Critical Links

I have come accross a wonderful piece of literature entitled 'Critical links: Learning in the arts and student academic and social development' by the Arts Education Partnership.

http://www.aep-arts.org/files/publications/CriticalLinks.pdf

The Arts Education Partnership are an American based coalition that promotes the Arts in America's schools. They undergo studies to prove that the use of the Arts increases the learning and development of school children.
One of the results of these studies was written by Ann Podlozny and published by the Journal of Aesthetic Education, Fall 2000, 34(3-4): 239-276, in which the following question was asked:

"Does classroom drama help students develop verbal ability?"

Podlozny set seven different areas in which she would study, including story understanding (oral measures), story understanding (written measures), reading achievement, reading readiness, oral language development, vocabulary, and writing. The results of the studies undertaken showed that there is a possitive correlation between drama instruction and verbal ability, prompting the Arts Education Partnership to encourage drama to be included in the classroom.

6c - Literature Reviews

Here are three pieces of literature that I have come across and have found useful in planning my inquiry. I have added some sources of interest on our Linkedin SIG groups 'arts in education' and 'Dance within secondary education'. Looking forward to seeing what others in the group have come up with too!

1. Partnering Dance and Education: Intelligent moves for changing times
    Judith Lynne Hanna 2000

2. Einstein on Creative Thinking: Music and the Intuitive Art of scientific Imagination
    Michele and Robert Root-Bernstein in Imagine That!

3. Does dance and education help academic achievement?
    Judith Lynne Hanna in Dance Magazine 2001

Review

1. In this book, Hanna explores the ways in which dance can actually be beneficial to learning in other areas such as citizenship, business creativity, social skills and personal development. She examines ways in which children learn and goes on to suggest reasons why dance should be taught within secondary educatoin. Hanna is the senior research schloar in the Department of Dance at the University of Maryland. She provides research evidence in her book and looks in to how history has shown us the potential of dance education. I have found this book to be invaluable throughout my research as Hanna provides much of the evidence I require for my inquiry, having actually undergone certain studies.

2. Michele and Robert Root-Bernstein are lecturers and authors. I found their literature on their website 'Psychology Today'. Robert studies scientific creativity and although his article is aimed at scientists, it was actually very relevent to me, looking in to the importance of the arts in education. Root-Bernstein speaks about Albert Einstein and how he, someone who is so famously known as a physicist, frequently praised his scientific attributes wholey on his creative abilities. Einstein played the piano and violin and insisted that 'personal creativity provided the kind of recreation that enables professional innovation' (Root- Bernstein, 2010). I think this article will help me to put my point across well. Einstein is well respected and for him to insist that one needs creativity in ones life in order to excell in other fields, I think others will find my arguement more credible.

3. This is an article that I came across during my research in to Judith Lynne Hanna. It provides statistical data relating to 'teaching and learning in the arts and measures of academic achievement ' (Hanna, 2001) Hanna is a believer that the two are linked and therefore it is important to teach the arts in schools. Hanna does explain that this topic is relatively new and much more research is required. She puts forward questions that have been beneficial to my own inquiry, such as 'what are the mental skills in creating and perceiving dance that students acquire through a well designed dance education programme? How can these skills transfer to reading and maths?'

6b - merits and limits

I have now conducted two pilot interviews and one pilot survey. I used two different methods to conduct the interviews. One was conducted using a set of structured questions which I emailed to the interveiwee and have reflected upon in my blog '6a pilot interview'.
     I decided to do a second pilot interview due to the limiting nature of my first interview. Although I gathered some very interesting information, I felt the method I used (email) was too limiting and I needed to be able to ask questions that lead on from certain answers. With this in mind, I prepared a semi structured set of questions and the conducted them via a telephone interview. This turned out to have its own merits and limits.

Limits

• No body language or facial expression, which can lead to mis-interpretation 
• It was very difficult to write everthing down as she spoke and I had to use short hand, which I did sometimes find diffiucult to re-read
• I would have liked to have been able to prompt further questions from her, but as I had no voice recording mechanism and hadn't pre-set particular questions, I didn't want to run the risk of persuading her in any direction. 

Merits

• I could hear the words she stressed and emphisized
• I was able to ask her to repeat herself if i was unsure of what she meant
• Speaking on the phone, I felt she said more than she would have done if she were writing answers to me. She could easily elaborate.
• So long as I wrote further questions down before asking her, I was able to ask her to go in to more detail in certain areas.

2nd pilot interview

The other research tool I used was a survey which I created on Survey Monkey. I think the concept is really fantastic - that you can create a survey so easily and it can instantly reach so many people. The limitations I came across however, were that simply not enough people completed the survey to make it a fair representation of what the majority think or do. 9 people answered my survey for me. I actually found that the questions that I had left a comment box available were much more beneficial than the ones where they ticked a box. I think that on a wider scale, this could have shown me some clearer information, but as it was, the statistcis didn't really show any obvious answers. If I use this tool again, it needs to be done on a much wider scale and I think I will use more comment boxes. I acutally received comments on my blog and facebook page (for those I sent the survey to who are not on the BAPP course), saying they would have like to have been able to explain more in their answers.

I'm really annoyed with myself that I haven't been able to conduct the focus group or the observation. It has been impossible as I am currently on school Easter holidays - this is entirely my own fault as I should have done them before the end of term. I think that the focus group could have been very beneficial to me and would have provided a more counter balanced discussion. I will be going ahead and conducting one when school starts again, just so I have the experience.

Data Protection Act 1998

I have just read through the Data protection act 1998 which explains how you can lawfully use personal information an individual has given you.
I have understood it as follows:

1. Information must be processed clearly and fairly. Permission must be granted by the individual to have it collected and they must understand what it is being used for.

2. Data can only be used for what you have told the individual it will be used for.

3. The information obtained must be necessary for my inquiry and I may not ask random information for no appartent reason.

4. The information I process must be accurate and up to date.

5. Information must not be held for any longer than is necessary. It must be destroyed when my inquiry is finished.

6. The individual I obtain information from has the right to a) a copy of the information I use. b) Object to me processing the information. c) Prevent the processing for market research. d) Demand to erase inaccurate information. e) Claim compensation for any inaccurate information processed,.

7. Information must be kept secure and kept away from any thrid parties.

8. Information can not be processed out of the EU

Having acknowledged these points, I have reflected over how I will ensure I apply them. Everyone who agrees to provide personal information will be shown my covering letter information so that they are aware of the reason I am requesting personal information. As my letter states, they are informed that they have the opportunity to see the data they have provided in my inquiry, should they so desire.
I will only be using the information provided in order to do my inquiry and the all information I request will be relevent to the inquiry. On completion, I will be destroying all data and information I have obtained. I will be deleating my survey on SurveyMonkey as the information will no longer be necessary. All information I have received is on my personal laptop and I shall delete it once my inquiry is over to ensure no third parties see it in the future. Both my laptop and survey are protected by personal passwords. I will not be processing information outside of the UK.

6a - Pilot Survey

Hi everyone,
I would love you to help me out by completing my survey. Please comment if you find any of the questions difficult to comprehend or answer. Thank you very much in advance.

Arts in Education Survey

6a - Pilot interview

I decided to start off my research by conducting a pilot interview. My line of inquiry is based on the importance of Arts in education. I decided I needed to interview someone who currently works in education so that they have a good understanding and knowledge of what the current educational system is like in England. I thought it was also important to interview someone who has a broad knowledge, rather than just one subject, so that they have witnessed a range of lessons, teaching methods, subjects and how the pupils learn. This meant it would not be appropriate to interview a teacher, as they only encounter one or maybe two subjects. I myself am a teaching assistant, and support pupils in all subject areas. Therefore, I thought it appropriate to ask another teaching assistant to be interviewed. I chose this particular colleague due to the fact that not only does she have this desired, broard knowledge, she also has a BA honours in Drama and Media Arts. I thought this was benefical as she has the background knowledge to support the questions I needed to ask.

I will be conducting a different method of research to look in to other aspects of my inquiry, but with this interview, I wanted to use my colleague's knowledge to identify the current state of the Drama department in my place of work. This will be necessary because it will help me to point out the way in which creative subjects are currently perceived within secondary education.

I sent my colleague the following covering information sheet and semi-structured set of questions. I did this via emial because we are currently on school holidays and she is away. I actually found it beneficial to conduct the interview via email because it meant that I had all her thoughts and answers in writing which made it easy to go over and there was no room for mis-interpretation or forgetting what she had said. Of course the draw back was that I couldn't ask her to elaborate on any of her comments.

Covering Information Letter

Interview Questions

Interview Answers

This is the interview in full, but I will be carefully extracting areas that are particulary relevent for my inquiry. Please let me know what you think of my covering letter and questions. I have tried to be as objective as possible and not impose any of my personal thoughts in to the questions. Have I done so?

Sorry it's all quite long!
Thank you!

5c professional ethics

Having read Reader 5, I understand that there are three types of ethics. Organizational (how we do things), Professional (sometimes know as the ‘code of conduct’) and Personal. I feel that personal ethics present themselves as the most challenging as it is often very difficult to ignore what one believes in so passionately. For example, I would find it impossible to kill an animal, even if it were for someone else’s benefit.

What I do find interesting is how some people who believe themselves to have strong ethics, can find themselves being manipulated in certain environments. Reader 5 mentions the Jade Goody/Shilpa Shetty argument on Big Brother back in 2007. Although the people involved protested that they were not racists, it seems they became a product of their environment. Although they were brought up to know right from wrong, this case suggests that our ethics can be easily changed.

Therefore, there doesn’t seem to be a right and wrong when it comes to personal ethics. It is a very grey area and different people have different perceptions. I was particularly drawn to a line from Plato’s play ‘Theatetus’

“whatever in any city is regarded as just and admirable is just and admirable in that city for as long as it is thought to be so”.

This line highlights that really there is no such thing as right and wrong – it is merely what one perceives it to be. 400 years ago it was perfectly acceptable to burn people who did not believe in the same religion as the monarch. These days this seems unimaginable! Though as human beings, there are actions that go beyond ethics or morals and are taken for granted. These include murder, rape and adultery. Most people agree that these examples are things that no human should do to another, whatever the situation. However, there are grey areas when the choice of whether something can be considered right or wrong/ good or bad is left to the individual and some cases, the jury.

Examples of these include: assisted suicide – is it always wrong to help someone end their life if they are living every day in misery and pain?

Theft – is it always wrong to steal if you are starving and have no other means to survive? (possibly applies to other poverty striken countries rather than the UK)  Treason – If people had not fought against the crown in history, we may not be living in a democracy today.

Hobbes, 1651 saw ethics as a necessity in society to prevent everyone doing as they pleased and subsequently leading to an intolerable community. This is still relevant in today’s society and the majority of people adhere to the law, which in the UK, is here to prevent people from harm in some way or another. Nowadays, ethics do not lie as deep as the law. What some people may consider unethical, others may not and without the law to back them up, people find themselves in a position of having to legally tolerate what they believe to be unethical.

For example, I think it is unethical to keep thousands of chickens in a dark room together without being able to spread their wings and having their beaks cut off to prevent them from pecking each other due to living in inhabitable environment.

I was interested in the concept of consequetialism – conducting something unethical for the greater good. Would it be right to torture a terrorist to extract vital information that could save hundreds of lives? I believe so.

I could not, however relate to the second case study of Reader 5. Whilst I can objectively understand the role of the photographer is to observe, the role of a human being is to participate in life and have compassion for others. My ethical stance on this is that it was a terrible, inhumane decision not to help the little girl. Surely there must come a point where you ignore your professional obligations and act on your instinct?

In my profession, I have found myself in situations where my personal and professional ethics have collided. As we live in a diverse country, we can sometimes find ourselves in situations where conflicting ethics and morals come together and do not unite. For example, homosexuality is legally accepted in the UK, but as we know, this does not necessarily mean that every British citizen finds it ethical. At my place of work, I came across someone from the Islamic faith who would not accept homosexuality. To her, her religion and close knit society had brought her up to believe that homosexuality is unethical, regardless of what the law states. She made some very homophobic remarks and this most certainly caused ethical tensions. I was horrified at some of the comments she made regarding homosexuality and she was horrified at some of the remarks that I made regarding her beliefs. People’s views on ethics can lead to not only conflict and tension, but also violence and war. What I learnt from this experience is the importance of professional ethics. These are here to protect the individual in their work place. Of course the law still exists within the work place, but certain ‘codes of conduct’ are essential to the worker and working environment. The outcome of my example was that I was informally disciplined for undermining her faith, and she was disciplined for actually breaking the law due to vocalising homophobic comments.

Reader 5 states that ‘the importance of carrying out functions in a good way was in the Greek’s view, central to contributing to a civil society. This rings true regarding ethics in the work place, as it promotes and implements a civilised working environment. The Reader also notes that some professions now have certain licences in order to function and uphold standards. In schools, the staff can also become members of a union which will act upon any unethical situation that may be imposed upon the staff. This is a similar concept to being a member of ‘equity’ within the entertainment industry.

In conclusion, it is very difficult to determine what is right and wrong due to the individual’s perception and we need laws and codes of conduct to oversee conflicting views.

5b - professional ethics

Having looked through the staff handbook's policies, I can see that all of the potential ethics I considered, are there.
Some that I hadn't considered included : Treating pupils with dignity, building relationships rooted in muteral respect, and at all times observing proper boundaries appropriate to a teacher’s professional position, having regard for the need to safeguard pupils’ well-being, in accordance with statutory provisions, not undermining fundamental British values, including democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty and mutual respect, and tolerance of those with different faiths and beliefs and ensuring that personal beliefs are not expressed in ways which exploit pupils’ vulnerability or might lead them to break the law.
The only practice here that I think is a difficult ethic to follow is the one relating to 'not underminding fundamental British values', due to the fact that Britain is such a diverse country with so many different nationalities, cultures and religions. This follows on to say that other faiths and beliefs that may conflict with British values are not to be expressed in a way that may lead to breaking the law, but I think it is difficult to explain this to young people.
Working in a school, I am often scared to say something that may be taken as a negative comment towards that person's religion. I think additional training on school ethics would be very beneficial.

In my school, we tend to communicate through internal emailing. It has become commonplace for us to use a pupil's initials when writing about them rather than their full name. Sometimes there are other pupils in close proximity when we are writing these emails, and to keep the pupil identity confidential, this has become a regular practice.

We also have a letter that is sent out to all pupils in year 7 that their parents sign to give permission for photos and recordings to be taken of their daughters within the school. If a parent objects, they can then choose whether they would like their daughter to not participate in any photos or if they would like the school to ring them for permission on each different occassion, depending on the objective. Some pupils can not have their photo taken for religious reasons and some prefer not to give permission for their own reasons.

5a - Professional Ethics

There seems to be a lot to consider regarding ethics in a government run school. There are various codes of practice which act as a guide to both staff and pupils.
The pupils, for example must follow the rules which are set out to them, and are in fact written in their individual contact books. These include:

The first time rule - Do what is asked of you the first time, no arguements.
Respecting everyone around you
No swearing
No racist/ homophobic/ sexually oriantated remarks
Safety precautions such as no running in the school.

For staff, I imagine the ethics which apply include:
Following instructions
Being respectful of all members of staff
No racist/ homophobic/sexually orientated remarks
Adhere to the law
Understanding and following the curriculum
Undertaking regular training and observations
Dressing suitiably
Ensuring pupils are following the rules
Abstaining from any known foul play in relation to cheating

I found the last possible ethic which is surely to be applied in my professional practice difficult to write. I have recently found myself in a situation where I have been unsure whether to follow my own ethics or the professional ethics. I was shocked and taken aback by the example featuring the starving little girl and the photogrpaher who did not help her. He followed his professional ethics, which subsequently contributed to his death, when obviously his personal ethics told him to help her. At the risk of losing ones job, it is often very difficult to know what direction to take.

my worries

As I work in a secondary school, I know that I will have to be very mindful when it comes to certain questions. I'm actually a little fearful because I will probably be asking some questions that the school is not keen to be probed on. This particular shcool has recently had an Ofsted report which came back as 'satisfactory' - not the result the head was hoping for. The exam results are improving each year, but there are still plenty of grey areas. Since the previous Ofsted report in 2006, whilst the school was under a different head, it has been a great focus for the school to improve the GCSE results. My inquiry will be looking in to why the arts are not considered to be as relevent as the academic subjects, and my worry is, that at this particular moment in time, that is not the school's concern. I believe they are focussed on getting the best A*-C grades possible, especially in Maths, English and Science. Entrance numbers are becomming lower and lower (partly due to the fact the school is under-going a multi-million pound overhall and it is currently a building site), and as tensions are high at the moment, with the new GCSEs about to start, I don't think the head will welcome my inquiry.
Due to these concerns, I will be conducting my research with my line manager, rather than the head, who is more accommodating. Next month I will be finding out if I am one of the assossiate staff who will be made redundant due to massive cuts. I don't want to be fueling the fire in my direction!!

why do we need maths article

I am in the process of looking in to 'why' maths is important as a compulsorary school subject. I read this article from 'the guardian', and although it is rather tongue in cheek, I can't help but think that this is another example of why we should have 'numeracy' lessons in schools rather than 'maths' which teach, in my opinion, unnecessary topics (unless you choose to go in to a career that needs simultaneous equations).

 Why do we need maths? Guardian article

academic subjects are favoured

A few weeks ago I was having a conversation with a like-minded colleague about the importance of creative subjects within schools and how it is unfair that these subjects are being removed whilst academic subjects thrive. We were sitting next to one of the maths teachers and as I would have imagined, she was very much all for the continuing battle to improve A*-C grades in Maths, and cared very little for subjects such as drama. She made a good point, that every person in society needs maths to some extent when they leave school. I completely agree. Maths is everywhere. And is relevent in many areas of life and many different careers. What I have personally found however, is that I have never called upon my distant knowledge of trigonometery or pythagarus. Yes, I understand that we all need to learn how to count, know our times tables, even percentages, area and ratio but surely these come under 'numeracy' rather than 'maths'. I find it wrong that every pupil has to have 4-5 maths classes a week. I believe it should be an option to pupils to choose maths if they so desire, and have 'numeracy' as a compulsorary subject.
I think it is just as important that pupils learn to stand up in front of their peers with confidence and good diction- something that is taught in drama classes and is certainly beneficial in most careers.
Having recently sat through year 10 GCSE speaking assessments, I was horrified to witness pupils who refused to stand up in front of the rest of the class, due to a lack in confidence, who could not string a sentence together due to embarrassment and refused to work outside their friendship groups. I believe that we are letting down these young people. By concentrating so hard on A*-C grades in Maths, Science and English, we are not teaching them everyday skills such as speaking in front of a group. We are not teaching them about culture. We are not teaching them to express their thoughts, feelings and experiences.
I would be really interested to hear your thoughts about this
thank you ,
Sarah

Back on track

At last, I'm able to blog again! It's Easter holidays so no excuses, I'm back on track!