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Microteaching Task: Object-based Learning / Friday 9February 2024 / LCC T11.07

The first online seminar led by Judy Willcocks, Head of Museum & Study Collections at CSM, and Georgina Orgill, Assistant Manager of the University Archives and Special Collections introduced object-based learning as a pedagogy to explore the various ways we experience physical and digital objects. 

Judy Willcocks`s preparatory watching, thinking & doing (video on the archives and the UAL study collections and short film, Emotional Responses to Objects) prior to the Object Based Learning session provided context for the history of the Central Saint Martins Museum & Study Collection as well as addressed the multi-sensory aspects in object-based sessions and instinctive reactions to objects; how a response to an object is formed based on an individual`s disciplinary training, cultural background and/or life experience. How the exploration of the emotional or extra-rational responses to objects as a key part of experiential learning in art/design context can enhance learning awareness, encourage object analysis and critical reflection (Willcocks, 2018). References to framework which encourages deep forensic examination of objects such as methodology based on the work of Jules Prown that coined the phrase Material Culture in the 1980s and advocated a staged examination of objects through description, deduction, hypothesis and the material qualities of objects deducing from a close examination before moving on to storytelling offered a deeper understanding of the online seminar. Further reference to Perspectives on Object-Centered Learning in Museums by Scott G. Paris addressing the issue of object engagement in a museum setting, the meaning of an object not held inherently within the object itself rather a transaction between the object and the learner, Jerome Bruner`s attributed interest and curiosity as being the key motivations for learning, Lev Vygotsky`s investigation on object-oriented action, the ways humans use objects as mediation aiding in memory, reasoning and how learning is being constructed by the learner contextualised the session.

Dr Kirsten Hardie, graphic design historian and cultural theorist also refers to constructing meaning through interpretation of objects as part of process of learning, encouraging analysis and critical reflection. In a report from the Innovative Pedagogies Series, the reconsideration of the value of particular objects and university museum collections suggest how objects can be used to facilitate learning by presenting key pedagogical case studies that highlight activities created to enable and advance object-based learning (Hardie, 2015).

As a response to the online seminar, relevant contextual material and Microteaching task brief I prepared a 20 min learning activity based around an object. I approached my peers as they truly are, a group of teachers from different disciplines. I viewed the task as an opportunity to initiate a discussion by showing an object in an interdisciplinary way on the assumption that the focus on object engagement isn`t necessary discipline specific but rooted to own experience, visual literacy (ability to read objects and find meaning from them), critical/analytical skills and aesthetic judgment.

I used Judy Willcocks`s Emotional or Extra-rational Reading of an Object questions as an exercise that encourages the readers/participants to be self-aware, explore their inner world and question their habituated responses to objects.

THE DIGITAL SOANE was a competition initiated by the Royal College of Art Jewellery & Metal alumni to create a series of pieces for Sir John Soane`s Museum to enhance digital techniques in craft.  

3D scanning specialists scanned the museum’s bust of Sir John Soane using hand-held equipment before 3D before 3d printing it and digitally fragmented it. The fragmented pieces were then used as the starting for the creation of a new object by the RCA Jewellery & Metal alumni through the programme`s Thinking Digital Initiative in 2014. The digital fragments 3D printed in various materials were given to the participants of the competition that we re-interpreted them into a range of outcomes to the displayed and potentially sold at the museum’s shop.

My response was to recreate my Fragment (back of Sir John Soane`s head) in a piece of wood, washed up from the shore of the river Thames. I took inspiration from Soane`s Design from a bridge named Triumphal Bridge across the Thames that won the Royal Academy gold medal in 1776. The accolade was a milestone in Soane`s career as led to a scholarship to travel to Italy for 3 years. It was during this period that his close friend and fellow student James King had drowned on a boating trip to Greenwich. Soane, a non-swimmer, was going to be with him but decided to stay home and work on his design for a Triumphal Bridge.

The architectural drawing and this serendipitous incident are piecing together a narrative comparable with the fragmented nature of Sir john`s digitally “shattered” bust originally made by Francis Chantrey and the nature of the museum housing not only drawings, architectural models of Soane`s projects, large collection of paintings, sculptures, antiquities but also curious objects such a large sea fungus, a skeleton, a plaster beaver, a bent twig, a lock of Napoleon`s hair preserved in a ring. The film A Triumphal Bridge and a Boating Trip to Greenwich in 1776 and in 2014 shows process, how Soane`s fragment of his bust is digitally reproduced (CNC milled) on the surface of drift wood sourced from the Thames foreshore is an attempt to tell the story of an object. The Thames is here considered as a museum, composed of a plethora of flotsam and jetsam objects, mingled together with objects from all periods; a democratic coexistence of objects subjected to chance.

Once out of context the object is released from its history, the marble bust, Soane`s home, a part of a body, the proximity to something intimate as human hair. Bare from associations the driftwood was presented to my peers. I referred to the story behind the object and based on Judy Willcocks`s Emotional or extra-rational reading of an object exercise I asked my peers to reflect on their immediate reaction to the object, their emotional, physical responses, what the object reminded them of, made them think of, how does that influenced the way they encountered the object, if they could relate this object to themselves or their lives, how and/or if triggered their imagination, if they felt comfortable touching an object sourced from the Thames foreshore:

References:

Hardie K. (2015) Wow: the power of objects in object-based learning and teaching: Innovative Pedagogies Series. Higher Education Academy. Available at: https://s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/assets.creode.advancehe-document-manager/documents/hea/private/kirsten_hardie_final_1568037367.pdf

Willcocks J. (2018) Central Saint Martins Museum & Study Collection: Object-based learning and the modern art school curriculum. Judy Willcocks Copenhagen Presentation. University of the Arts London. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M3O7MM5WuFo

Willcocks J. (2021) Central Saint Martins Museum & Study Collection: Emotional Responses to Objects. University of the Arts London. Available at: https://arts.ac.libguides.com/c.php?g=686452&p=4906489

Further References/Reading:

Artech 3D (2014) The Digital Soane: How Artec 3D scanners bring together new technologies and contemporary art. Available at: https://www.artec3d.com/news/digital-soane-how-artec-3d-scanners-bring-together-new-technologies

Google/Wikipedia Entry (2024) John Soane. Available at:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Soane

Hidden Architecture (no date) Triumphal Bridge. Available at: https://hiddenarchitecture.net/triumphal-bridge/

Lever J. (2005) Sir John Soane`s Museum Collection Online: Rough preliminary designs, some attributed to George Dance, and design ‘for a Mausoleum to the Memory of James King drowned June 9. 1776’ , 1776-7, with J.M.Gandy perspectives, 1799-1800 (19). Available at: https://collections.soane.org/drawings?ci_search_type=ARCI&mi_search_type=adv&sort=7&tn=Drawings&t=SCHEME117

Militsi M. (2014) Digital Soane: A Triumphal Bridge and a Boating Trip to Greenwich in 1776 and in 2014. Available at: https://vimeo.com/110061495

Sir John Soane`s Museum (2007) A New Description of Sir John Soane`s Museum. Sir John Soane`s Museum 11th Revised Edition

Summerson J. (1978) The Architectural Review: John Soane and the Furniture of Death. Available at: https://www.architectural-review.com/essays/john-soane-and-the-furniture-of-death

“Who am I”? What is my role as a teacher within the context of the higher education sector and the ever-shifting landscape of the creative industries? How open am I to the requiring changes in my identity and worldview as I re-encounter myself as a learner? How both my own teaching practice and creative practice interrelate and connect my experience with that of the students as they embark on their year-out-in-industry? An optional, experiential work-based learning opportunity where students can test, develop, and exchange knowledge and skills in a professional context for one academic cycle. As a Diploma in Professional Studies tutor I facilitate the space between second and final year study for the CSM BA Jewellery Design and BA Textile Design students to reflect on real-life experience, contextualise placement learning as appropriate to their creative practices, meet the learning outcomes and assessment criteria of their DPS year before they resume and complete their BA degrees; a dialogic space, created to elicit student perceptions on their creative practice, aptitude, diverse background and life experience as well as to allow professional practice norms, industry ethical and sustainability approaches to be challenged, reinterpreted and reevaluated.

Yet how do I reevaluate my teaching practice embedded in the context of real-world relationships, opportunities and constraints (Mckie, 2022)? As I progress through the PgCert academic practice programme I`m provided the space to reflect on my professional identity, familiarise with new to me language of higher education literature, teaching philosophies and theory, pedagogic methods and techniques applicable to my local context of teaching; being provided with the initial framework for reflection to be enabled to try out ideas in a safe space that I can ‘mess up’ if necessary (Mckie, 2022).

The online session from the TPP Event Series led by Annamarie McKie: Reflect on this..or that? Enabling space for reflection on the creative arts outlined different contexts for reflection and strategies to set up safe spaces to deconstruct teaching terms, experiment with educative technology and un-learn practices. How lecturers are enabled to derive ideas from their disciplinary practices to put a fresh perspective on their reflections as educators.

The prep reading for the session: The Critically Reflective Practitioner (chapter 3, Contexts for Reflection, pages 55–69) cover the concepts of Personal Reflective Space and Dyadic Reflective Space (Thompson & Thompson, 2008) and refer to David Clutterbuck’s comments on reflective space at three levels: personal (quiet thinking, time on one`s own); dyadic (one-to-one); and as a group or team (1998, p.15). Notions of philosophical thought and Friedrich Nietzsche`s work and the school of existentialist thought of being a free spirit is consistent with the philosophy of critically reflective practice as opposed of being bound by mindless acceptance of teaching habits that may need adjustment; being immersed into day-to-day workload pressures I often find myself losing sight of my own role as a university teacher but also of my own disciplinary practice in the process and I may suppress learning opportunities presented through critically reflective practice and some valuable aspects of academic identity work.

Ben Miller on his paper Brookfield’s Four Lenses: Becoming a Critically Reflective Teacher (2010) argues: “The most important aspect to excellent critical practice involves going beyond the collection of feedback (from self, student, peer or scholarly lenses) by altering teaching methods and goals, documenting those changes and any progress toward goals, and becoming a student-centred, flexible and innovative teacher. Overall, Brookfield argues that excellent teachers, in a deliberate and sustained way, continually attempt to shape teaching and learning environments into democratic spaces of knowledge exchange (Brookfield, 1995).

References:

Mckie A. (2022) An exploration of How Creative Arts Lecturers in Higher Education Talk About Reflecting on Their Teaching, Doctoral Thesis [EDD] University of Roehampton. Available at: https://pure.roehampton.ac.uk/portal/en/studentTheses/an-exploration-of-how-creative-arts-lecturers-in-higher-education

Miller B. (2010) Brookfield’s Four Lenses: Becoming a Critically Reflective Teacher, Faculty of Arts Teaching and Learning Committee, The University of Sydney. Available at: https://valenciacollege.edu/faculty/development/courses-resources/documents/brookfield_summary.pdf

Perec G. (1997) Species of Spaces and Other Pieces. London: Penguin Books, pp 15

Thompson S. & Thompson N. (2008) Contexts for Reflection, The Critically Reflective Practitioner, London: Bloomsbury Publishing, pp 55–69

Further References/Reading:

Brookfield S. (1995) Becoming a Critically Reflective Teacher, San-Francisco: Jossey-Bass