Session to be observed: Concrete Future Workshop
Size of student group: 15-25
Observer: Vida Vega
Observee: Becky Allen
Part One
What is the context of this session/artefact within the curriculum?
Concrete Future is workshop run once each term to support year 3 BA Illustration students with their progression aims. Each term the workshop is different and builds upon the previous session. Concrete Future runs alongside their core teaching and is reviewed at summative assessment points.
How long have you been working with this group and in what capacity?
I have been working with all third years since the end of their second year (June 2023 – present). This Concrete Future session is on a sign-up basis and therefore this group may be comprised of students who have not worked together before
What are the intended or expected learning outcomes?
The session strives to build upon student’s progression aims and support the development of their professionality:
- Demonstrate the integrated use of sustainable, coherent and critically engaged and personally defined research methodology and developed from a wide range of relevant sources
- Demonstrate a very high level of autonomy in your independent and collaborative Illustration practice through the proactive and personally defined management of your own learning and the use of critical reflection and self- evaluation methods
- Professionally communicate your practice, research, ideas and skills in visual, verbal and/or written forms appropriate to multiple and varied audiences demonstrating your critical understanding of Illustration in the wider context
What are the anticipated outputs (anything students will make/do)?
A Task sheet/booklet will completed containing the following:
- Students will start forming a Vision statement
- Students will start forming a Mission statement
- Students will prepare 5 progression goals according to SMART principles.
Are there potential difficulties or specific areas of concern?
- Whole group interactions – We may have a quiet group that respond minimally to interactive group questions and discussion.
- Students may be uncomfortable working in groups with peers less known to them and therefore confidence to give feedback may be limited.
- Students may not have attended the original (mandatory) session in term 1 and therefore may not be aware of all terms or tasks mentioned previously.
- Students may not have brough adequate resources to work with – e.g. laptop, notebook/sketchbook
How will students be informed of the observation/review?
Student will be informed in an email prior to the session (in a reminder email) and also told at the beginning of the session.
What would you particularly like feedback on?
It would be helpful to get feedback on:
- Level of student engagement with the tasks during the session
- Student engagement with each other when giving peer feedback – was their feedback critical, constructive or compassionate? How can I support this?
- Student responses to tutor led discussion – I want to encourage a relaxed and informal session to encourage students to speak up and interact.
- Is the session inclusive and responding to a range of student’s needs. How could I make it more so?
How will feedback be exchanged?
Through use of this document and email correspondence.
Part Two
Level of student engagement with the tasks during the session
- 17 students came – great turnout for an optional session!
- At first students were quiet but nodding and following the introduction.
Everyone was engaging quietly, writing on the sheets of paper given and looking at the prompts on screen. As the session went on, they were talking more with each other and asking questions. - The session itself is quite introspective, as one of the students noted of one of the prompts “it’s a big question!”.
I thought it was good and reassuring that you reinforced that it’s ok to be hazy on some of the answers at this stage, encouraging engagement at different levels and creating a safe space in which to open up and share their thoughts. - Mission statement / vision statement. The level of detail that each of these tasks requires follows on naturally, encouraging more focus and defined reflection from the students (constructive alignment!).
- SMART goal setting in groups / pairs – most people started doing this on their own rather than together. But everyone engaged with the task and was thinking and writing throughout.
It’s a tricky to encourage interaction and peer feedback in such a short session that requires individual writing time as well. - At the end of the session when you explained to me and Chris that normally this would be a 2 hour session that made a lot of sense, there is a lot of reflection to squeeze into 1 hour and balancing giving students enough time to think individually and also to interact with each other is challenging. I think you did the right thing and gave the students more time to engage with the questions on their own as ultimately the session is about goal setting and defining their individual practices.
Student engagement with each other when giving peer feedback – was their feedback critical, constructive or compassionate? How can I support this?
- Some students who seemed to know each other were happily chatting and offering feedback based on what they already knew of each other’s work. The ones who came in late and sat alone / didn’t know anyone else in the room were a little more isolated.
- Maybe during the activity when they write feedback for one another the booklets could be handed to you and shuffled before being given back out to ensure all students swap equally and have a chance to make new connections whether they know the group or not.
- Another small suggestion: you could move students around when the group tasks start so that latecomers have a chance to move onto tables / into groups that are of equal size.
- The prompts you gave were really useful: Ask a question, Identify something that works well, Acknowledge what could be developed. Good structure to ensure the feedback is constructive and compassionate. It may have been nice to get the students to do this verbally as well, both to build rapport and to practice giving critical feedback to one another in person. It’s hard to comment on how critical and constructive their feedback was since most of it was written and handed directly between students.
Student responses to tutor led discussion – I want to encourage a relaxed and informal session to encourage students to speak up and interact.
- Students answered questions that were offered as prompts (what jobs might one get after an illustration degree) and were comfortable speaking during the session.
- I really like the writing on pieces of paper to record student responses on the wall – I sometimes forget how personal and tactile analogue activities are. Simple and informal but very effective at acknowledging / validating student responses. I found this also encouraged students to expand on their thoughts in a very natural way and engage with you, directing you to write more. Maybe you could do this at different points throughout the session?
- A student asked a question “what does it mean – what are you committed to?”, it might be good to unpack terminology like this a little at the start by asking students for some examples and having a group discussion before getting everyone writing – a little like you did at the beginning of the session with the question about what jobs they might get.
- Maybe leave more silence for students write in response to the prompts – it can be hard to write and listen at the same time. I personally struggle with leaving silences during workshops I’m running but I realise how important those moments are, how sometimes it’s important to be there in support, hold the space and do less. Perhaps they could collaborate and do the task together in pairs to encourage more discussion?
- You mentioned a really good point about writing a statement about yourself in 4 different ways and how an “arrogant” tone is actually just normal and confident. This was an excellent point though it perhaps only made sense to those who had been in Nick’s class. Is there a way of folding it into this session? Expanding on it and unpacking it a little?
Is the session inclusive and responding to a range of student’s needs. How could I make it more so?
- The screen the presentation is on is quite small, making it hard to read the type from further back in the space. Having printouts to support students who can’t see it / are seated facing away is a really thoughtful detail. Your offer to move the screen closer to people was also very helpful.
- Having a coloured background on your presentation slides is great in terms of inclusivity – is there sufficient contrast between the type and background colours? I find this tool useful for testing colour combinations and making sure I’m designing templates inclusively: https://toolness.github.io/accessible-color-matrix/
- You could save a couple of empty chairs at the tables closest to the entrance for late comers to make it easy for people to slot in unobtrusively.
- I wondered if the session was intentionally focusing on UK employment or if it could be expanded a little to touch on international jobs / job market as a nod to some of the international students in attendance.
- The printed sheets you provided are great for students to fill out and take away, directing the session and encouraging reflection.
- The flexibility of having the list of “who is your inspiration?” on Moodle for people to access from phones / laptops as well as printed out for those without devices made the session accessible for everyone – fantastic.
In my department at LCC, we’ve been advised to embed slides / tasks on Moodle a minimum of 24 hours before a session so students can read the materials beforehand. I always make changes to my documents up until the last minute so a way round this is to embed the presentation on Moodle (google doc / onedrive) labelling it as a draft so that you can continue to work on it but students who wish to can also get a sense of the session in advance. - I loved the excerpts (e.g. SMART goal setting: specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, timely) you picked from the book you mentioned in the session:“The profitable artist” Peter Cobb and Felicity Hogan. It gives students the chance to dig deeper if they want andI am going to look it up for myself!
Part Three
- Vida’s notes on how to make the digital presentation more accessible was really useful. Using more than one screen or a larger format using a projector would be more beneficial for visibility moving forwards so that more of the group are able to connect with the presentation.
- The online tool for testing colour combinations is a very useful resource that I will definitely use when making future presentations. This will be so helpful to make sure that I am able to communicate clearly and inclusively.
- Creating areas with empty seats at the front for late students to fill is a brilliant idea for making latecomers feel at ease joining the session. This will also help with the flow of the session so I do not have to find seats each time a student joins us. If these areas are not filled by latecomers, then I will need to ensure the groups are evenly spaced at some point during the session – perhaps when we break out to do timed tasks.
- Providing a focus for international career opportunities is a very valid suggestion and something that is on my list to explore and incorporate into these sessions. Currently I am trying to find leaver information or data that indicates career paths of graduated international students, as well as home students seeking employment or opportunities abroad. This is definitely something I want to take into account and develop for future sessions as part of mr role.
- Notes on how to use Moodle more efficiently is a helpful suggestion and using draft modes as well as published content is something that would help the session. This way, I can edit the document as we progress throughout the session with student contributions and publish this subsequently to the workshop, without disrupting the student accessible version