Arts Timeline by https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw My experiences in AED1260 this semester from understanding the importance of arts in education to my role as a teacher/facilitator of learning and the benefits of drama, dance and media arts. en-us 2020-03-11 01:00:06 UTC 2024-11-21 10:23:40 UTC hello@padlet.com https://padlet.net/icons/png/1f3ad.png Week 3 - Choral Reading/Reader's Theatre jenar https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/458040775 Now that we are in week 3 I am beginning to feel more comfortable with attending the arts workshops and with participating in all the activities. I am positively surprised with my experiences so far and I think it is interesting to see how the ideas and topics that are covered in the weekly readings are being brought to life in the workshops.

Before this weeks workshop and assigned readings I had no prior knowledge on choral reading or reader's theatre, so I found it particularly interesting to research further. I learnt that choral reading is the practice of reading in unison (in varying group sizes) and that reader's theatre builds on this with students standing in lines or semicircles performing a script. In the workshop we were asked to create a short performance based on a script we were given, adding actions and movement where we thought appropriate. After reflecting on everything I learnt this week, I think the most important thing I learnt was the educational benefits of choral reading/readers theatre. This is because it can cater for a range of diverse learner needs without making students feel isolated or as though they are being left behind in activities. This resonated with me as it shows how drama can be used to foster collaboration and cooperation amongst students in the classroom.

For students with speech impediments choral reading has been proven to dramatically reduce or in some cases even rid children of their impediment (most commonly stuttering). This is because the process of reading along with others and the mimicking reading effect that occurs can override the part of the brain that causes stuttering. As a teacher delivering an arts program in the future I can use this in my drama lessons to support these students and help them feel more self-confident in their ability to participate in activities. I can also use readers theatre to demonstrate to students that just because some people are different it doesn't mean they have to be left out. Readers theatre can help create a sense of social awareness in the classroom and foster a sense of community and respect. Classmates who have impediments are able to collaborate with their peers that don't have impediments without discrimination.

ESL students can also be benefited by readers theatre as the collective reading helps support their developing ability to recognise and read words. 

My role as a teacher facilitating choral reading/readers theatre activities:
  • Use an expressive voice + gestures when demonstrating/encourage children to use these
  • Chose texts that have a rhythm or 'beat' to them 
  • I could use a video to show children what readers theatre looks like e.g. arrangement of people, voice manipulation, actions
  • Ask children questions about the ideas presented in the scripts
  • I could allocate numbers in groups to determine who speaks when
  • I could ask students to number their lines to make it easier for them/provide them with already numbered scripts

Popular books/poem books that have a good rhythm that I could use as a pre-service teacher in a readers theatre lesson:
  • The Giant Turnip by Edie Evens (has a repetitive structure which could help beginner readers)
  • Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? by Bill Jr Martin
  • There Were Ten in the Bed by Susan Chapman Calitri 
  • Families, Families, Families! by Suzanne Lang

I have attached a video that shows the powerful effects of choral speaking on people with speech impediments. 
]]> 2020-03-11 01:01:48 UTC https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/458040775 Week 4 - Storytelling jenar https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/458067710 Some of the points mentioned in the textbook this week, such as how storytelling can be used to help students understand other cultures made me reconsider just how important storytelling is. I feel as though I may have disregarded it previously as an activity where as a teacher I would read children a book, however I feel like I now have a much clearer understanding of why storytelling should be utilised in primary school arts classrooms.

One of the reasons why storytelling is an important aspect of a  drama/arts curriculum is because it allows for children to more deeply understand the world in which they live and expand their own knowledge/ideas. Storytelling help children think outside the box as stories can represent what it going on in the world around them and can represent a range of different people's experiences and lifestyles. Storytelling can also help students accept themselves and others as children can listen to/can tell stories about their own family cultural heritage. If children are able to share stories from their culture and are able to learn about other cultures, then students will grow to appreciate and accept their peers unique traits. As a teacher if I am able to promote a sense of cultural awareness through storytelling then students will be learning important life skills. Fiction stories such as fables, myths/legends and fairy tales often have important messages/lessons within them which can be meaningful for students to learn. 

Other benefits of storytelling:
  • Promotes creativity and imagination 
  • Helps develop children's speaking and listening skills
  • Helps children engage with alternative perspectives (e.g. historically, culturally)
  • Development of narrative skills (e.g. structure - setting, climax, resolution and character development)
  • When sharing stories students can be prompted to explore dramatic elements such as space, movement and time (pauses, fast or slow speaking) to create different moods

Some things I would need to consider as a pre-service teacher when completing storytelling activities in my arts lessons:
  • Storytelling that occurs in a drama class is different from recounting events. Dinham recommends exploring voice, actions/gestures, eye contact, facial expressions and pregnant pauses.
  • That storytelling can be very simple or can be complex. For example with older children the use of cues, moral dilemmas or props could help form ideas for stories. A good progression between being told stories and then acting them out and developing a story from scratch could be asking students to perform a recount of a story they are comfortable with.
  • Sharing stories (especially if they are personal) can be nerve racking and I will need to create an environment that is comfortable, respectful and accepting. 

I have attached a link to a webpage that has a few examples of activities to improve children's own storytelling abilities that I really liked. My favourites activities were the 'Story Stick' (because I feel that it could be modified easily to allow for younger and older students to participate) and the 'Story Stones' (because I think it provides younger children with a more exciting prompt system than flashcards). Both of these could be used by students to explain to their peers their own life story/their family life stories.
]]> 2020-03-11 02:21:01 UTC https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/458067710 Week 1 - Tableaux jenar https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/513878763 The idea of having drama as the first section of the arts unit this semester made me quite anxious as I am not normally comfortable 'performing' or 'acting'. However, after undertaking the first workshop I found that I had actually quite enjoyed myself and found myself feeling comfortable by the end of the lesson. The tableaux activity was something new to me and it was something that I really enjoyed and could see myself employing as a teacher in the future. Tableaux is an activity in which students must freeze in their poses to create a picture - usually in groups of four or five. I found it interesting how this activity could be adapted easily to cater for other subject areas (e.g. science with life cycles of animals, english to comprehend narrative structure or in HASS to present historical events). I also found it interesting how this activity could be used to help those who are normally reserved or not as confident in a drama setting (like myself) to be actively involved without having to perform in a traditional sense. 

Ways I found to modify or extend the traditional tableaux:
  • The scene can be brought to life when the teacher claps their hands
  • Can use 'thought tracking' to find out more about frozen characters (tapping students on the shoulder and then they share what they are thinking/doing) 
  • Asking the children to explore with different levels (e.g. ground, standing, sitting, stretching)
  • Students form a part of an object and when they come together they form a whole (e.g. washing machine) 

Prompt questions I could ask as a pre-service teacher when completing this activity with students:
  • How will you stand?
  • What do you want other's/your audience to think/see?
  • How will you show emotions/what facial expressions will you hold?
  • Are you all going to stand at the same level or are you going to be on different levels?

I have attached a link to a video of students using tableaux to create the story Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs to show how this activity could be used to help develop children's understanding of narrative structure and drama concepts such as levels.  
]]> 2020-04-18 00:50:29 UTC https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/513878763 Week 2 - Puppetry jenar https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/513878819 I was highly anticipating this weeks workshop after finding out we would be exploring puppetry. Watching the video on the War Horse stage production this week fascinated me, which along with the balloon/plastic bag puppets we created in class inspired me to research how puppetry could be used to benefit students in primary school arts education.

My biggest realisation this week was that puppetry can benefit students in so many ways. This was because in my head I had preconceived notion that puppetry consisted of merely shows that were given to children for comedic or story telling purposes. I learnt that most of the benefits of using puppets/puppetry actually come from the creation and experimentation of this during class activities. This was an important realisation as without knowing the benefits of puppetry and how multifaceted it is I most likely wouldn't have considered using it with students beyond a younger primary level.

Some of the benefits of puppetry I learnt were:
  • It helps develop social skills. Puppetry can help increase and extend student's communicative skills as they are able to trial social situations through their puppets. 
  • Puppets can support confidence in reading and speaking. Some children may struggle with reading or speaking aloud in class and puppets can therefore be used to help give children the support needed to do this.
  • Puppets can help develop children's motor skills. Student's using puppets are required to manipulate them and explore the ways in which they can cause the puppets to move. This helps encourage the development of fine motor skills, especially hand coordination skills.
  • Puppets can encourage creativity. When using puppets children are often asked to embody a persona or adopt a character. This allows children to create situations and stories whilst using outside of the box problem solving strategies. 
  • Dramatic play (which is natural to young children) is promoted and enhanced through puppets. Children can use puppets to act out their own scenarios and manipulate the 'characters' that the puppets are given in a variety of ways.
  • Puppetry can be used to help diverse learners such as English as a second language (ESL) students and those with disabilities.

The document attached presents the findings of an in depth study into why puppetry should be used as a pedagogical tool in the classroom for teachers and also how they can be used by students to promote learning on both personal and educational levels. The first few pages of the document are particularly helpful in summarising this.

As a teacher my role would be to help facilitate creativity and experimentation in activities involving puppetry. Here are some prompt questions that I could ask students as a pre-service teacher in order to do this:
  • How are you going to move you puppet to make it look sad/happy/angry? What kind of movement will you be using?
  • Are you going to speak for your puppet or is it going to show its feelings through actions? 
  • After children present I could ask them to reflect on what they think other people's puppets were doing/feeling. (e.g. What was happening? Did this surprise you? What do you think the puppet might to next?)
  • How much space are you and your puppet using? 
  • What is your puppets relationship to your peers puppets?
]]> 2020-04-18 00:50:37 UTC https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/513878819 Week 5 - Teacher-in-Role jenar https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/513879004 The concept that sparked my interest most this week was the idea of teacher-in-role participation, which is when the teacher directs the activity from the 'inside' using triggering devices/props to represent the transition between teacher and character.  This interested me because until this point I had majorly considered drama to be a teacher directed subject rather than a subject where the teacher is participating as an active character. I think this is important for me personally as it made me realise that even though you are the teacher it doesn't stop you from joining in appropriately. I feel that I, like many pre-service teachers/teachers would benefit from teacher-in-role activities as they allow for you to not only extend the children's skill levels but also expand your own as you are actively able to engage in the learning process like the children. For me, as someone who has very little experience in drama before this unit, teacher-in-role provides a way for me to learn and to try things that are out of my comfort zone, something which I hope to encourage students to do. 

Reasons why teacher-in-role can benefit students:
  • Emphasises to students that the classroom is a safe space and that it is ok to participate.
  • It can help encourage more reserved students to participate as the teacher is showing that it is ok to join in and take risks.
  • The teacher can steer the activity from the inside as they are an active participant - meaning they can present challenging points and stimulate thought/discussion/action of the students in a more fun and engaging manner.
  • It can help students to create and express themselves.

In this weeks readings we were asked to investigate a website called Mantle of the Expert which is dedicated to Dorothy Heathcote, a lady who dedicated much of her career to encouraging the teaching and use of drama in schools. This week I attached a link to some videos of Heathcote in action - exploring the use of teacher-in-role with primary school students. I found it particularly interesting how she was able to engage the students instantly and encourage their participation. Also, I liked how she picked ideas/concepts that her students would enjoy - such as in the Three Looms Waiting video. 
]]> 2020-04-18 00:51:00 UTC https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/513879004 Week 6 - The Elements of Dance jenar https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/513879130 This week we started exploring the art of dance and how dance can be used in primary school arts programs. I was excited for this week as I have always enjoyed dancing with friends, however I have never done it in an educational environment or taken dance lessons so I was interested to learn what would go into teaching dance to students. 

One thing I learnt this week was the elements of dance. Before this week I didn't realise just how important an understanding of these elements were to being able to create effective dance activities for students and how important they were for students to understand and explore dance themselves. The four elements of dance I learnt were body, energy, space and time (BEST). In the workshop this week we were asked to construct a dance sequence with four movements before being asked to modify each movement considering to show an understanding of an element of dance (e.g. space: smaller or taller, time: slower or longer, body: use the upper body or lower body, energy: sharp, strong, smooth). This activity was helpful as it showed me how easily movement can be modified in so many ways and how by changing one small aspect, such as the timing of a movement, the entire style of the sequence changes. 

How the activities this week have shown me how dance can be used by teachers to facilitate creativity in primary students:
  • Everyone ended up with a different routine when we altered our moves to show different elements of dance (something I saw comparing mine to the workshop instructor). 
  • The activity would have encouraged students to move in ways that feel comfortable to them whilst enabling them to try new movements. 
  • There was no right or wrong way of moving in the activity.

How I could use dance elements to encourage children to express themselves?
  • Ask them to use the elements to show different moods/their mood, seasons and reactions to different events.
  • Play a piece of music and have the children use two elements (e.g. time and space) to reflect how it makes them feel
  • Split the room into four sections and give each section of the room a different characteristic e.g. windy, filled with water. Ask students to move between the sections
  • Call out action words e.g. jump and have students see the different ways they can perform this action

I have attached a poster I found that shows many ways in which the elements of dance can be explored more deeply, something I hope to do when I am teaching dance in primary schools myself. 
]]> 2020-04-18 00:51:09 UTC https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/513879130 Week 8 - Media Arts jenar https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/513901334 The most important thing I learnt this week was the different terminology that goes along with media arts, specifically photography. Even revising basic terms such as contrast and the different types of camera shots has enabled me to reflect on my own personal knowledge and see that there are gaps that exist in this area.

When exploring how I would be able to teach children terms associated with media areas I found a website/app called PicMonkey that I found to be helpful. Even though I have learnt how to edit photos in the past personally through my use of social media, this website provided me with a helpful insight into the terminology I would need to use when teaching students and also has given me some ideas about the types of skills I could explore with children when using cameras and editing photos. Also, when exploring this website further, despite many of its pages discussing how their app could be used in photo editing, I feel like I could use many of the ideas to inspire my own media arts activities that I may teach in the future.

Activities that I could use as a teacher in a media arts photography lesson: 
  • Picture scavenger hunt 
  • Creating a photo book (could be used in English to support short stories made)
  • Creating calendars - chose to take a picture of the favourite activity done at school each month
  • Could create story board type sequence of photos to show stages of science experiments
  • Visual voids - when students make paper cut outs and photograph these against natural environments (could use in HASS about endangered species or habitats) 

Edit: I downloaded the pic monkey app myself (the free version) and I found the tools really easy to use, so I feel it would also be a good app to try with students. 
]]> 2020-04-18 01:44:25 UTC https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/513901334 Week 9 - Media Arts Reflection jenar https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/513901359 During week 9 we were asked to reflect on our knowledge of media arts beyond just learning skills, terminology and strategies that we learnt in week 8. A statement about the most relevant skills in media arts being those related to artistic expression was put to us. I believe this to be true as media arts is centred around sharing and voicing one’s personal stories, and without knowing how to manipulate media to produce the intended outcome, this important aspect might be lost. I would consider these skills to be things such as editing videos, managing photos and designing PowerPoint presentations (to name a few). If children aren’t taught the skills to express themselves artistically, then they will struggle to share their personal story accurately through media arts, something which is imperative as students will be growing up in a digital era. 

After completing the media arts component of this unit, I feel like my weakest area would be making/editing videos. I am able to perform basic tasks such as filming a video, however I will need a deeper understanding of how to edit and manipulate footage before I am able to teach children confidently. I plan to do this by watching tutorials online, accessing resources such as Arts Education Australia, Arts POP and FUSE, and by experimenting with these forms myself. Although part of the media arts experience can be me learning from the children, it would be nice to be able to extend those students who need extending and having the knowledge to do so confidently.

I experimented with iMovie and have attached a small clip of my progress. I added effects and sound and also slowed down and sped up videos. ]]> 2020-04-18 01:44:29 UTC https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/513901359 Week 11 - Product v Process jenar https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/513901426 An idea that was reiterated to me to this week in the mini lecture and one that I found to be significant was the idea of product versus the process when creating art of any kind. This is basically whether the final piece of art created is more valuable/of equal value to the steps taken to get to the final product. Before starting this course I would have said that the product is more valuable as it shows students final abilities, however upon reflection I would say that the process is equally, if not more important in some situations. This is because it is when undertaking the construction of the product that students are able to experiment with and learn new skills and techniques. Without first developing these skills and knowledge, students will not be able to express as clearly what they are wanting to convey or be able to create the product that most clearly reflects their intentions.

The group work that we have been doing for our final arts proposal has really hit home for me with this idea because all the planning and workshopping of our ideas has shown me that even though I want our final production to be seamless and aesthetically pleasing, the prep work is where I am going to be learning and improving the most. 
Even reflecting on past weeks where we practise and develop ideas (e.g. in puppetry) before doing group demonstrations to the class this same idea shines through.

I have attached a video that highlights the differences between product and process focused art teaching. I found this to be helpful in providing tips that I will be able to put into my own teaching in the future. (Even though the video has a visual arts focus I feel the content is general enough to apply to all arts learning areas). 

As a teacher I will need to emphasise to my students the importance of the activities they are completing and how the skills they are learning can be applied in other subjects/arts areas. I will need to make sure I am planning arts lessons for my students that help them develop skill and are not just centred towards the end result. I have learnt that by reiterating that mistakes are part of learning and by providing open ended activities/questions to students I will be able to develop this idea in my classroom.]]> 2020-04-18 01:44:37 UTC https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/513901426 Week 12 - A Final Reflection jenar https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/527486751 2020-04-24 05:53:03 UTC https://padlet.com/jenar/a8wkxc1a5iyw/wish/527486751