Scaffolding Creativity
By John Guy
Teacher of Art & Design
Using Pre-recorded Videos and Live Modelling to Scaffold Creativity
One positive to arise from this pandemic is the time I was granted during Lockdown to reflect upon how I deliver my curriculum content to students, both inside the classroom and at home.
During Lockdown, I created a series of video demonstrations that were uploaded to Google Classroom as an aid to remotely support students with their assignments. Compiled, the video demonstrations created a time lapse of the whole task; however, they were segmented into separate videos, with each part of the task being scaffolded with clear instructions for every stage. Through providing a visual reference and distributing instructions for each task in chunks, I discovered that, overall, my students achieved better outcomes as they avoided cognitive overload by only focusing on one part of the process at a time. What’s more, I found that by providing multiple videos I was able to offer students increased flexibility whilst also encouraging independence as they could manage their workload more effectively by choosing particular areas to focus on or spending more time on aspects that needed more development.
Embedding Pre-Recorded Videos into Lessons
Initially, the idea of teaching an Art lesson whilst maintaining social distancing seemed very alien to me as a large part of my lessons are usually spent either providing one-to-one support with students or observing how the whole class is progressing. As a department, we decided pre-recorded video demonstrations would not only be useful for socially distanced teaching, but to also:
1. Allow staff to deliver demonstrations no matter what room they were teaching in due to ‘bubbles’.
2. Enable students who were self-isolating to access work at home via Google Classroom.
3. Help non-specialist teachers deliver content.
Since returning in September, each lesson has started with one of the pre-recorded demonstrations. Again, allowing students to see the desired outcome but also gain an understanding of which approach to take for each part of the process.
Moreover, the pre-recorded videos can be replayed during lessons and paired with questioning to check for understanding. Students may also watch the video independently (when it is repeated during extended tasks) which encourages them to decipher the task autonomously. As students are able to refer to video, this has encouraged independence from students who might have depended more on one-to-one support pre-Covid.
an example of a Pre-recorded demonstration video for Year 8 Art students looking at Ernst Haeckel and his illustrations of Natural Forms.
Live Modelling
I have supported the pre-recorded video with the use of a Hue HD visualiser camera which also allows for live demonstrations during lessons. This has been successful, particularly with drawing and painting demonstrations, as students are able to grasp processes much easier as the task is broken down into even smaller steps during the live demonstration. One example of this is the improved painting outcomes of Year 11, who all painted the same blood orange to gain a better understating of painting processes.
Increased Independence, Increased Confidence
Upon returning from Lockdown, I noticed that some students had struggled to create work that they were proud of. However, through modelling the use of the pre-recorded videos live in lessons and providing step-by-step demonstrations, students now have an increased sense of confidence, independence and are enhancing their understanding of the drawing and painting processes.
Example of a students outcome who’s confidence has increased as a result of live demonstrations using a visualiser in lesson.