TASK 2b. Journal Writing Experience

I really struggle to write in my journal, mainly because it takes me so long, once I start writing and trying to make sense of things that happen and start making plans I generally go on for some time. Because I see it as time consuming I tend to put it off, saying to myself , "I will do it in the morning when I have more time and can do it properly"... I tend not to!

So when confronted with nine styles of writing I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to find a better way, and I am pleased to say that not only did I find new value in logging my actions and thoughts I also found a more appropriate way for me to do this.

Description was the first method on the list and this is the way that I have always written a journal previously. But in actual fact when comparing it to the other methods there is little value in it for me. I find I write an account almost like a story, but I was there, I know what happened, so simply recalling the events doesn't really help me, and it takes a very long time as I cant help but go into too much detail about where when and how, but too little on why and how successful. 

Initial Reflection I found incredibly useful, rather that recalling the whole of an event or day I recalled how I felt about my day and why, which in turn lead to me recalling events with meaning rather that everything, important or otherwise. This was much quicker, and gave me points to follow up on, things that I felt went badly, why and how to improve them or things that went well that I would like to repeat. Analysing the day and learning from it the most important aspect of writing the journal for me.

List is quick simple and brilliant if you are short of time. It is much more concise which makes it much easier to go over at a later date, and I was surprised by how much I found to put in my lists. It contained more valuable information in one page than my normal descriptive way of writing did in four. It also automatically created me a "to do" list, by including things I want to find out more about, I instantly know where to go next with my work/ research. To get this from my normal descriptive way of writing I would have to analyse several pages of my rambling thoughts to get to this point.

Evaluation I found fairly similar to Initial reflection, I think it's really valuable to analyse what went well and what needs improvement, this is the way I always worked as a dancer. By evaluating particular areas, specifically new tasks or decisions I can come to some good conclusions as to what actions to adopt or what needs to be amended.


Graphs, Charts and Diagrams. I put these three together, as this was the method that I was most sceptical about. But in I actually found it quite useful. I used the graphs to show fun, freedom and stress, as suggested in the handbook, to compare last year to this year when teaching my senior ballet class. I then analysed the reasons for this and found it quite a nice way to plot my progress. It isn't something that I would use regularly to record my activities as I feel there would be too many variables to make this possible on a day to day basis, but it is something I would use at intervals maybe 4 monthly to track my progress in specific areas.
I like using pictures and diagrams when I am choreographing and I took this task as a prompt to plan some projects for the future, I really enjoyed it, I think its a brilliant way to get ideas from my head onto the paper with having to be too specific, just to get a feeling of what I am trying to create, a starting point to go from and I will certainly use this in the future, however I wouldn't feel comfortable using this as a daily diary format.

What if? Again this is something that I found very useful but not something I would use on a regular basis. It was nice to let my mind wonder and to visualise the things that I would love to happen. Visualisation is a valuable tool in deciding what directions you want to move and where you want to be working towards and I was surprised that I saw things that I hadn't really considered as serious options, but when I let my mind wander did seem possible.
The most valuable aspect for me though was actually thinking about the things I would not like to happen. It has made me consider my current working position. I am not always entirely happy with the way things are done in my current employment, I always maintain in my mind that I am separate to this, I work for them, I am not them. But in considering this I realised that others may not necessarily see this and my reputation is on the line also. It has made me consider that perhaps I need to seek other employment, or even more frightening... go it alone. I never thought that writing a diary entry would make me question who I work for so seriously, but I am glad that it has opened my mind to other possibilities, both good and bad. Again as an exercise to solve a specific problem then I find this was very valuable to me, but I wouldn't use this as a diary as I like to analyse things that are actually happening.

Another view was the most fun to write, I really enjoy writing and it was nice to have the freedom to do something different. It also made me more aware that I am in fact being watched all of the time by other people, and the way that we present ourselves and our work is so important. If we aren't professional and don't take ourselves seriously then others will not. And if we are having an off day and the wrong person is watching this could lead to missing out on vital work, or gaining a bad reputation. I found it interesting to imagine how others see me. I also found though that I was more likely to pick out negative aspects that I feel need improvement rather than concentrating on the good. In the process of learning and self improvement this may be a good thing, but I think maybe this would be a long winded and often negative way to write, for me anyway. I also don't think that it involves close enough personal analysis of what I felt was successful or otherwise and so wouldn't  be a method I would use regularly.

All in all, I found value in all of the nine methods, with possibly the exception of description, which is strange as it is always the way I have written journals and imagined that they should be written. The most valuable to me and the one I will be adopting is the list method. With some adaptation, I am going to create a diary form that requires me to write lists of the information I find most valuable, (what I did, saw, and felt) and including my all important "to do list" with further points to examine and research. I will also include an evaluation section where I will go over specific aspects of my day and record my thoughts as to why they were or were not successful. I hope this should provided an easily accessible and easily achievable method of recording my thoughts feelings, successes and trials.
On top of this there has been some discussion on the blogs about whether to include personal as well as professional aspects into the journals. I feel that the two are interlinked. My professional work effects how I feel personally, and I have an emotional attachment to my work. However I understand the need to keep some distinction between the two otherwise the purpose of these writings may become clouded. To allow me to keep this separate I have been highlighting each entry, one colour for specific professional aspects, and one for emotional or personal views and hope this will allow me to keep a check on the content I am including in my journal, and perhaps even provide insight into the actions I am taking and why.

If you dont try.... You'll never know!

While writing my journal after teaching yesterday, I had a revelation that I felt may be relevant to more than just me so I thought I would share.

I was talking to my class about confidence, and doing things half heartedly, the girls who are lacking in a little confidence can often be seen marking, rather than risk being wrong and doing it full out incorrectly, they do it half-heartedly thinking that no one will notice because it’s small. I keep saying to them

 “If you’re marking because you’re scared of being wrong, you’re not doing it correctly anyway, you’re automatically wrong without giving yourself a chance.”

I was trying to get across to them that they are taking away their opportunity to be right!! (or their opportunity to improve by getting it wrong and learning from it.)

And then I realised, I often take away my opportunity to be right, or to improve by avoiding situations or not doing anything at all. This fear of making mistakes can often hold us back.

This then took me back to some things I had reviewed in the reader about experience, reflection and learning, John Dewey felt

“…the quality of the education was linked to the level of engagement with, and consciousness of the experience”  

If we are not engaging with the experience, by marking instead of dancing, thinking in our heads but not blogging, knowing how to improve our workplace but not communicating it, all for fear of being wrong or reprimanded then we have no opportunity to improve ourselves or our situation.

In order to learn we have to take risks, my Mum always says to me “If you don’t try… you’ll never know!” and this is exactly what I was trying to say when I was teaching. And something I need to keep in my own mind more often.

In the environment of a dance studio I find it easy to take risks, to try and fail and use that opportunity to improve, but in every other area of my life, I see trying and failing as a negative. Maybe it’s time I changed that perspective.

In Peter Honey and Alan Mumford’s model inspired by Kolb’s learning cycle they identify four stages of learning

• Having an experience
• Reviewing the experience
• Concluding from the experience
• Planning the next step

If we are avoiding experiences (in case we fail) then we have nothing to review or reflect upon, and while we may think we know what will happen we have nothing concrete to go from and so we stay in the same place, situation or mindset that we had previously. (You could call that failure in itself?)

In order to be reflective we have to do something to reflect upon, something that matters, an action or an attempt, and then in reflecting upon this we can make decisions about the success of that experience and use this to plan, move on and grow.

I liked Adesola’s post about getting messy…

“Hopefully you are well into everything, possibly getting acquainted with the feeling of ‘not knowing’, which comes before that light-bulb moment as things click into place. I think the biggest thing to check at this point is that you are ‘in it’.”

We have to be “in it” whether we know what we are doing or not, we have to keep trying and engaging, then we can get it wrong, reflect and learn or as Adesola says have a “light bulb moment” and succeed. Either way it’s a positive thing, through not trying we are failing anyway, so what is there to be afraid of?

References.

Adesola Akinleye. Blog,  08/03/2012

Dewey J. 1916

Honey 1982, Honey and Mumford 1983

WBS 3730, Reader 2. The Reflective Practitioner 2011/2012

Harvard Referencing and Essay Writing

I am one of those people who can not learn anything without writing notes,  it's long winded and sometimes frustrating but it does seem the only way that things stay in my head. In reviewing the first reader on communication technologies I wrote a lot of mind maps, notes and quotes to help me understand what I was reading.
I was going to leave professional communications technologies behind as in my last post I decided I had gotten all I could from it, I think this is still the case but after talking to Hollie I decided to have a quick look through my notes, and as an exercise in getting to grips with studying again I have formed all of my learning into a kind of essay. The essay can be found at the link below...

Web 2.0

It's long, and I don't expect anyone to read it, but it did throw up some questions for me about Harvard referencing, as this is my first attempt at using it. I was wondering if anyone could help?

I found many quotes, which I scribbled down in my notes, but I also found that work I was reading also contained quotes from other sources.... which I wanted to use, so who do I use in my referencing, is it enough to simply reference the work I was using, or do I need to quote the person who originally made the quote or both? 

Also, I used a lot of websites, have I referenced them in the correct way?

And finally I used some YouTube Video and quoted the interview. I found the video via Ahmetts blog, would I need to reference him?
And how exactly do I quote an interview from YouTube, or should I not use such sources in academic work? 

By no means do I expect anyone to read the essay but if anyone has time just to skim and see if I am referencing in the correct way, or are having similar problems with it then maybe we could discuss? any comments or corrections would be really useful to me for future work.

Moving on...

I had sat down this morning to re-read and to re-write my efforts on task 1b. Professional communication technologies, with a view to feeling like this section was complete, as I felt my first efforts were not up to scratch and with a need to move on feeling satisfied with my work to date.
I have not been able to re-write my work, I have become completely stuck! Reading everyone's blog entries about this subject shows that we have all gained a good understanding of what these technologies are, both positives and negatives, and how we use them on a regular basis. Some have gone on to thinking about how they can use them to promote themselves and their businesses, and this is where I feel like I have failed.
I don't use these sites to promote myself, I don't shout about myself or my work, in fact I hate talking about myself or my opinions and this is where I am struggling both in my professional career and so far in this course.
This has been a stark wake up call for me and the first real insight that I think is really going to aid my Professional Practice. It is funny that I use the term "Professional Practice" in this context as I do not feel like a professional, I teach dance, but I do not feel like a "Dance Teacher", but why is this? and how can I discuss or have opinions on professional communication technologies, if
1. I don't feel like a true professional?
2. I have never really tried to use them professionally or to promote myself?
And finally why would anyone communicate with me (the whole point of web 2.0 technologies) if I don't share my insights or information.
My conclusion, these first tasks have taught me a massive lesson. I have been wanting to move forward in my career for a long time, but day to day work commitments have been crowding my ambition, leaving little time to concentrate on my creative work and I now realise having compared myself to others that I am not taking myself seriously or doing enough. Not using the opportunities that are available to me to get to where I want to be.
So armed with this realisation, and new skills and understanding gained from these tasks. And having been thrown into a community of real professionals, with the opportunity to witness professional communication first hand through the blogs, I have decided not to go over the work I have done.
I feel I have learned a huge amount and now have the tools to begin marketing myself as a real professional, any progress I make using web 2.0 to do this I will now be shouting about on my blog! I hope to be a much more obvious presence in this community in the future.
I may have completely missed the point of the part 1 tasks, and please comment and let me know if you think I have? But for me, gaining new skills in how, and new insight into what I need to be doing along with new confidence to put myself out there for constructive criticism and advice, and to share my thoughts and opinions with others is a massive step forward and my first achievement on the journey of this course.

Photos

Photos, a set on Flickr.

I have been looking into the use of images of children for publication and I have found some useful information from the NSPCC website.
The information basically states that if you are responsible and take steps to minimise the risks that the photographs will be used inappropriately, that to a certain extent you protect the children identity, (so not including names and addresses) and that you have parental consent, then the use of children's photographs to promote your work or organisation is acceptable. More information can be found at

NSPCC - Using photographs of children for publication

So I now include some photographs that I had taken at my classes last week, I have avoided using photographs where children's faces can been seen clearly, faces have been blurred on several photos, and I have asked consent to make use of the images.