iholmesPGCert_2025

Categories
Record of Teaching Practice

Record of Observation/ Review of Teaching Practice 1 Peer Observation (Ian Holmes as Observee)

  

Session/artefact to be observed/reviewed: 

Language Development BSc_MSc_(Strategic) Fashion Management Year One 

Unit: Marketing Management 

Fashion Business School 

London College of Fashion UAL 

Monday 20th January 2025 14:00-15:30 

Room Number: EB406 LCF  

Size of student group: est: 3-5 (possibly more) Register includes 21 students from course.  

Observer: Maria Thelin 

Observee: Ian Holmes 

Note: This record is solely for exchanging developmental feedback between colleagues. Its reflective aspect informs PgCert and Fellowship assessment, but it is not an official evaluation of teaching and is not intended for other internal or legal applications such as probation or disciplinary action. 

Part One 
Observee to complete in brief and send to observer prior to the observation or review: 

What is the context of this session/artefact within the curriculum? 

This session is the second part of a speaking/ seminar skills series. Last term we focused mainly on research and writing, for the remainder of block 1 the focus is on speaking – along with tutorials to review written assignment: Fashion Marketing Report. Here is a link to the Padlet which contains all the materials we have covered so far, this academic year: 

https://artslondon.padlet.org/iholmes9/bsc_msc-strategic-fashion-management_yr-1-8p1rv65ed0dgiive

This Padlet also contains the activities materials for today’s session – following the class I will add the main slides. This platform is accessible to students via their main course Moodle page.  

Here are the materials activities for the session:  

https://artslondon.padlet.org/iholmes9/seminar-skills-2_marketing-management-joq0qfpzp7ehgzsk

How long have you been working with this group and in what capacity? 

I have been working with this group specifically since November 2024 as Language Development Tutor. However, during October I lead the Language Development element in the ‘Into to Fashion Business’ course, which was a large cluster of a number of BA/BSc courses in the Fashion Business School, of which this current course was a part of.  

What are the intended or expected learning outcomes? 

  • MAIN AIMS 
  • Learners acquire/revise lexical items for managing seminar discourse – agreeing/ disagreeing. 
  • Learners to improve confidence in talking about the issues relating to their practice. 
  • Learners to improve ability at managing conversation/ seminar discussion. 
  • SUB AIMS  
  • Learners gain greater awareness of cultural differences which affect communication 
  • Learner’s practice asking critical questions of source material 

What are the anticipated outputs (anything students will make/do)? 

Engage in conversation (1:1) – producing target language: agreeing and disagreeing  

Are there potential difficulties or specific areas of concern? 

  • Attendance – non-compulsory course – means the majority of cohort will usually not attend (actual numbers are difficult to estimate + the composite of attendees re language groups and abilities)  
  • Active participation – Some students may lack confidence/ some students will be more introvert others more extrovert (also see below)  
  • Ability range – L1 speakers – and competent L2 speakers and less competent/confident L2 speakers of English – creates possibility for dominance L1 and anxiety/ reluctance to participate L1. (L= Language)  

How will students be informed of the observation/review? 

The students were informed in the previous week’s lesson – they will also receive notice via Moodle announcement – email as part of my communication with them re content and materials ahead of the lesson.  

What would you particularly like feedback on? 

  • Students’ interaction/ engagement with the tasks and each other  
  • Production of target language in scaffolded tasks (pair work) and open discussion (whole/small groups).  

How will feedback be exchanged? 

Via email (form)  

Verbal – following Observation (TBA)  

Part Three- Observation feedback  

Architecture and delivery 

Your delivery is clear, engaging and relaxed. But at the back of the room there is a noisy fan, which made it difficult to hear you. Closer to the students I could hear well, and you made sure all students gathered at the front. But if you have a bigger group of L2 students, you might want to consider speaking up slightly more. 

The small group of students sat in the front row of tables. When a student arrived late, you made sure that they sat next to the others and could join in the discussion straight away. For a discussion exercise you moved the tables, creating a square so the students could face each other. Maybe you could try this layout from the beginning of the class?  

Students can look at the presentation on their own devices as well as on the big screen. You helped them find the right resources and checked that it worked. Despite this, one of the students got distracted by a glitch during the first task, and I think some personal notifications. You also offer the students paper and pens to take notes, and most opt for this. Maybe you could try a session without personal devices? 

Achieved goals 

You explained new vocabulary, and the students also helped each other find the right words. You put common terms before academic ones in you presentation, e.g. body language (kinesics), making it more approachable. You wrote down vocabulary on a paper pad and a white board. I like how these stayed up during the session, as opposed to notes on a slide which quickly gets replaced. 

You greeted the students as they entered the room, asking how they were and creating a relaxed and safe setting from the start. When you gave the students a question or task you allowed them time to reflect and find the right words without interruption. You noticed if a student didn’t engage in the task or the discussions, and gently encouraged them to contribute, which they did. 

In the open discussion, the L1 students were first to speak, but the L2 students were paying close attention and soon joined in. The L2 students brought their cultural perspectives, and experiences of the global fashion market into the discussion. The conversation grew organically, everyone participated, and it is clear that they had grown in confidence and conversational ability thanks to your tasks. 

Summary 

Your session was clearly structured and the students achieved the aims that you had set out. It is a shame that your sessions are not compulsory. I know they would greatly help my students to complete the work for their compulsory units. Having visited your class, I will encourage them to attend with a new enthusiasm. 

Part Three 

Observee to reflect on the observer’s comments and describe how they will act on the feedback exchanged: 

Thank you, Maria, for the useful feedback on the lesson. 

Architecture and delivery 

I agree that the volume of delivery on my part would need to be louder for a bigger group – especially in competition with the air conditioning system in that particular room. I anticipated that the number of students would be 3- 5 (however – it is always an unknown).  

The arrangement of the furniture would have been better early on as you have suggested. My rationale for leaving the tables arranged in a line was because a lot of the work at the beginning was plenary, and I wanted the group to focus on the presentation. However, in retrospect I feel that it could have worked better, as per your suggestion, by having smaller tables for pair work – where the students could face each other and then bring the tables together for the whole group discussion.   

I think that the overreliance on personal devices in terms of my classroom activities is certainly an issue for reflection. The use of Padlet – to share the activities – which mirror the presentation slides – has become a staple format for delivery. This in part has been driven by an attempt to make my lessons paperless from an ecological perspective – in terms of the resources; I am trying consciously to avoid wasting paper. It is also through my assumptions about the learners and how I perceive their preference for working- i.e. in the digital space. However, this then does require students to be able to access and use the platform – and there is always the possibility that technical problems will arise which then create barriers to the learners engaging with the tasks. Where possible I do try to give students alternatives – like using pen and paper. This will usually need to be supplied as students will not have pens or paper. I think I need to try to resource more ‘scrap paper’ ahead of sessions (and pens) so that I can offer alternative ways of engaging with the tasks.  

On reflection – in terms of getting to understand the needs and preferences of learners, it might even be worth me surveying them regarding this. I feel like there are benefits to using Padlet as a way of delivering activities – but it does also present barriers. The other issue that you picked up on was the student then becoming distracted by personal messages – this also happened several times with other students – even with devices that they weren’t using to do the tasks – i.e. smart phones. This is an issue which I observe across all my teaching experiences – but honestly, I really don’t know how I should deal with it – rather than take the devices from them – which is something I do not feel comfortable doing. I point for further reflection and research, I think – both from literature and peers.  

Achieved goals 

I always try to make use of the whiteboard (where available) for highlighting vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation items – that come up during the class. Reflecting on your comment- that you liked that the board work stayed visible for the duration of the lesson, this is something that I will make a conscious effort to do more of in future. I think there is value in having the ad hoc language items visible for reference for the whole duration of session (after they have been written), as these points of learning reflect the emergent language in the room, as well the scaffolding that can help learners to communicate their ideas more effectively (especially in speaking focused lessons such as this one).  

Encouraging students to participate is always a tricky balancing act – with regards to students’ levels of confidence – preferences for interaction etc., however, I’m glad that, in this instance, I encouraged this learner to engage – as she was able to produce cogent language and make a valid contribution to the discussion. An aim of the lesson was to build confidence through participation, and it is my belief that through having the (encouraged) opportunity to participate, that this student will be more confident about doing this in future discussions – e.g. the seminar sessions in their main course – BA (Hons) Fashion Management.  

I was also happy with the level of engagement between the L1 and L2 students, the exchange of cultural knowledge and increased cultural awareness was a sub aim of the session – but one which I think has a greater value beyond this session and the language Development programme. This is a strategy which I will adapt for other courses that I teach in the Fashion Business School at LCF. It was very useful to have an external observation of the interactions between participants in this session.  

Summary 

My core approach with Language Development is to provide learners with the skills and strategies with which they can successfully apply to the compulsory and assessed elements of their course. I agree that it is unfortunate that the sessions are not compulsory – as this reflects the attendance, however, this is beyond my control (and as a non-credit bearing course it would seem unlikely that Language Development would been given that status. However, what is within my control is the (strategic) marketing of what I can offer, determining when the best time is to address certain foci, e.g. skills – writing – reading – speaking and listening – for the students during the term/block – communicating to students in their main course sessions  (where possible) the value of these sessions, and communicating and collaborating with course leaders as best I can.  

Categories
Case Studies

Case Study 2: Planning for effective learning – Product vs Process oriented learning.

Introduction and Background

Effective learning requires outcomes that are focused more on collective knowledge generation than individual knowledge acquisition; learners having gained cognizance of the processes necessary to become effective – i.e. learning to learn (Watkins, 2002, p.4).  

However, this requires the motivation of the individuals to engage in this practice. My EAP (English for Academic Purposes) challenge is to navigate the tension between the paradigms of education and training (Widdowson,1983); educate students a capacity to manage a range of disciplinary possibilities and not purely train them to meet defined specific outcomes (Tibbets and Chapman, 2023). 

Evaluation

Learning Outcomes enable students to know what they must do, through which activities, with what resources and how and when they will be assessed; however, since they were imposed in late 1990s there has been a question mark over their efficacy (Addison, 2014, p.314). I devise LOs for each session, however, I also work with other people’s LOs for units – deconstructing them and encouraging learners to analyse them from a linguistic approach so that they more fully understand what is required- the product.   

My current procedure is, at the beginning of each unit, asking learners to identify the instruction (imperative) verbs in the LOs – and then, to understand what they mean in terms of cognitive domain, we explore (the revised) Bloom’s Taxonomy (Anderson and Krathwohl, 2001). Next, we break down the other components – using a frame originally designed for analysing essay questions (Gillet, n.d.) – to identify the topic – the aspect on the topic – and any restrictions or expansions on the topic (see examples 1 and 2 in appendix).  

Learners’ ability to do this varies and reflects (in my view) how well they are written, and sometimes it is also necessary to verbalize the abstract nouns that are sometimes used by course leaders for instruction.

Moving Forward

My rationale for showing learners how to use these tools is firstly so that they can more effectively visualize the product offered via the learning outcomes – however, as I have begun to reflect on (and verbalize to students) is how these tools might also be used to analyse their own writing – especially those students at post graduate level who need to devise working titles, aims – objectives and research questions of their own.    

I have taken a more collaborative approach to working in recent lessons – whereby the ideation in the design of possible avenues for research can be explored through language and ‘collective disruption’ (a term that emerged through the experience of a colleague’s microteach). This is an approach which is essentially more process focused, although it begins with the deconstruction of product.

A new procedure that I have applied recently (see Teaching Practice – Tutor observation) is to analyze previous student example aims for their components – (see fig 1 and Advanced Research Methods – ARM2 in Appendix) – then removing this content leaving only the frame. Before returning to the frame – students then generate other possibilities (as freely as possible) – this is done on a Padlet wall – and an actual wall (see figures 2 and 3). Once we have generated lots of potential content students work together to create a new example aim from the newly generated possibilities of content. The intended purpose here is to develop greater flexibility with the generic language and, through a ‘collective disruption,’ with the possibilities for research.

Fig.1 Analysis of who, what, where, how, why of student example research aim.

Fig.2 Padlet Student Aims example generator

Fig.3 Post Graduate Fashion Marketing students generating content ideas using same categories as Padlet wall above- LCF classroom.

Fig. 4. Frame for students to apply generated ideas.

We are experimenting with this approach of foster the capacity of students to co-construct knowledge, which Freire (2005 [1970], p.72) defines as that “hopeful inquiry human beings pursue in the world, with the world, and with each other,” and restore those affective relationships underpinning social learning (perhaps) denied by LOs (Addison, 2014, p.325). Below is some useful student feedback on the lesson helps me understand how future iterations of this lesson might be designed.

Figure 5. Student Feedback on Lesson Padlet.

Action Points:

What: Implement ‘collective disruption’ approach to research aim and question development lessons

When: February/ March 2025

What: Gather feedback from students and peers – PG Cert and Language Development departmental observations – to evaluate efficacy of approach

When: March/ April 2025

Appendix

EXAMPLE 1_Analysing LOs_BSc_MSc_(S)FM_Product Management.pptx

EXAMPLE 2_Analysisng LOs_PG Marketing_Advanced Research Methods.pptx

2_ARM.pptx

References

Addison, N. (2014) ‘Doubting Learning Outcomes in Higher Education Contexts: from Performativity towards Emergence and Negotiation,’ The International Journal of Art and Design Vol 33- Issue 1- pp.313-325  

Anderson, L. W. and Krathwohl, D. R., et al (Eds..) (2001) A Taxonomy for Learning, Teaching, and Assessing: A Revision of Bloom’s Taxonomy of Educational Objectives. Boston: Allyn and Bacon. 

Friere, P. (2005 [1970]) Pedagogy of the Oppressed. New York: Continuem 

Gillet, A. (n.d.) Understanding the question Available at: https://www.academia.edu/122158876/Understanding_Essay_Questions (Accessed on 6th March 2025)

Tibbets, N.A., Chapman, T. (2023) A Guide to In-sessional English for Academic Purposes, New York: Routledge  

Watkins, C. (2002) ‘Effective Learning’ NSIN Research Matters Institute of Education. Issue 7 London: University of London 

Widdowson, H.E. (1983) Learning Purpose and Language Use. Oxford: OUP 

Categories
Case Studies

Case Study 1: Scaffolding interactions and learning – diversifying task outcomes and media 

Introduction and Background

This case study focuses on learners at LCF in Language Development, which aims to support speakers of English as an additional language. However, first language (L1) English students also find it useful for communicating at an advanced academic level. I aim to address diversity of linguistic and communicative ability as well as cultural and neurological diversities. My approach in general is based on the paradigm of communicative language teaching (Nunan, 1991) and although this can be interpreted to mean a variety of strategies (Thornbury, 2016), this has been the architecture of my prior teacher training (CELTA and DELTA- see appendix for acronyms) and practice.

Evaluation

My strategy currently relies on assumptions about providing a range of tasks (in a range of media) – which have differentiated points of production (even to the extent that learners may not do the tasks at all and simply observe others doing it). Peer learning leverages the knowledge and skill of the L1 learners. I draw on a mediation between what Vygotsky (1987) defines as the more knowledgeable other (MKO) and the zone of proximal development (ZPD) for the learner (a space in which I also facilitate scaffolding). I aim to foster a community of practice and learning based on the assumption that all knowledge acquisition begins through engagement in social interaction (Wenger, 2000). This approach is easier to measure regarding specific speaking lesson aims than it is for academic research and writing lesson aims.

Moving Forward


The media for materials is predominantly digital, however responding to feedback from peer observation regarding accessibility, I have increased haptic tasks that can also be done with paper handouts and whiteboards. Rather than black and white on slides and materials, I use pastel colours and avoid contrast issues (BDA, 2023). Despite dyslexia being the most common specific learning difficulty, intersectionality makes it difficult to differentiate dyslexia from other general learning issues and to design effective strategies for different cultural contexts (Davies, 2022). The multilingual classroom presents challenges for teaching and learning in respect of dyslexia in the context of a ‘super-diversity’ of learning needs (Peer and Reid, 2016), where data on students is not always available or reliable.  

Aside from development of reading and writing skills, students also need to develop their interactive speaking and listening skills for seminar work (this has been identified by both learners and course leaders). My approach to this is to scaffold conversation by allowing space for preparation thinking time (Kerr, 2017), but also by making learners cognizant of cultural differences in turn taking (Frendo, 2005, pp.115-116) and allowing them to reflect on the possible impacts for intercultural communication.

Figure 1. Selected Lesson Slides using text and diagram (source: Frendo, 2005, p.117)

Learners then have the opportunity for semi-controlled practice in pairs before freer practice in a larger group. – Feedback from observation (see appendix) of this approach reports that:  

L1 students were first to speak, but the L2 students were paying close attention and soon joined in. The L2 students brought their cultural perspectives, and experiences of the global fashion market into the discussion. The conversation grew organically, everyone participated, and it is clear that they had grown in confidence and conversational ability thanks to tasks. (see Appendix 2)

This is a procedure which I aim to employ and test for efficacy with other Language Development groups. Regarding reading and writing tasks, deciding which strategy to use and when (Deunk et al., 2015) and not knowing which combination of students will be in each (non-compulsory) session presents the differentiation problematic, and a strategy for mediating the issues of complexity raised above (Davies, 2022; Peer and Reid, 2016) needs to be developed through further research of literature and more accurate profiling of learners, which can more effectively identify complex needs. 

Action Points:

What: 1:Trial this lesson approach with Bsc_Msc_Fashion Management class- (gather feedback from observation). 2: Implement this lesson approach with new groups April May – and 3: with all groups for new academic year

When: 1:January (February) 2025, 2: April/May 2025, 3: October/November 2025

What: Gather data from admissions and course leaders on neurodiversity of students who may attend my classes in new academic year – and design lessons to support these students.

When: September 2025

Appendix 1: Acronyms:

CELTA- Certificate in English Language Teaching to Adults

DELTA – (Level 7) Diploma in English Language Teaching to Adults

Appendix 2: Peer Observation Notes

Holmes_20.01.25.docx

References

BDA _British Dyslexia Association (2023) Creating a dyslexia friendly workplace. Available at: https://www.bdadyslexia.org.uk/advice/employers/creating-a-dyslexia-friendly-workplace/dyslexia-friendly-style-guide (Accessed: 20.02.25) 

Deunk, M., Doolaard, S., Smale-Jacobse, A., and Bosker, R. J. (2015) Differentiation within and across classrooms: A systematic review of studies into the cognitive effects of differentiation practices. RUG/GION 

Frendo, E. (2005) How to Teach Business English, Harlow: Pearson

Kerr, P. (2017) ‘How much time should we give to speaking practice?’ The Cambridge Papers in ELT series. [pdf] Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 

Nunan, D. (1991) ‘Communicative Tasks and the Language Curriculum.’ TESOL Quarterly. 25 (2): 279–295.  Available at: doi:10.2307/3587464. JSTOR 3587464. (Accessed on 20.02.25) 

Thornbury, S. (2016) ‘Communicative language teaching in theory and practice.’ In Hall, G. (ed.) The Routledge Handbook of English Language Teaching. Abingdon, Oxon.: Routledge, pp. 224–237. 

Wenger, E. (1998) ‘Communities of practice: Learning, meaning and identity.’ Journal of Mathematics Teacher Education 6(2):185-194 Available at DOI: 10.1023/A:1023947624004 (Accessed 23/02/25) 

Vygotsky, L. S. (1987) ‘Thinking and speech’. In R.W. Rieber & A.S. Carton (Eds.), The collected works of L.S. Vygotsky, Volume 1: Problems of general psychology (pp. 39–285). New York: Plenum Press. (Original work published 1934.) 

Categories
Reflective Posts

Reflective Post 1: Reflections on ‘moral goods’ and the critique

McDonald and Michaela (2019) explore ‘moral goods’ and ‘the critique’ – from the perspective of what matters for studio instructors. This provoked me to reflect – what matters to me?  – how does this affect my instruction and the diverse students I teach.  

The term critique is not unproblematic – the emphasis is on the critical, and outside of the academic context, this is perhaps something which humans try to avoid being, in day-to-day life. The crit’ can range from the traditional presentation of a student’s work, followed by an interrogation, to one-to-one feedback. It is with the former that I first had experience, as both tutor and assessor, on the UAL Pre-sessional English (PSE) in 2021. 

The crit forms the primary speaking element of the PSE assessment, for which students who speak English as an additional language need to reach a threshold grading to progress to their main courses at UAL. It is this participation which often causes the greatest anxiety, especially for those more introverted learners. The students develop a creative project and then present their work, followed by a Q&A by 2 tutors (and sometimes students). Over the 4 years that I have been doing this course, the time allocated for the presentation has been incrementally reduced and vis-a-vis the time for critique has increased. This is presumably because it is the most exposing of communicative ability – presentations can be learned by rote – or read from script. I encourage students to move away from this rote learning to make it as live as possible, both for pragmatics – passing the course, and perhaps for fostering something more moral– developing a fundamentally human skill in the age of machines.  

From the position of ‘moral realism,’ how we take part in the world is manifest as ‘participation in practice,’ and this practice involves (normative) ‘real moral reference points’ (Yanchar and Slife, 2017, p.165). Using this frame, McDonald and Michela (2019) investigate three types of ‘moral goods’: student development; teacher/practitioner self-cultivation; and for other stakeholders, through investigating how instructors talk about critiques. The paper finds that these moral goods can both reinforce and pull against each other – and that instructors are often mistaken in their view of a good and that this can interfere with actually achieving it (Ibid, p.28).  

AI has already revolutionized the way in which we can produce text and is therefore becoming a less reliable measure of communicative, academic and professional capacity. In future, the viva – currently reserved for Phd students – may become part of the method for assessment for written papers at other levels. This would increase the need for students to embrace the critique, however how instructors should approach this regarding diversity is another point for reflection. My point of departure here, drawing on Harris (2022. P101), is to investigate how I can help make this form of participation meet the historically underrepresented needs of introverted learners, whilst building skill and confidence through practice.  

Harris, K. (2022), ‘Embracing the silence: introverted learning and the online classroom’ Spark: UAL Creative Teaching and Learning Journal, 5 (1) 101-104 

McDonald, J. and Michela, E. (2019), ‘The design critique and the moral goods of studio pedagogy,’ Design Studies 62 (2019) 1- 35 

 Yanchar, S. C., & Slife, B. D. (2017), ‘Theorizing inquiry in the moral space of practice’, Qualitative Research in Psychology, 14(2)146 -170. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/14780887.2016.1264517. (Accessed on 11.01.25) 

Categories
Reflective Posts

Hello everyone

I’m Ian I have worked with UAL since 2021 as an Associate Lecturer and Language Development Tutor – I have worked across colleges – CSM – LCC and CCW and I currently work at LCF East Bank with the Fashion Business School and with the LCF IISF Team at Lime Grove Pre Degree School. I have worked as a teacher of English language since 2007, as an actor since the late 90s, (in theatre and film in the UK and Italy) and, more recently, as a producer/ presenter and journalist with BBC Learning English and BBC World Service. My most recent experience as student in HE was doing an MSc with Queen Mary University London in International Public Policy, from which I graduated in 2023. I look forward to meeting the rest of the Friday cohort in January.