please go to the link on moodle entitled project roles to choose your role.
Note that once the role has been chosen by one person from the group it will no longer be available ( greyed out) as a choice.(no something like this is possible on moodle)
On the day there will be a short presentation before the shoot, a discussion between the group, in which you explain your roles to each other and a briefing by the art director who may re- assign roles to make sure all areas are covered on the day.
ENTRY ii
For prep work I looked at an article from the AISHE Journal entitled
The Influence of Teaching Satisfaction on Student Persistence
The piece written by Thomas Dwyer aims to further evaluate conditions which encourage persistence of third level students. The paper gave a good overview on the literature to-date highlighting the already understood concepts in and around persistence, It reinforced the theories and concepts discussed in the literature review with out adding too much to the debate. The qualatative sections of the study made the study very relative and personable but the author admitted that the fact that the work was a single institution study meant that is was not possible to draw any general conclusions from the study that could be applied to the general mass of students in Ireland or elsewhere.
The conclusion I drew from this was that the paper was more informative what was currently understood about persistence in third level education, but not a study which threw any new light on this important area of education.
ENTRY iv items around pp1 one presentation
Active and Passive Learner Perspectives,
In my practise all passive events ( powerpoint, or instruction) are reinforced by take away in the form of pdf where the powerpoint is concerned, and practical excercises involving the doing whatever was instructed or demonstrated. I try hard to give assignments which are solve-able through re-immersion in the course material. So I could say that my practise considering I do a lot of instruction, is active, but wherever it becomes passive I should try to bring these sessions to life later in the form of related task based exercises.
Content Driven or Student Driven
I suppose there has to be a balance struck between being content driven and student driven as a lecturer/facilitator/educator.To be successful with all or most of our students we need to be strike a balance between delivery of information in a way that resonates with students in order to allow them the space to use information provided to move their knowledge forward. Our content is finite and quantifiable for sure so we need to deliver it in some way. If we are student focused we can assess the success of our delivery methods and not be afraid to try new ways to deliver more effectively, to enrich the learning experience, and to facilitate a greater transfer of knowledge.
What are the Basic Factors Needed to Create a Learning Environment
Before Motivation kicks in ( Motivation Theory)
Herzberg Motivation theory dictates that there are certain "Hygiene factors" which must be present before motivation takes place and students can be elevated to higher learning.
for example there must first be a desk on which to learn in a space or a learning virtual space like moodle, a knowledgeable and motivated tutor, Good well structured notes and other resources.
All of these should be a given, and only when those needs are provided for can we move on to using innovative tools and techniques to enhance the learning experience and outcomes.
How Do We Encode Learning
In my case if information is given in power point presentations I try to use language that is easily understood explaining any new terms or concepts in terms of what is already known. As a means of further decoding all presentations are followed up with a pdf with or without presenter notes. I have never considered making a video of the presentation for follow up and as an exta channel of communication and as an assist to decoding, but now I see how this can be a major benefit to learners who need to get the info presented to them more than once, or indeed learners who had become saturated with information during previous learning that day. I always welcome questions via email and discussion forum especially as I generally only see my students once a week during a module. Although my assessment strategy combines formative and summative assessment I would be better served to give feedback on the formative assessments as soon as is possible to facilitate improved outcomes.
Learning Paradigm's -- Behaviorism -- Cognitivism -- Constructivism
In my teaching experience behaviourism is not fully employed however when explaining at first to students how to use specific tools, for example, a scanner, ( used for bringing images from film into the digital realm) I will start with a powerpoint, then a demonstration- then I give the group a list of instructions on how to use the scanner - I set them a scanning assignment to scan their own work - they scan submit the work and receive a grade - as a consequence of this they can now scan. ( if there are any who encounter difficulty I can give further instruction - all go forward with the work done.
Although this at first looks like a behaviouristic pattern it turns cognitivist once the instruction list is provided and then the student relies on what they retained from the presentation, the list of instructions, and the practical assignment to assemble new learning. If difficulty is encountered with the exercise I will give extra assistance and support on site to fill the gaps in the students learning thus scaffolding the experience for them in a constructivist way. With timely formative feedback following as soon as is practicable. Furthermore, in my module( digital photography, year 1 B.A. in photography) I aim to logically explain the established workflow of digital photography. To do this i take the approach as outlined above. The success of this approach is explained by the theory of constructivism. When structure is logical this allows the learner to process and relate each element in the work flow to what has gone before and thus create an understanding of the whole. Some times repetition is necessary to before the pieces start to fit and I feel I should point out that all pieces will fit together into a whole, right from the very start. So a good thing to do going forward is to roadmap the workflow from the beginning in a chart which shows the relatables as a structure before fleshing these out logically and allowing the learner to assemble the workflow in their own consciousness.
A series of three in line assignments built around a series of presentations and discussion and practical exercises are in place to give structure to this learning all of this backed up with notes, occasional instructional videos, and moodle resources. All of these pieces in place scaffold the learning, being now more aware of these concepts should mean I can closely monitor the success/failure of my teaching methods.
Reflection on toolbox!
some resources from my toolbox at present are, Traditional lectures /tutorials, discussion sessions, Lab work, videos, Guest speaker, Site Visits. Things I would like to include in the future are Games, Brainstorming, jigsaw methods, clear goals and Guidelines.
How does all of this impact on pp1 observation exercise design?
Obviously this all feeds into the process and I had an opportunity to try something really new with 3rd yr students in the photography BA inGriffith College. For the observation I had the opportunity of running a hands on workshop for final year photography students as part of lecturer Sinead Murphys' 'People Photography' Module.
I have run a workshop here before, 3 times in fact. Here students listened to a presentation about my work and philosophy, and then they observed me work and asked questions and made some comments on the process. After the first PP1 day classroom, I could see the possibility of doing something really different with this process. So, I flipped it, Gave the students an advance briefing on moodle, had them choose a role, had them inform themselves of this role and reflect on the knowledge they had gained on their course to make an informed decision on the role they would choose. Then in class I outlined my practice described how it related to the session we were about to have and let the students inform each other about the roles they would perform.
Below is the documentation I posted for the students it should inform you the reader of this post of the process I will also post here, for your understanding, details of the research and literature I have engaged with in preparation for the session which took place on Thursday Nov 30th 2017.
Portrait workshop with David Monahan
2pm till 5pm Thursday Nov x
The purpose of this workshop is to make a new version of the image above, whilst investigating the dynamics of being involved in a team making photographic work for a particular use.( on completion of this workshop you will be able to etc…..) To this end I will take the role of Art director and all other roles will be assigned to the group. Collectively the group will be given the responsibility of creating a work together that satisfies my needs to update this work for my client Sinead, who may use this photograph to promote the B.A. and Cert in Photography along with other works created on the course.
Each student according to their roles will be given a series of tasks to perform. Some of these will be carried out independently prior to the workshop, some during the course of the prep and shoot.
These roles are as follows.
1. equipment Manager, (cameras)
2. equipment manager, ( lighting)
3. casting and talent management.
4. production/ site management.
5. photographer.
6. post production. (photoshop editing)
Please go to the link on moodle entitled project roles to choose your role.
Note that once the role has been chosen by one person from the group it will no longer be available ( greyed out) as a choice.(no something like this is possible on moodle)
On the day there will be a short presentation before the shoot, a discussion between the group, in which you explain your roles to each other and a briefing by the art director who may re- assign roles to make sure all areas are covered on the day.
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the final work made by participants of the workshopdetails of the research and literatureThe photographic course participants are primarily concerned with acquiring the skills to carry them into a professional career. So as with all the creative courses group learning and problem solving becomes a valuable tool. Although the exercise is not as open ended enough to describe it as an problem based learning scenario’s As defined by Barrett and Cashman (2010). But this kind of inquiry does actually require students to draw on existing knowledge in order to complete the task and there may also be several possible routes to a solution. The workshop will as Horton(16) describes fit the Vygotsian concept of scaffolded learning. Where the exercise encourages a situation where ‘ teacher and student, or peer and peer, work together to fashion something unique to that distinct social combination.’Surgenor (2011) emphasises the teachings of Biggs and touches on several key points that need to addressed for deep learning to take place in an environment similar to the one where the observation session will take place. Some of his insights are as follows. In order to to be motivated students need to see and understand that the learning goals and processes are relevant to them.Students need to be active and so the workshop approach is key as deep learning is associated with doing rather than only passively receiving. Discussion with peers before and during the exercise can improve and focus thinking. Any new knowledge should build on learning to date whilst reflecting on the overall goals and learning outcomes. Baring the above in mind, before final formulation of a workshop on must consider the ways and means to creating a more immersive and a deeper learning experience for all concerned. Firstly, If the students had some preparatory work before class this would give them a perspective on what was about to happen. If they had a role to play out they would have to look into their past experiences or do some extra research before coming to class. If they had to choose one of 6 roles in advance this would invest them in the process of making the work in the workshop, and if those roles were limited to one person as a choice in moodle it again would lead them to a deeper understanding of the role they were about to play in the exercise. These advance steps before class combined with an engaging presentation, good notes and printed matter on the day will provide the lower order needs or hygiene factors, as defined by Herzberg, which are needed to motivate the participants to engage fully with the process ( Timmerick, 1997). After a presentation the group could discuss their roles with each other and make use of the jigsaw method of learning as proposed by Elliot Aronson(2000). Before the practical part of the exercise they could explain their understanding of their roles to each other giving an overview to the entire group of their position within the work about to be made. A final briefing could tie up the role expectations of all and roles could be reassigned if needed and the group could then proceed to the practical part of the workshop.( This part will not be observed.) References: Aronson,E. (2000) Available at: https://www.jigsaw.org/information/( Accessed 21November 2017) Biggs, J and Tang, C. (2011)Teaching For Quality Learning at University, Maidenhead:Open University Press.(p 23) Barrett, T., Cashman, D. (Eds) (2010) A Practitioners’ Guide to Enquiry and Problem-based Learning. Dublin: UCD Teaching and Learning.(unpaginated) Horton, S. Lev Goes to College: Reflections on Implementing Vygotsky’s Ideas n Higher Education, The International Journal of Learning, 15(4) P109. Retrieved from http://www.Learning-Journal.com, ISSN 1447-9494 ( accessed 19 November 2017) Timmreck, T. (1977). Motivation-Hygiene Theory Adapted for Education. The High School Journal, 61(3), 105-110. p.105. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/40365315 Accessed 21 November 2017) Surgeonor, P. (2010) Large and small Group Teaching. Dublin: UCD Teaching and Learning.( unpaginated) |
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