Artefact

This blog hi-lights some of the significant discussions I had during Wednesdays Group Skype and this evenings Module 3 Skype on how we communicate ideas.

From the first call I took away the idea of staying honest to my practice. I have been worried about where and how I am going to film my choreography for my video, as I don't have the facilities of a theatre or a professional cameraman and was concerned filming it in my dusty old dance hall would look unprofessional. However, on the call, I was reminded that we want to give an honest representation of our practice and give the viewer of our artefact a real view into what we do and to keep our artefact in context with our practice.

Tonight's call also reinforced this idea, with Adesola saying that the length of our artefact should be in line with what we create in our practice. In my practice there's a time limit generally of 4 mins, dancers and choreographers only have that amount of time to capture everything they want to say in their creation.

Adesola added - The artistry is how poignant it can be, not how long. This made me think more about the content of my artefact. I want to tell a story of the journey of my inquiry that will communicate to everyone. On the call, we discussed how the art is telling a story that is understandable and not letting the watcher edit it for themselves.

I want to express the passion I have for dance but also show where the threads start to tie together. I have felt the journey has been quite emotional and I hope my music choices for different sections of my dance hi-light this.

Expectations were also a topic of Wednesday's call, how things very rarely go to plan and how deviating from the plan is part of the process. My artefact has changed shape a number of times now, but I feel it needs to in order to grow and strengthen as an idea. This evening we discussed how we have to be aware of our own creative process in relation to our practice. For me, this is a reminder that I usually play around with ideas, I'll create choreography at home and adjust it as I'm teaching. I'll change it dependant on the space available and pupils abilities and on watching it back. I can't expect anything different from my artefact.

Lastly, one point that was significant to me was the question - Will the process of making the artefact add to my already existing data in my inquiry? I hope it does, while my artefact is about the journey I have been on, not so much the discovery of information I hope I can use this process to add more to my practice.

It may help me concentrate more on portraying a story or working with my students to develop their storytelling skills. Once I have shared my artefact I may have new questions or ideas that I can take further and add to my presentation. I am starting to see how all 3 ways of communicating my inquiry process - Essay, Artefact and Presentation are linked together.

The Practicalities of Practice Based Inquiry

As we are nearing the end of Module 2  it was really helpful to have a Skype Discussion with the focus on the Practicalities of doing an inquiry. 

I had already drafted my inquiry plan and sent it for feedback, but the call reminded me that discussion can help you see things from different angles. As we were discussing how we are going to consider Data Protection of our Data Collection we discussed password protecting computer documents this helped me re-consider how I am going to keep my notes for my observations. Instead of a notebook to store my thoughts and observations, I can keep them securely on my laptop. 

We also discussed, how we are planning to note take and how this can affect our interviewee or participant. I plan to observe my fellow dance teachers at my place of employment over the course of a few weeks and plan to make my observations as unobtrusive as possible. For this reason, I feel typing will be off-putting in a lesson setting plus I will find it difficult to type and observe at the same time, so I have planned to take notes on paper, which I will be able to shred once I have typed them into a word document that I can then password protect. It was also suggested that we consider back-ups of our information, such as an external hard drive or pen drive, that can also be password protected. 

It did take a while for us all to get in the right mindset of thinking of practicalities, Adesola suggested we start thinking like we have hired an assistant to help carry out our Inquiry Plan, this is to remind us that we have to consider how we are planning to carry out each step and how we are going to explain the reasoning behind these steps.

We also briefly discussed analysis and how we can be prepared for many different outcomes, it was thought-provoking to consider that sometimes if there are gaps in literature or you do not get the co-operation from participants that you were hoping for that this is all information for analysis. For example, if you are contacting someone to interview about Support in the Arts or Guidance in Career choices and they do not get back to you, Could this be considered as a lack of support or guidance??

I will be applying these thoughts and discussions to my final draft, I have also received my feedback and I am pleased that I have made many good points, and only need to re-word a few paragraphs.
I do however have a lot of work to do putting together my Literature Review, I am planning to create a Map similar to my Module 1 Diagram. 

Good Luck to everyone finalising your drafts, if anyone wants to share how you are getting on or any thoughts you have had after recent Skype Calls it will be great to hear from you.