Contextual Background:
During the final year of our BA Hair, Makeup, and Prosthetics for Performance course, our third-year students have to design, research, and realise multiple fully formed characters which include elements of all the skills they have learned on the course. This is a culmination of their entire degree and an opportunity for them to take risks and push themselves, which so often results in students wanting to use skills and techniques that they have never used or only used once before.
Evaluation:
As the student’s designs are highly specific and technically challenging, I often only work one to one with them during their final year. By their third year, I know most of the students quite well on an individual basis as I have helped them in their previous projects, but occasionally I will have a student who has not made something within my specialism before and therefore do I not know them or how they learn, but I have to teach them a technical specialist skill to a high enough level for them to hopefully get a good mark. This can result in a delay in us understanding each other and therefore a delay in their making process.
Moving forwards:
One to One tutorials: This is already my most commonly used method of teaching third-year students. Individual tutorials allow me to tailor my advice to the individual project and not potentially confuse the student with techniques or advice that would not work best for them. These tutorials are based around students bringing me a specific problem or need that I then give them instructions on how to solve. After learning more about feedback, I need to start allowing students to solve their own problems. Bloom’s Taxonomy of Questioning (1956) provides structure on how to ask questions that prompt a student to evaluate and analyse their problems without me having to outright tell them.
Samples: There is an ever-growing collection of wig-making samples that I have made to help students ground their designs in the sensory of the materials they will be using. Before the production of these samples, I noticed that students with tactile learning desires were lost after having to produce 2D designs for their assessments. Introducing materiality and object-based learning gives students a starting point and gives them the base knowledge to understand the physical limitations of the processes they wish to employ (Orr, S., Shreeve, A., 2017). The samples grow every year as I encounter students who learn in different ways and need more specific, visual examples.
Supervised Studio: During their first term of making, I share supervised studio sessions with other technicians. This operates as a ‘studio’ whereby there is “usually no central focus” and the students “create a social learning environment” (Orr, S., Shreeve, A., 2017). This allows me to encourage students to ask each other questions and problem solve together rather than come straight to me for problem solving. I have noticed that this can result in students feeling like they are not getting the help they should, and they are forced to turn to others. In future I plan to be more present in supervised sessions and use it as time to make samples, so that they can see me working and feel my presence in the classroom.
Armstrong, P., 2010. Bloom’s taxonomy. Vanderbilt University Center for Teaching, pp.1-3.
Orr, S. & Shreeve, A. (2017). Art and Design Pedagogy in Higher Education: Knowledge, Values, and Ambiguity in the Creative Curriculum. Milton: Taylor & Francis Group.