Link to my comment on TC Eliza's video on laptops in exams.........

Link to ICT ASSIGNMENT 2 : Topic 2

Watch THIS to see the

ways that online blogs

are suitable as a medium

to track creative ideas in

VCE visual art folios.

Group work and ICT for collaborative planning

Following the recent tutorial on self publishing webpages I was excited to discover free online wiki sites.

I thought this would be a perfect opportunity for our Assessment, Learning and Teaching group project (Designing a Matrix) to have an online site for planning and sharing files, rather than the pingpong game of emailing files that tends to happen.

The wiki worked for a little while though one member of the group could not work out the interface to upload files. Another could not open the files when she downloaded them, which turned out to be a glitch with her computer.

I saw that there were 2 problems that arose here, level of ability/confidence with interactive technologies and the other being a hardware/software compatibility.

What are we to do in these situations? Online wiki's for teacher collaborative planning could be a really fantastic tool for the future, providing everyone is willing and on the same platform!

join our wiki at.....

The Assessaurus Wiki Site

Some of my favorite technology/art collaborations....

These are a few links to amazing things people have come up with to create images usig technology - great inspiration for teachers and students alike

Facade Printer

A digitally run - large scale, think paint ball, sized plotter for the outdoors!

Disco Bike

Yeah baby! This bike is it! Thank goodness for computers in this age of bike riding/music making

The Graffitti Research Lab do some amazers things with technology and architecture, this is about as modern as it gets people.

more to come......

Printmaking and the Interactive Whiteboard

Today I gave a Year 12 lesson on creating digital colour separations for printmaking to some fellow teacher candidates as part of our method area requirements.

The computer, in particular Photoshop or Illustrator, is an amazing tool when it comes to designing and playing around with print separations for transfer to printmaking techniques such as Lino Printing or Silk Screen printing.

(Feel free to leave your email in the comments box if you want a copy of my lesson plan!)

During the lesson I was able to demonstrate with use of an interactive 'Smart Board'. This was fantastic, not only could i stand along side the students - changing the dynamic of teacher at front/student watching - but we could also see the information and images large size projected while we worked, creating a creative ambience, the power of the image is not to be underestimated!

IPAD and the Artist

Here was something of note in the weekend Age, (Life and Style section 17/09/2011) and article on The Artist and the ipad - David Hockney reinvents the drawing.

The article covers Hockney's use of the ipad as his always at hand sketchpad, Hockney says " The great thing about the ipad is it is like a sketchbook but you have the whole thing with you all the time with all the paints ready to use." (p14)

The article continues on to talk about the subject matter afforded by the convenience of the ipad and how this is unlike any subject matter thru history because it is a take anywhere medium. Hockney executing images from the moment he wakes up in bed to other off hand, spur of the moment sketches that are captured in full colour and with ease via the ipad.

Further to this the dissemination of the images are infinite and instant via email and online posting. A greater revolution than the digital print!

With all these interesting options surely there are opportunity and application for use of such technology within the class room....

ICT and VELS in relation to VISUAL ARTS!! :)

ICT provides

Accessibility to ease of digital manipulation (Adobe Photoshop, Painter etc..)

Access to a vast network of art and artists opperating online through blogs, digital communities, art wiki’s, online museums and digital resources

Wooster, NAVA, redbubble

Access to sharing platforms within the classroom, school and community

Digital technologies in use within Year 7 - 10 classrooms include : computers with creative programs like photoshop and movie makers, digital cameras for photographic work and documentation, the internet.

Not to mention the accessibility to online demonstrations of art facilities beyond classroom use

eg: Facade Printer

a rich and flexible learner-centered environment

Students are guided through the skills needed to use such technologies (if they do not already have them) and shown entry points for exploration where they can then be guided by their own interests, aesthetics and personal connections.

Students can be exposed to the most current develpments within visual arts or study the work of old masters unlike any other time – with a few clicks of a mouse students can visit online museums around the world.

http://www.googleartproject.com/

in which students can experiment and take risks when developing new understanding

Experimentation and risk taking is particularly pertinent in creative settings - and the Visual Arts domain is 'creative' by default. In terms of understanding, i feel that understanding is not always generated by the creative process, though new product may arise, it is the refelection on the creation that gives way to understanding. ICT allows students to easily retrace steps reflecting on the process after they have excecuted it. Such reflections are enabled by ‘history’ within digital image files, digital images which document process of an artwork, digital journals or blog rolls documenting researched artists (I think there should be more of this for the junior levels!)

FURHTERMORE…..

In programs such as Adobe Photoshop the VELS statement above is particularly evident, students after being shown the initial entry points into photographic manipulation, including cropping, copying, pasting, adjusting, filters, using layers and text etc... are granted an exciting playing field where images maybe manipulated and changed, created and experimented upon. Students can take creative risks in their image adjustments knowing that the 'step back' function is only a click away, or failing that they can revert to previously saved files when they want to navigate back to a previous idea. Such flexibility within image making negates the common 'fear' where students are scared to move forward with a picture or sometimes even try out making an image because they are scared that they "can't do it".

While this technology is fantastic when used not only with photographic images but also scans of the students drawings (for example so they can apply colour and play around with compositional elements), I would like to see this technology pushed to help students overcome what can be a significant barrier to arts enjoyment and education, the ability to draw. Why have digital drawing tablets not found their way into classrooms? Digital pads and stylus could see these developments arise in the future....

RJRAE commented on this entry by another Group 6 member

IWB issues at my placement school.

Last week i met the E-learning Coordinator at the school. I wanted to find out if i could use the interactive white boards for teaching. This is what i found out -

• The school has Smart Boards, Two Touch and Prometheus boards.


• The smart boards are no longer used for interactivity because the 10minutes it took to calibrate them at the beginning was too much time wasted in a lesson.


• The two touch are the most commonly used now in the school and mainly in Music classes.

SO - what does this all mean? I think mainly it points to a low intergration of IWB in edu settings, well this school anyhow, teachers are pressed for time and learning new software is just not an easy option.

Its just like Tony Jones pointed out in todays lesson, there are barriers to using IWB in ed and the idea that technology (such as IWB), will revolutionise teaching are some what a fallacy - using this technology takes effort and ingenuity to implement - with teachers in public schools stretched to the limit as it is where will the the energy for this to evolve come from!

MORE ICT at my placement SCHOOL

A minor note:
Well, as it turns out you don't really need to have blinds to see the projected screen, it sure helps on a sunny day but you can make do, we have a board in the artroom leaning up over the window which blocks out a bit of light so that does help. Worst case scenario you could just bluetak up some white paper over the windows closest to the screen, this would still let light in but provide some shelter for better projection clarity.

IT in the class room - Year 10 Visual Communications
The kids in this class are 50 percent on task, 50 percent off task. The set project mimcs the year 11 Vis Comm project in that it follows the design process and is very student directed. The students have longer on the tasks than the year 11's would and at the stge they are up to (Research/Idea Generation) there is less technical drawing. The task is to design a magazine cover design for the school magazine and they must use a variety of materials to work their ideas up.
In most of my observations more than half will get out computers and work on photoshop to do this. They work from ideas out of their head and have no thumbnail sketches or prep drawings as reference, which i personally think is best practice because it holds focus when using computer design tools and makes it easier to reach a set goal. I can see the value of experimentation of course, but from my experience at high school years ago, i remeber how easy it is to just get lost when computer aided desiging without thought to the idea first.
The students work at varying levels and without much instruction as to photoshop tools. I have observed peer teaching and students finding tutorials on the web. I go around in my observations and help where asked, one student was having trouble with a selection tool not working. I had a look at his screen and noticed the file size was 12.7GB (a bit big for a plain photoshop file) opening the image size window revelled it was 10 meters x 10 meters big!!! So i showed him through dpi and file size etc. The selection tool worked much better after that.

The teacher of the class noticed that the students did need some instructionn in this area and the next class gave them a bit of a tutorial on creating a file, layers, selection and basic text uses. They were given a handout for reference with screen shots on it. I think this was a good starting point. I wonder though if this is enough? Some of these kids obviously want to create amazing effects and are finding online tutorials to this effect but are struggling a bit through it. In this class where it is quite open and student directed i think there is a difficulty in juggling each students requirements. On questioning the teacher about the unit design for this class, he said, it is worth doing it this way rather than a more prescriptive unit where each lesson is more ctructured as by the time they get to year 11 they are totally up to speed on the design process and how to navigate it. I remarked that also it may serve a purpose in sorting out the stronger students from the weaker ones in terms of the self direction needed for VCE Vis Comm.

Possibilities for ICT at my placement school.

I am currently teaching Year 8 Visual Communications, Year 9 Art and Year 12 Art - Focusing on the contemporary issues writing outcome.

The Year 9 class and the Year 12 class are in the same room which is a stand alone room which is quite large and is fitted with an interactive whiteboard (Smart board). When given a tour of the school with my mentor i asked him if he ever uses it and he replied, not really just to project on sometimes.

I recently gave the Year 9 Class a lesson on colour theory for paint mixing which is part of a unit on Impressionist style landscape painting. After giving the class, which was a wild ride of varied levels of paint staying in the correct areas (some on paper others on students and uniforms), I reflected and thought how the whole exercise could have been explained to better effect through the use of a prepared powerpoint - or better yet an actual interactive diagram for use on the smarboard - of the colour wheel showing the primary, secondary and tertiary colours and their effects before the students went to paint wily nily on their works.

After finishing the class I had to stay back to clean brushes and the sink (need to factor in more time for students to clean up next time!) this did give me some reflective time alone in the room however and it struck me that while the interactive white board had been installed in this room, no provision had been made to make it a usable facility. The room, which has windows spanning the length of the room on two sides, has no blinds fitted to allow better visability for projections. It lead me to think that the opportunity for this technology to really work was being overlooked and I wondered if ICT in this case is seen within the school as something that was installed but never really used and hence seen as not useful?

I will investigate further......

ICT provides a rich and flexible learner-centred environment in which students can experiment and take risks when developing new understanding.

I think this statement will be the most applicable to the areas of visual art because in many cases learning to work creatively is about taking risks and experimentation.

Possiblilities for ICT in my second placement.

I recently visted my second placement school, which is a secondary state school in Mont Albert with 1100 students. This is the largest school i have been to! Amoung the subjects i will work in at the school are Year 12 Art, Year 8 Visual Commuications and Year 9 Art. My mentor teacher gave me a tour of the school which has 4 separate art making class rooms. The buildings are fairly old but adequate and the art rooms have good lighting. In one of the class rooms i noticed that there was a Smart Board installed. I commented on the use of ICT in the classes, my mentor said that he didn't really know how to use the board and mainly used it for projecting on to. A possible area for experimentation on this placement perhaps....