Issue 16: January 2012
Articles from our latest edition.
Welcome to the sixteenth issue of Networks
Editorial
Networks is all new this time round. We have moved the publication on to a new website hosted by the Faculty of Arts at the University of Brighton. We hope that you like the new design. The content, as usual, comes from individuals and partnerships based in a broad range of higher education institutions with art, design and media provision; from Plymouth University, to Northbrook College Sus...
Networks team, University of Brighton
Reminder: Art Design and Media Student Award 2012
News
A reminder to staff and students that the closing date for entries for this year’s Student Award is Friday, 3 February 2012. The award, now in its seventh year, provides a unique opportunity for students to showcase their work alongside an extensive range of UK institutions to a global audience.
Jenny Embleton, University of Brighton
ALTO UK – Arts Learning and Teaching Online
News
ADM-HEA is delighted to be part of ALTO UK, a project funded by phase three of the Higher Education Academy/JISC Open Educational Resources Programme www.jisc.ac.uk/oer The ALTO Project Manager, John Casey from University of the Arts London, gives details below.The broad aim of the ALTO UK project is the creation of Open Educational Resources (OERs) in art and design subjects for staff, stud...
John Casey, University of the Arts London
Inclusive Practices, Inclusive Pedagogies
News
Inclusive Practices, Inclusive Pedagogies, a new book jointly commissioned by the Council for Higher Education in Art & Design (CHEAD), United Kingdom Arts & Design Institutions Association (UKADIA), Arts Council England(ACE) and the Art Design Media Subject Centre (ADM-HEA) is now available. Authored and edited by Dr Dipti Bhagat and Dr Peter O’Neil, the book draws on research into widening p...
John Last, Norwich University College of the Arts
Art, Design, Media Creative Learning and Teaching
Event report
ADM-HEA’s 5th Creative Learning and Teaching Day provided an opportunity for art, design and media colleagues to come together to hear about and discuss current research, developments and innovations in higher education teaching and learning. This last ADM-HEA event provided a platform for many members of the subject network; teaching fellows, project holders and Networks contributors to prese...
Debbie Flint, University of Brighton
Higher Education work placements in the creative industries: good placements for all students?
Feature
This article reports on a small-scale qualitative study into equality issues in higher education work placements undertaken in the creative sector. The study revealed a range of equality issues students encountered both in terms of accessing work placements and making the most of these. This article provides an overview of these issues and presents a series of recommendations for institutions ...
Kim Allen, London Metropolitan University and Jocey Quinn, Plymouth University
The construction of video games studies in British Higher Education
Feature
The study of computer games is now a legitimate part of the undergraduate portfolio in a number of academic fields (Boellstorff, 2006). Previous accounts of games studies have examined how the subject has evolved through a number of conferences, the publication of certain key texts and the formation of academic associations (Eskelinen, 2004). This history has described a tension between how gam...
Marcus Leaning, University of Winchester
Peer support and the learning experience of postgraduate research
Feature
This article examines the importance of peer support networks in fostering interdisciplinary and inter-institutional collaborations between postgraduate research students. Such networks engender spaces and interconnections where postgraduate students can enrich their learning experience by engaging with others with a similar status for mutual benefit. Peer support networks should therefore be ...
Einar Thorsen, Bournemouth University
Co-production: all in this together
Feature
In the last issue of Networks we congratulated the three successful National Teaching Fellows working in art, design and media disciplines. In this issue one of the Fellows, Ruth Dineen, Learning and Teaching Associate at University of Wales Institute, Cardiff, tells us about her background, philosophy and plans for the future. Concerned about the frequently negative effects of formal ass...
Ruth Dineen
Autographic Photographic: developing critical analysis through slow doing and embodied thinking
Case study
Photography students’ critical analysis of their own images traditionally occurs in written self-evaluations and ‘critiques’ where their photographs are viewed and discussed. Analysis is thus often understood to be a physically remote conceptual process that takes place in the realm of language, beyond the doing of photography. In the context of ubiquitous digital technologies that enable st...
Paul Grivell and Claire Scanlon, Northbrook College Sussex
Audio assessment and student learning
Case study
Our project was designed to test the potential of audio feedback as a constructive and motivating aspect of student learning within a practice-based course. We looked into the form, content and timing of the feedback, and at both the immediate and subsequent responses of students in relation to their learning and motivation. We were also interested in the extent to which audio might provide the...
Ruth Dineen and Annie Grove-White
Only connect: an integrative, participative approach to writing through film that promotes the experiential over the theoretical
Case study
Through a series of city-related film viewings, students respond through pre- and post- viewing discussion and reading-related activities to produce a series of visual and content-related written responses that form a portfolio of experiential and experimental writing – a key course outcome on the English for Academic Purposes (EAP) summer pre-sessional at the Royal College of Art. This articl...
Simon King, Royal College of Art
Art Design Media Learning and Teaching Projects 2011-12 - Progress Reports
Projects
This year’s successful ADM-HEA project holders are focussing their attention on three key themes: better teaching; flexible learning and graduates with impact. The projects incorporate a broad range of aspects of art, design and media undergraduate, and post-graduate, programmes, principally: interdisciplinary considerations of game design (Institute of Arts, Media and Computer Games, Universi...
Stephen Mallinder, University of Brighton
After The Media – Culture and Identity in the 21st Century
Review
Bennett, P., Kendall, A. and McDougall, J. (2011), Routledge. .......... This book will be useful for teachers of media and cultural studies courses from secondary school level upwards, but also to postgraduate media students and engaged undergraduates, Level 6 particularly. But it is important to point out straight away that this is not a textbook simply collecting together and re-presenting i...
Steve Hanson, Bradford College of Art
Think inside the sketchbook
Review
Robinson, G., Mountain, A. and Hulston, D. (2011), Collins Education, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers. .......... The title of this book caught my attention, in part, due to being responsible for a collection of artists’ book and knowing very little about the rationale behind these artefacts. When the book arrived for review it was a large scale item that makes good use of graphic desig...
Fiona MacLellan, University of Northampton
Visual Research: An Introduction to Research Methodologies in Graphic Design
Review
Noble, I. and Bestley, R. (2005 and 2011), AVA. .......... As an owner of the first edition, I was delighted to be offered the opportunity to review the second and updated edition of Noble and Bestley’s Visual Research: An Introduction to Research Methodologies in Graphic Design. As the authors explain; whilst well established within the fields of medicine, education, social science and the l...
Dawne Bell, Edge Hill University
Pedagogy in (E)Motion: Rethinking Spaces and Relations
Review
Zambrana-Ortiz, N. J. (2011), Springer. .......... We can be forgiven for feeling misled by the title, as this book is not concerned with e-learning or digital literacy or any other aspect of ‘new media’ in relation to education. The play on words with (e) motion relates to emotion and transformation / hope. Zambrana-Ortiz sets out a ‘pedagogy of the emotion’ and uses ‘street pedagogy’ as a te...
Julian McDougall, University of Wolverhampton
Working with Cultural Diversity in Higher Education - SEDA Special 28
Review
Foster, M. (Editor) (2011), SEDA. .......... This SEDA (Staff and Educational Development Associates) Special publication deals specifically with cultural diversity and, while generic in context, offers a range of experiences on relevant issues within this agenda. The publication offers a useful source of evidence-based research into the experience and expectations of students from China and a...
Barbara E Thomas
Contributors to Issue 16
List of contributors
We would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has contributed to issue 16 of Networks. .... Kim Allen (London Metropolitan University); Ray Batchelor (Bucks New University), Dawne Bell (Edge Hill University); John Casey (University of the Arts London); Ruth Dineen; Paul Grivell (Northbrook College Sussex); Annie Grove-White; Steve Hanson (Bradford College of Art); Carolyn Hardake...
