Task 4a: Developing Lines of Inquiry

So I’m sat in Middlesex University waiting for the campus session to begin and Module 2 is now seeming even more real! I have been trying to tackle reader 4 but I’m thinking it’s going to take a few more reads yet until I fully understand! 

Being here this early would seem a good opportunity to post my questions up on here and after seeing that others have already uploaded theirs, I feel more confident!

As teaching is a career I would love to peruse upon completion of this degree, that is the subject area I decided to focus my questions on. I am also aware this is a career path many others on this course are looking into and therefore a good top to discuss!

1. What makes a good teacher?
2. Will my experience of professional training at a performing arts college help me more or less than than doing a dance degree at university when trying to persue a career in teaching?
3. Does being so young affect staff/students taking me seriously as a teacher?
4. How does teaching a creative subject such as dance/drama compare to teaching a  more academic subject?
5. How does my teaching style compare to a more experienced practitioner?
6. Will people people take me less seriously as a dancer for going straight into a teaching career as opposed to performing first?
7. In such creative subjects, how do you find a “happy medium” between creativity and discipline as a teacher?
8. As a teacher how do you encourage the students who are less willing to join in?
9. How do you determine the best route to take in order to achiever your teaching qualification?
10. Some students who are less able academically can excel in these creative subjects. Why is this? And can doing these subjects benefit them in the academic subjects?

Please feel free to comment and let me know your opinions!

Back to Reality!

So with the holiday season well and truly over it’s time to get back to work and start looking at Module 2. Despite sitting down with the intention of doing “uni work”, once again I ended up on Facebook and was horrified to come across this article about how every year, hundreds of Calderon dolphins, are killed for “fun” as a “right of passage” in the Denmark.

http://mp.weixin.qq.com/s?__biz=MjM5NDM0NTA2Mg%3D%3D&mid=10100142&idx=7&sn=2338d5d305296bc264ba02c8620c3c69&scene=4#rd

I quickly exited the site without thinking anymore of it other than how cruel it was and disgusted at the people who would participate in such activity.

It wasn’t until a few days later (when I was on Facebook again) that I came across this:

http://meganastamper.tumblr.com/post/74306785476/the-denmark-dolphin-slaughter

I feel this is a perfect example of how you cannot just accept the first source of information you read as the truth and shows the importance of making a deeper inquiry.

As it states in Reader 4, module 2 introduces you to, “a process of inquiry through which you will be able to further investigate, explore, evaluate and understand your professional practice.” I thought that this was just a small (not entirely relevant) example of what we are about to develop as we begin to put together ideas for our own professional inquiry’s.

Task 3b: Theories Relating to Networking

“Professional Networks and their effective engagement could produce benefits for you personally and the things that matter to you” (Reader 3, 2013).

Within the work place, especially in the performing arts, it would almost seem it’s part of one’s instinct to ‘get to the top’ no matter what that takes. ‘Co-operation’ and ‘Affiliation’ are two different networking theories exploring how different people will take what they want from a given situation to get where they want to be. 

Co-operation

When  think about ‘co-operation’ and how I use it within daily life, and particularly my working life, I think about getting on with people (whether I like it or not). In most cases, it is just something you have to do and without yet thinking about ‘game theory’ you will co-operate to achieve something. For example, working in a dance company, each member would work together as a team to put on the best performance possible. Robert Axelrod is an influential researcher in this field who identified the benefits of “co-operating fully, until you reach a point of maximum benefit, and then defect” (Reader 3, 2013). A representation  of this can be seen in “Prisoners Dilemma” which involves two contestants who each must make a choice without knowing what the other will do. From this game theory, Axelrod inferred, “The temptation is to defect. But, the dilemma is that if both defect, both do worse than if both had co-operated.” (Axelrod, 1984). From this, I came to the conclusion, that whilst eventually, one would defect in order to gain the most one can, equally, it pays to cooperate and consequently, the longer you co-operate, the more you can achieve. Arguably, co-operating for too long, can leave you worse off if the opponent defects before you. Within the theory, Axelrod also points out that a “tit-for-tat” pattern is created and we should “take advantage of networks for our own benefit and that of the wider network”. (Axelrod, 1984, p. xi-xiv).

It could be argued that the usefulness of the actual game, on the other hand, could be that this model is fundamentally flawed. It is based on a scientific scale, few social situations could be modeled accurately by a single transaction, and as the reader states, it’s “a very simple model”.

When reading through other blogs posted about this task, one opinion I saw was that Axelrod’s game theory, to them, was just ‘using’ someone. I could relate to this as I thought this too at first, however, I would challenge this by saying; it is very rare that a person will give without gaining something themselves. For example, within my workplace, I will co-operate because I gaining from the experience to support my PGCE application yet at the same time, the department is gaining from me, new choreography that the students have used for their assessment. I believe, in order for co-operation to work, all persons involved should be getting something out of it and benefit from it, whether that be for themselves or someone else. There may be situations, for example, in auditions, where people follow Axelrod’s theory and co-operate up to a certain point, and then defect.

Affiliation

Although I can see it sharing similarities with the traits of ‘co-operation’, in terms of ‘getting on’, when I think of ‘affiliation’ I associate it with friendships you make and this theory would seem a lot more intimate than that of co-operation. As humans, it is in our nature “to form close relationships” (Crisp and Turner, 2007). Everyone has affiliations and some rely on them more heavily than others, which links to the affiliation theory of ‘homeostasis’ where we each seek to balance our affiliations to a preferred level (O’Connor and Rosenblood, 1996). In other words, finding a balance of associations which is right for you at a particular time. Within this concept comes the idea of ‘having friends in the right places’, and is all part of professional networking. 

Another key aspect of ‘affiliations’ is trust. Those you affiliate with, both professionally and socially, are people you trust and trust information and knowledge they pass onto you. With this also comes the risk of putting trust in the wrong person and with that, the ethics behind that information getting leaked. 

References:

The Evolution of Co-operation, (Axelrod, R, 1984)

Essential Social Psychology (2nd ed), (Crisp, Richard J. and Turner, Rhiannon N, 2007)

Task 3c: Sources of Information

There are many different sources and networks that we all use both professionally as well as socially. All networks are appropriate and valued for different reasons but there are some I would tend to turn to more frequently.

Google

Whether it be for BAPP, a new teaching idea or even what time a shop opened, I would most commonly just type it into google. Most of the time it will provide me with the information I was looking for, however, with it offering thousands of options, there is always that question of the authenticity of the site you on are on and the accuracy of the information it is offering. This is why it is always a good idea to to cross-check the information with another source.

YouTube

To me this is a sort of “visual google” and something on which I rely heavily on both inside and out of the teaching environment. YouTube is perfect for giving me inspiration when choreographing, but also, showing the students performances of different dance styles. For example, the other week we were studying the jazz style of, ‘Fosse’ so I used YouTube to show them a clip of professional fosse dances. While this visual aid is highly beneficial would always watch the video before showing it to the class as ‘YouTube’ is a site where anyone could upload anything so I like to check it is appropriate before showing it. Also, with a site like this available, especially in dance, it makes it very easy to just copy someone else’s work so another thing to be aware of.

Networking in the Workplace

The information I gain from other teachers and staff members, with whom I work with in the school, is invaluable to me. Being new to this profession, there is know better way to learn than from people who have years of experience in this field, in my opinion. Equally, I currently spend a lot of time with a girl who is undertaking her PGCE at the moment, so it’s very interesting to see what she is having to do, what her course entails, and also her opinion of it. One thing to bare in mind is that this information is entirely opinionated and possibly biased and so not necessarily ‘the truth’ about this profession. This idea of networking within the workplace is not something I had considered a ‘network’ until reading other people’s blogs (based on task 3a). It was only on completion of the task that I reflected and thought, why? I had just decided in my head that networking meant only connecting via online sites. Looking back this now seems silly but enhances the importance of sharing ideas.

BAPP

This links in nicely to the point I just made above. Whilst undergoing this course, I am forever flicking from blog to blog, reading what other people have written and from what angles they have approached the different tasks. On one hand, this is a good way of sharing ideas across a wider network (like I learnt in task 3a). As well as this, it would seem that many BAPP students are all hoping to go down the teaching route and this is another way in why the blogs useful because you find a lot of relevant feelings and ideas. Yet, on the other hand, something I often feel, is reading a task and feeling like I have done it wrong. I am aware that on a course such as this, there is no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’, but I still find that it puts doubt in my mind of my ability. Although I sometimes get concerned with regards to the blogging, I find when everyone comes together for the BAPP campus sessions really helpful. Everyone sharing ideas and ‘bouncing’ off one another really helps me to develop own ideas.

Facebook, Twitter and Instagram

I probably would not regard these as ‘important’ for me personally, however, I still wanted to discuss them because they are sites I use a lot and I am aware that for some people, they are relied on for a different source of information. I know on Facebook, there are groups such as, ‘The Hustle’ from which people can gain knowledge of upcoming auditions or events. I personally, do not tend to write status’ or ‘tweets’ or upload pictures very often and tend to go on them more because I am nosey. So while I can gain information about different people by doing a bit of “stalking” this is also a downfall of sites like these. They are not particularly private and you have to set any of these privacy settings yourself. This is why when I do post, I have to be very careful of what I put on. I think this is also especially relevant within the teaching profession because, let’s be honest, we have all typed in a teachers name on Facebook thinking it will be hilarious to see what their page is like..! For this reason, all my privacy setting are on on all my social networking sites.

Task 3a: Current Networks

It took me a while to understand the concept of this task and how it differed to tasks set as part of the first section, particularly 1b. I broke down the question and picked out the key words which I believed were, “current”, “professional” , “networks”. 

‘Current’: belonging to the present time; happening or being used or done now

‘Professional’: engaged in a specified activity as one’d main paid occupation rather than an amateur 

‘Network’: a group or system of interconnected people or things

(Oxford English Dictionary)

Networking is very important in any profession but I would argue that it is even more relied on in the performing arts industry. There is a particularly strong sense of “it’s all about who you know”, and often teachers in college would tell us how they had just been speaking to a choreographer or director asking about how a past student worked and whether they were reliable etc. So if we are using this as an example, the network used here was most likely to be via phone or email.

When I think about my own networks that I use professionally I would initially think about my blogging site which is obviously important to help me develop throughout my studies, but also if a prospective employer was to type in my name on ‘Google’ this would come up above social networking sites and (hopefully) show me off in an intelligent manner. When I first started thinking about this as network and how it fits in with task I thought that despite it being a ‘Current’ and ‘Professional’ , it lacked the aspect of communication that you would expect in a network. But then I realized that, actually, me commenting on other blogs and others commenting on my blog, is communication, thus making it a very useful ‘Network’. 

Another site that I had heard about but never looked into, was “LinkedIn”. When I first came across it I just thought it was like Facebook and so discounted it but after discussing it with family friends I became aware that, although a similar set-up to Facebook, it was, in fact, a networking site used by professionals to articulate there skills and achievements and connect with past, present and potentially future employers or employees. Like on Facebook, in order to connect to people you have to send them a request which can either be accepted or ignored. Furthermore, if you wanted to get in contact with someone, you have to do it through the messaging service ‘LinkedIn’ provide and the persons email does not show up so you would have to personally ask for it. This makes it a safer environment to display information as you only have to show details that you are happy to be seen and only with the people you accept.

Sites that are more commonly known to me are ‘Twitter’, ‘Facebook’ and ‘Instagram’ and as well as used socially to share pictures or thoughts they are both used by the majority of celebrities as a way of promoting themselves. These sites, however, are very informal and you do not have as much control over them as you would with ‘LinkedIn’ and as a result you tend come across a lot of spoof accounts and often you hear about “hacking” going on. Whilst you can make your page ‘private’ (and that does seem to be happening a lot more) you have to activate this setting yourself, posing a risk to the safety of private details.

More and more people are joining these examples of current networks but equally, I hear of more and more people deleting there accounts as they don’t want people they don’t know looking at their site. However, for professional use they are an ideal way of making contacts and networking and there are even examples of professionals being offered jobs through these sites or sharing job opportunities/auditions through ‘open groups’. Especially with the way technology is advancing and the majority of people owning a smart phone or tablet, an increasing number of people are using the internet and online networking sites to connect.

Task 2c: Reflective Theory

“We shall not cease from exploration

And the end of all our exploring

Will be to arrive where we started 

And know the place for the first time”

(TS Eliot, Four Quarters, 1943)

I came accross this poem whilst studying A Level English and thought it suited this task quite nicely!

For me, being a teacher heavily relies on me to constantly critically reflect on everything I do, whether I realise it or not! In this profession you have to keep up with changes in the curriculum for one but also, working with children, I feel it is important to make sure what you are doing is relevant to them. For example, being a young and recent graduate, I feel that the choreography I bring is current and and challenging, not an “old school” jazz piece to “Jamirioqui” that has been taught to the 20 years prior to them.

When researching online about 'Existing tools for reflection within Professional Practice' I got a link to a file, Improving Learning Through Reflection where it discussed how “Reflection is a way of maximizing deep learning and minimizing surface approaches” (Hinnet, 1997). It also looks at how reflection is a key component of the artistry in performance-based subjects (something I feel is very relevant to all those participating in the BAPP course). It then goes onto say, “Writing in the form of learning journals and reflective logs is often used as a way of capturing reflection” (Hinnet, 1997). We then use these journals to learn something from the experiences we wrote down. 

This leads me on to Kolb’s Learning Cycle. 

Concrete Experience: This is where Kolb’s cycle begins. This could perhaps be an individual or team task that has been assigned to them. In a teaching environment, more specifically, it could be ice-breakers, a practical exercises, or even a discussion or debate. In Kolb’s model, the individual or team member must actually “do” in order to learn.

Reflective Observation: This is stage two in the cycle. A time to step back from the “doing” part of the task and review (reflect) what has just happened (what they have just experienced). Again, from a teaching perspective this could be, peer evaluation, self evaluation or in the form of a journal. I know in the school I currently work in, through-out both the dance and drama BTEc courses, the students are asked to keep a log as part of their learning. For Kolb, it was very important for the individual/team to communicate to one another and discuss their learning.

Abstract Conceptualisation: This is the process of making sense of what has just happened. The individual/team makes comparisons between what they have done and what they already know and reflect upon this. When teaching, this would be the point where the students “give something”. Fore example, the theories or facts they have come up with based on the information they have been provided with, or more formally, present their findings to the rest of the class.

Active Experimentation: This is the final stage of the cycle and a chance for the individual or team to out what they have learnt into practice. It also leads them onto make predictions of ‘what happens next’. This is key part of both learning and reflecting because it is reflecting upon your learning that leads you onto where you will next take your learning and then cycle would repeat. In teaching, especially in say drama, give the learner the opportunity to use role play to express what they have learnt throughout the lesson. Or more simply, homework!

Looking back over my ‘Reflective Practice’ in both my online blog and private journal it would seem that I am reflecting on reflections.

“Reflection can happen while you are in the middle of it; reflection-in-action, 

or,

 reflection can happen looking back on it; reflection-on-action” 

(Schön, 1987)

When teaching, I often find myself adapting choreography to suit the capability of the children. This is a prime example of me ‘reflecting IN action’ in order to make the most out of the lesson and also get the most out of the pupils. One argument could be that I should know the standard the class are at before entering the room and so therefor should have planned an appropriate class, but everyone knows that there are always “off-days” or just wanting to push the class that bit further and this is why I feel, particularly in the teaching profession, reflection-in-action, is a vital part of the learning. I say “learning” because at the end of the day or lesson, you go away and use reflection-on-action and see what it was you had to change. You then use the experience for the planning of the next lesson.

“A reflection in a mirror is an exact replica of what is in front of it. Reflection in professional practice, however, gives back not what it is, but what it might be, an improvement on the original” (Biggs, 1999). In other words, reflection is not simply acknowledging the events that took place and where we might go next with the information we have and what may become of that, but it is a transformational process.

Task 2b: Reflective Writing Task

So it’s been quite a while since my last blog and although it has slightly hindered my blogging process a lot has happened recently which has somewhat aided my journal writing experience. One of the main things being that I have been asked to choreograph a dance for a national schools dance competition. Whilst not the next ‘Ghost Dances’ it is a still “A new and exciting learning process for both me and my students” (Amy, 2013). 

The first style of writing I tried was ‘Description’. I did what was asked and “described” the day in quite a detailed narrative, saying what had happened and what the main events had been, however, my account seemed to contain very little self-reflection of my own reactions. I would touch upon fragments of my emotions but would not continue to explore them further. As I researched more into this style of ‘Reflective Writing’ I found a quote that summed this up precisely, “There may be references to emotional reactions but they are not explored and not related to behavior”, (Moon, A Framework for Reflective Writing). This text further explores different methods of writing and separates, ‘Descriptive Writing’, ‘Descriptive account with some reflection’, ‘Reflective Writing (1)’ and ‘Reflective Writing (2)’. 

Although I criticized the lack of reflection in my ‘Descriptive Account’, I do feel that out of all the styles, this is the one that came most naturally to me, as would it appear in many of the other blogs I have read on this topic. That being said, it could be further developed as a reflective method by incorporating more of my emotional reactions throughout the day.

The next style was ‘List’. This was a quick and straight to the point account of the day but consequently lacked detail you would get from a ‘descriptive’ journal entry. Looking back and reflecting on the journal entry I made in this particular style, I seemed to include lots of small occurrences that happened through the day. I did the lists in bullet point form and found that one bullet point would lead to several more. In some ways this would be a good choice of layout, for example, for an inquiry, but in terms of detailed account of my day, this method would not suffice. From reading the Handbook, I ‘googled’ the site www.listography.com, this is a site you can join and upload lists of whatever you want. One example I read was just a list of movies someone put up entitled, “Movies to watch”. This is a nice idea and another expansion of ‘Web 2.0’ with everyone sharing their opinions/views with, well everyone! However personally, this is not something that wold interest me because I do not feel that I would have a particular use for it.

From here, I went on to explore the style of ‘Evaluation’. What I thought went well. What I learnt/discovered. When writing this felt very similar to ‘Description’ and upon reflecting on this I think that when I wrote in the descriptive style, I was perhaps doing it in a more evaluative style anyway. I read some blogs of past students and one in particular stood out where he had stated that he was strict on himself in terms of what he wrote in his journal in order to stick to the style. I think I should have done this too. I found this style a lot more fluid as it enabled me to include how I felt the day went in both a productive and constructive way. “Today I taught a new warm-up involving different timings and change of direction. The students found this challenging at first but in a positive way and after doing it a couple of times, there was already a huge improvement. It also made me feel good as a teacher because I could see I was pushing them, but they were enjoying it at the same time”. (Amy, 2013). This is just one example of how, in my journal, I was evaluating the point I was making.

Moving onto, ‘Graphs, Charts and Diagrams’. For me, this in no way helped me reflect on any part of the day and when I look back, it hardly even makes sense! I wrote on one blog that I could perhaps use a graph or chart to represent my energy levels or stress levels in comparison to what it is I am doing, and on another blog I noticed they had drawn pictures and diagrams describing what had happened in their day. But to me, this just seems a very time consuming approach and would leave little in terms of detail when they go back and look at the events had taken place. On the other hand, many people find it soothing and relaxing and sometimes easier putting how they feel into a picture rather than writing down the words, there is also the saying, “A picture is worth a thousand words” but I shall leave that one to your own interpretation as to whether or not you agree...

The idea of ‘What If’, was almost like writing a fairly tale as my brain seemed to forget about the bad side of things and always just wandered to what could be the best possible situation with the perfect “happily ever after” ending. As nice as it was to use my imagination and let my creativity flow, unfortunately, I was soon brought back to reality and well, that was the end of that!

Finally, writing in the style of, 'Another View’, I found very, very difficult. It’s hard to imagine how another person could view your day or, on a bigger scale, life and it felt really strange trying to see it from a different point of view. As I am currently teaching at a secondary school, I thought it may be quite interesting to write from the perspective of one of students. Or from one of my colleagues. On doing this it came to my attention that the majority of my day would be spent alone (when I am not teaching that is) and although that is not necessarily a bad thing, on a social front, perhaps a could make more of an effort to speak to people. This sounds silly writing it down but I think I could try this particular method again as it helped me learn something that I wouldn't usually even think about. 

I think learning something about myself was definitely the main outcome from this task. Taking time to sit down and reflect is a huge part of learning and moreover without trying something new like this, I wouldn't have learnt anything. Out of all the styles, O would try ‘Another View’ again just as a kind of experiment but in terms of the style of will most regularly be writing in throughout my journal, I think would be ‘Evaluation’ just because it is what I am most used to and how I would naturally tend to write. I do like using lists and so would use them if making short points I wanted to remember but at this point in time I cannot see myself thinking to use the other styles of writing.

A Framework for Reflective Writing

http://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=4&ved=0CE8QFjAD&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.tawasol.org%2Fdownload%2Ffile%2F340%2F&ei=tqiKUtWYFY2qhAfBsIGYAg&usg=AFQjCNGxKUXQzt9EpokIh2651ShkEDyOkg&sig2=fXKJaLr_DVcP5qyjS7wYBw&bvm=bv.56643336,d.ZG4

Listography

http://www.listography.com