2001 - Volume 20: Number 1
Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?: Resetting the Table of Modernist Art
ASHTON, LINDA
Volume 20.1
Racism has often been expressed in the form of physical violations of human rights, soul destroying emotional taunts and deliberate policies of social exclusion. Many educators who oppose such an approach would be horrified to find racist origins embedded in the aesthetic discourses which they have taken up as their own. In this paper I trace racist imagery and ideology in my own childhood, early schooling and adult art learning, and connect this with the persistent silencing of the black ‘other’ in the story of modernist art. As an educator of future art teachers the deconstruction of racist discourses is as essential as it is for pre-service students in their own emergent art pedagogy.
Assessment in Educational Practice: Forming Pedagogised Identities in the Art Curriculum
ATKINSON, DENNIS
Volume 20.1
This paper draws on the work of Jacques Lacan and Jacques Derrida in order to present a discussion of how students and teachers in the field of art and design education achieve their pedagogised identities. My purpose is to offer some thoughts on assessment by advocating a project of difference which attempts to embrace children’s and student’s ontological orientations of practice. Assessment discourses which assume universal and essentialist ideas of ability are criticised and shown to presuppose objective or naturalist fantasies. A valuing of difference and the singularity of practice is proposed by describing five drawings produced by Year 7 students in a London secondary school, and then by referring to the Lacanian Real in order to extricate the art object from normative assessment discourses.
The Vertex Project: Children Creating and Populating 3-D Virtual Worlds
BAILEY, FIONA & MOAR, MAGNUS
Volume 20.1
This paper outlines early investigations and initial outcomes of The Vertex Project, a school-based action research project currently underway at Middlesex University. The project aims to explore the potential of Shared 3D Virtual Environments as creative learning tools for children, and looks into the challenges facing their practical integration into the primary classroom. Working in partnership with three primary schools, the project sets out to investigate the teaching and learning possibilities offered by Internet based 3D virtual environments, placing particular emphasis on the opportunities provided by the active participation of children in the design and construction of their own virtual worlds, and in the creation of avatars with which to represent themselves within these spaces.
The Trouble with GCSE and Critical Studies
BLOXHAM, ANNABEL & WASS, KITTY
Volume 20.1
Most of the pupils of Surbiton High School found the Critical Studies section in GCSE Art challenging, difficult and less rewarding than art practice. The art staff addressed this problem, and this study describes the methods we used to integrate critical studies with practical Art and Design which the majority of students found acceptable and enjoyable and resulted in improved standards.
ICT in Art
CALLOW, PHILLIP
Volume 20.1
The role of ICT in art teaching is I believe of great importance. The paper outlines and illustrates some of the reasons and connections and makes an argument for its increased usage in future art education in schools. The work shown uses hardware and software that is affordable for most schools and creates links through the internet and Web page design on an international scale.
Designing Teaching and Assessment Methods for Diverse Student Populations
CHO, MIKA & FOYLE, EDWARD
Volume 20.1
The American student population is becoming increasingly diverse in terms of race and culture. To address this pluralism, a study of learning style preferences was developed for purposes of designing more relevant teaching and assessment methods. Different theories of learning styles were incorporated into a survey that was administered to 483 students at four major universities. This survey compared learning style preferences according to ethnic and socio-economic categories. Although it initially focused on students in Art and Design, it was eventually expanded to other disciplines for more inclusive reliability. The statistical analyses of this study are presented with corresponding recommendations for more effective teaching and assessment practices.
Specialist Art and Design Courses at 16+: Restriction or Liberation?
FINCH, SARI
Volume 20.1
Recent educational reorganisation of further education has highlighted once again the issue of how we should educate our sixteen year olds for a career in art and design. Trends have alternated between vocational or general art education both being largely driven by industrial and economic need. The paper examines whether one or both approaches are most suitable for 16+ learners and evaluates some initial findings.
Problem Interpretation and Resolution via Visual Stimuli: The Use of ‘Mood Boards’ in Design Education
GARNER, STEVE & McDONAGH-PHILIP, DEANA
Volume 20.1 2001
This paper defines and discusses ‘mood boards’ – those assemblages of images and, less frequently, objects, which are used to assist analysis, creativity and idea development in design activity. There is need for discussion since little published information currently exists to guide students and tutors. The paper proposes that mood boards can assist problem finding as well as problem solving. Primarily, mood boards provide a mechanism for students and practising designers to respond to perceptions about the brief, the problem as it emerges and the ideas as they develop. The construction of mood boards potentially stimulates the perception and interpretation of more ephemeral phenomena such as colour, texture, form, image and status. They are, like Debono’s lateral thinking techniques, partly responses to an inner dialogue and partly provocation to become engaged in such a dialogue. Examples are drawn from recent work in the field of industrial design at Loughborough University.
The Electronic Prometheus and its Consequences for Art Education
KIRSCHENMANN, JOHANNES
Volume 20.1
This paper consists of three parts. First, a discussion of certain aspects of media art pedagogy, secondly, comments on computers from the view of art pedagogy, and finally, thoughts on a future art and media pedagogy.
Obituary: Professor Brian Allison
MASON, RACHEL
Volume 20.1
A tribute to Professor Brian Allison (past president of the National Society for Education in Art & Design (NSEAD) and past president of the International Society for Education through Art (InSEA) who played a significant role in shaping the field in the United Kingdom for over thirty years and had a considerable international reputation.
Re-doing Design: Comparing Anecdotes about Design Research
ROXBURGH, MARK & BREMNER, CRAIG
Volume 20.1
In 1998 the School of Design (SoD), University of Western Sydney Nepean (UWSN) began running an offshore articulation programme in graphic design in partnership with the Nanyang Academy of Fine Art, Singapore (NAFA). The successful completion of this one year programme was built upon three year diploma studies and resulted in the award of Bachelor of Arts (Design) degree from UWSN. The primary focus in this article will be the curriculum and pedagogical challenges that were faced in developing and implementing the one year course. The most significant aspect of this was the relative freedom in moving away from the studio-based anecdote of design learning that dominates many post-secondary design programmes and the implications of this for design education.
Distance No Object: Developing DARE, the Digital Art Resource for Education
SINKER, REBECCA
Volume 20.1
This paper outlines the development of DARE, the Digital Art Resource for Education, detailing its specific aims and sketching the broad context in which the resource has been developed. It then examines a case study where the resource was piloted within a North London secondary school, highlighting some of the issues arising from this such as the need for educators and their pupils to engage critically with the Internet as a distance learning tool, and the importance of an equally critical practice in using new technologies to support art and design.