Record of Observation or Review of Teaching Practice
Session/artefact to be observed/reviewed: 2nd Year MA Performance Screen Seminar on Thursday 6th March 2-4.30pm
Size of student group: Roughly 20
Observer: Linda Aloysius
Observee: Chuck Blue Lowry
Note: This record is solely for exchanging developmental feedback between colleagues. Its reflective aspect informs PgCert and Fellowship assessment, but it is not an official evaluation of teaching and is not intended for other internal or legal applications such as probation or disciplinary action.
Part One:
Observee to complete in brief and send to observer prior to the observation or review:
What is the context of this session/artefact within the curriculum?
This is a one-off seminar for MA Performance: Screen 2nd year students, which has been included as part of their Unit 6 Final Major Project lecture series. Many students will be creating films, installations and moving image works, and this workshop returns to one of the key aspects of filmmaking, sound, which I initially introduced to them in the first week of their studies. This seminar will invite the students to consider ‘anti-soundtrack’ approaches, deepen their understanding and knowledge of what this means and encourage them to consider how to apply this theory to their own practice.
How long have you been working with this group and in what capacity?
I have worked with these students for a year and a half as a lecturer on their course.
What are the intended or expected learning outcomes?
Through reading, discussion, references and exercises, the students will be encouraged to consider how they can experiment and be creative in their approach to soundtrack in their final projects.
Through reading and discussion, the students will gain a deeper understanding of Michel Chion’s 3 Listening Modes and how they can apply this theory to their practice.
The students will explore examples of different listening modes in music and film and discuss how this could impact their own approach to making work.
Hopefully by the end of the session, students will feel inspired to take experimental and creative approaches to sound within their projects.
What are the anticipated outputs (anything students will make/do)?
Students will have a discussion based on reading set in advance of the class.
Students will create short scenes in groups combining sound and vision that demonstrates theory through practice.
Students will engage with discussions throughout the session.
Are there potential difficulties or specific areas of concern?
Students are at a critical point in their major projects, and the majority of them are working in a highly independent way at this stage. Potentially there may be some issues around attendance and lateness, but also some students may already have very clear intentions for how they will use sound within their pieces, so may not be as engaged with the material we will explore. The students are from a diverse range of backgrounds with a range of English language skills, some of the literature may be challenging to unpack so I need to be mindful of how I explain things.
How will students be informed of the observation/review?
I have emailed them in advance of the class to inform them, I will also tell them the week before in a group meeting and verbally before the class starts.
What would you particularly like feedback on?
Anything really, I’m curious about how my approach reads to an outside eye and would like feedback that is gentle and honest!
How will feedback be exchanged?
I would like to receive feedback in written form, but also have a conversation to talk through, if that works for you!
Part Two
Observer to note down observations, suggestions and questions:
Thank you, Chuck, for sharing your teaching materials and recording with me. This was all quite new to me – and fascinating! I felt genuinely educated afterwards and its very clear from the recording and the slides that you’ve produced a very well-crafted and highly engaging session for them.
The following are some thoughts and ideas that may be useful for you to consider for future teaching, and which mainly relate to ensuring inclusion within more diverse student groups – depending on what group you get, they may or may not apply.
Slide Presentation:
It’s always worth doing a spelling and grammar check on the slides and maybe asking someone else to read through to check for things that aren’t picked up – for example, on slide 12 the word “it’s” doesn’t, strictly speaking, need an apostrophe – the apostrophe would only apply if you are using the word “It’s” to compress the two words “It” and “is”. Sorry if this sounds picky – it’s the kind of mistake I make sometimes and doesn’t always come up in a word check – but it is worth adapting, especially to avoid confusion for people for whom English is not their first language and to establish for students that, as tutor, you are a reliable source of knowledge.
Recording:
The way that you talk students through the slides is extremely helpful and very engaging. The example of “ma” on page 15 is intriguing. Whilst I was watching this – and looking at the slides separately too – I did wonder about whether the session could be a bit more inclusive for a broader range of students – for example, for deaf / hard of hearing people and the way that they either partially hear or imagine sounds? There is possibly scope to think about that in relation to the slide about “ma”. What I mean by this is that the idea that sounds surrounding spoken language, and how we perceive their meaning relative to context, could possibly be extended to include the ‘imagined’ sounds that many deaf people – myself included in some contexts – perceive, depending on the context they are in, for example, through lipreading or through being able to hear only some of the sounds in a given situation..? This might seem to complicate your session but may be worth thinking about, not only for disabled students but perhaps also to generate more understanding and compassion about different hearing abilities.
Although the focus of the session is on sounds, and the slide format reflects this by being very clear and not having many visuals so as not to distract from this topic, I wondered whether it’s worth including some further visuals in the slide show as this may help a broader range of students to engage more easily; for example, neurodivergent students usually benefit from a range of stimuli.
Watching your teaching I was extremely impressed by how at ease you appear and how you engage the students so well. Although this suggestion is optional because I personally like things the way they are, I am aware that some students can become distracted by too much hand movement / hand gestures. I am very expressive in this way and use hand gestures a lot, but it’s something I’ve been aware has caused issues for some students previously.
Part Three:
Observee to reflect on the observer’s comments and describe how they will act on the feedback exchanged:
Thank you Linda, for your kind and thoughtful feedback. It’s great to read that you found the material interesting and that you gained new knowledge from the class. This is reassuring to hear and I’m glad that my passion for the topic is being communicated through the references and delivery.
Your feedback around how to make my practice more inclusive is so helpful, and I appreciate the time, care and personal reflections that you put into these comments. I will respond to the feedback mirroring the headings you used above:
Slide Presentation
I absolutely agree that double checking grammar, spelling and referencing is really important to build trust and to demonstrate best practice for the students. As a neurodiverse learner myself, I appreciate that this is an important element of access and that I can and should ask for help and support in this area from my line manager/colleagues ahead of delivery. It makes me think about the time required to deliver well designed and cohesive materials, and that I should give myself as much time as possible to double check ahead of delivery. Sometimes I think of new elements to add a day or two before delivery, and this is where aspects such as imagery, grammar and spelling get a little rushed, so I will bear this in mind for the future. Thank you for pointing it out. I also agree that more visual illustrations could help to engage students on multiple levels, so I will consider this for future slides. I received similar feedback during my micro teach about using more visual references to aid explanation of technical theory – perhaps I rely too heavily on gesticulating(!) to illustrate points and I will certainly incorporate more imagery so that my hands don’t have to do as much of the communicating.
Recording
I’m glad that you found my delivery to be engaging and helpful – I do my best to get the students excited about the material and really enjoy hearing from them and building rapport to aid the exchange of knowledge.
I found your reflections around d/Deaf and hearing-impaired peoples’ accessibility and relationship to sound to be really fascinating and important. I also really appreciate you sharing from your own personal experience too. I acknowledge that fostering inclusive practices is an ongoing process of learning and this feedback is hugely beneficial to my work, particularly when it comes to sound and listening.
In a later Unit that I run with my students, exploring community and collaboration, we partner with Graeae, a d/Deaf and disabled theatre company https://graeae.org/. Jenny Sealey, the artistic director of Graeae, runs a session with the students called ‘The Aesthetics of Access’ which is all about embedding access needs into performance and film works from the beginning of the process, rather than bolting it on as an afterthought at the end of making. I have found this workshop really beneficial myself when making work and will revisit this material to consider how I can apply it to my pedagogical practice too. During the TPP Unit I also took part in some training about inclusive practices with Kat Gill https://www.katgill.co.uk/ which was particularly helpful for thinking about how to support neurodiverse participants in workshops. I will implement my learning from Jenny and Kat to further consider how I can embed these inclusive principles into my pedagogical practice, not just my artistic practice. Some of these principles might include; offering different stimuli for students to engage with, publishing material online in advance, offering space for questions and sharing feedback, using visuals as well as audio explainers and including references from d/Deaf, disabled and neurodiverse artists working in the medium of sound. This is an important reminder that every year the demographic of the students in our course will shift and change, and that creating a learning environment that meets a diverse range of needs will be of benefit to everyone. I often encourage students to think about accessibility in their works, so I should also be modelling this in the classroom too, as much as possible.
Thank you, Linda, for taking the time to review my slides and recording, your feedback has been really valuable to my development as a lecturer.
p.s. Since sending my Part 3 Reflections back to you, I discussed the access feedback with a colleague and have been recommended a book called Aural Diversity edited by John Drever and Andrew Hugill which explores the nature of hearing as a spectrum of diverse experiences. Really looking forward to reading it and hoping it will help me to incorporate your feedback!
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