Journal of Useful Investigations in Creative Education
Learning styles theory proposes that educators use students’ learning style preferences to differentiate their teaching, and thus enhance learning. This theory is persistent and widespread, yet there is little evidence to support it and it has been thoroughly discredited. Although seemingly harmless, belief in preferred learning styles can negatively influence students’ choice of subject, and …
Abstract The Alexander Framework invites us to reflect on our underlying beliefs and assumptions about teaching and learning. In this article, Rebecca Fairley, Programme Leader for Textiles at the Open College of the Arts, provides an example of how the Alexander Framework can help educators achieve new perspectives on how they approach their teaching. Published …
Continue reading "Using the Alexander Framework to reflect on approaches to teaching"
Abstract With rapidly growing numbers of HE students declaring poor mental health, the responsibility of HEIs to provide more pastoral care is evident; in many cases, resources are severely limited, and there is a clear need for creative responses to this increasingly common barrier to learning. Almost all learning environments in HE are sedentary (lectures, …
Abstract Mentoring in an art institution seems to be a particularly vulnerable line of business. You devote yourself to a small number of students each year, give your energy and creativity to their wellbeing – and with some of them, it’s as if your meetings had never taken place: each session you start from more …
Continue reading "Things fall apart: what can we do when nothing seems to work?"
Abstract In September 2016, the Fine Art team at the University for the Creative Arts (Canterbury) suggested recording lectures as something they could do in response to Disabled Student Allowance funding changes. My role then, Learning Support Coordinator, was to initiate/trial/encourage inclusive practice, so I was eager to support this. The practice was trialled across …
In 2016, University for the Creative Arts (UCA) set up a project on inclusive practice to look at areas such as mental health and transitioning into FE and HE, buddy schemes and best use of technology to support teaching and learning. As part of that initiative, the author undertook research into reading lists, which will …
Whether dealing with latecomers, the prevalence of mobile devices, or the incidence of learning and language difference, approaches to facilitation can have dramatic effect on the experience and outcomes of education. Two contrasting examples are placed side-by-side in this narrative description of a hypothetical digital workshop. The first person narration takes its reader on a …
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