A Prehistoric Microteach
For the topic of my 20-minute microteach I chose the theme of cave painting. This is not a subject where I had any particular knowledge and therefore had to undertake a little research both to be informed and to establish the content of the session. This is perhaps in contrast to the contributions of my five colleagues who introduced us to aspects of their expertise and experience.
The session began with a short talk from myself to introduce the topic. in summary, this provided dating and locations of some famous European discoveries (whilst acknowledging this to be a worldwide phenomenon), explored various hypotheses on its purpose, and finally the pigments and tools used. The purpose of cave painting cannot be known with certainty as no such records exist to enlighten us, but the most likely conjecture is that it recorded and passed on information useful within these early societies. Whilst I provided acrylic paint rather than authentic pigments, I did construct some basic tools using twigs, chicken bones, and horse hair. Usage of these bizarre implements had positive feedback from participants. Although I anticipated the possibility that some of my colleagues may refrain from using animal products, and consequently supplied some contemporary brushes with synthetic bristles, these went unused.
With the context set, using the tools, paint and card provided, participants had approaching 10 minutes to create a work of this particular genre. (I just watched, and engaged in a little conversation). Following this was ~5 minutes to share and discuss the process and result.
The general aims of this object-based learning session (picking from the Brief!) cover Visual Literacy, exploring the message or meaning within a completed painting (regardless of the artist’s intention), Design Awareness, considering the tools used and comparing them to more conventional ones, and, perhaps obviously, Drawing Skills, although I was certainly not teaching this myself.
Whilst my colleagues, who threw themselves into the activity, demonstrated their existing skills, I am not gifted in drawing and painting. Consequently the comments they made regarding the use of the unorthodox painting tools was revealing for me: amongst these were the stiffness of the horse hair in comparison to conventional contemporary brushes, which proved to be a positive experience. The participants’ feedback included comments saying that it was an enjoyable activity, practical and hands on, with a level of authenticity that took people back in time, and that the sharing time was valued. This was an experimental exercise for me, and am very content with how it went. Of course there is scope for improvement, such as doing something to create a cave-like feel to the classroom through low lighting or, as suggested, having the card canvases attached to the wall rather than on a table. Doing these would still allow the session to be completed within the twenty minutes – and one surprise I had is how much could be covered effectively within this time frame. True, the participants were all enthusiastic, and not like ‘normal’ students: this activity with regular students may require around thirty minutes.
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Description and reflection on my colleagues’ microteaches are in the following post, The Physical and the Virtual.