Natalie Shannon
Graphic Design
Christina Hirts
11.03.2011
Title
Effective communication between the teacher and pupil in primary education.
Summary
I am currently looking into effective communication between the teacher and pupil in primary education and want to look into different ways in which children learn. Is it down to the personality of the teacher? “Teaching is first of all not a question of methods or techniques, but of personality; lasting influence is personal radiation.” (), the text in the textbooks or the way in which each individual lessons are planned and taught? “Teachers control the learning process by way of planning and carrying out the lessons, evaluating students, maintaining the order in the classroomand ensuring that their students participate in activities which could be benificial for them o reach the goals of the lesson.” (The teaching profession: knowledge of subject matter, teaching skills and personality traits)
Through some research i already know that children are alll different and learn differently. “ As learners we make our own sense and build on our own connections no matter how brilliant the teacher.” ( Making formative assessment work) Why is it that children find some subjects more interesting than others? This may well be down to personal interest, but is there a way in which this can be resolved?
Could we bring something new to teaching? A new method of teaching or new method of learning? Is there something that we have never tried before or has it already been done? As I study Graphic Communication, I am wondering if graphic/visual communication would work in schools and what difference would it make? It has been proven that visual storytelling is a benificial but challenging method for researching into health with young people. Within this experiment “ Visual storytelling was valued , a) being a draw card during recruitment and increasing positive feeling about the research, b) being fun, c) promoting self understanding and d) promoting expression, communication, and focus during interviews.” (Visual storytelling: A benificial but challenging method for health research with young people.) It also states in this article “whithin this methodology, images are seen as a powerful medium for communicatng issues and promoting change.” (Visual storytelling: A benificial but challenging method for health research with young people.)I am going to research thoroughly into whether this sort of technique is being used in schools. If soi will research into it and find out how teachers are designing lessons using this technique and if not I will interview teachers to find out what they would think if this technique was brought into schools. This may solve the problem of children only liking certain subjects, there might not be enough fun in teaching.
Also, another aspect I have been researching into, is whether teachers have more knowledge or interest in some subjects than others. If so, do they encourage participation more under these circumstances, as they are fearless of any questions or queries asked by the pupil, as the teacher has good knowledge on these subjects. “ Teachers who have comprehensive knowledge of their subject matters let their pupils actively participate in the lessons. These teachers are awear of the problems the pupils encounter while learningand are ready for any questions put by the pupils and the answers these teachers provide are not evasive or ambiguous.” ( The teaching profession: Knowledge of subject matter, teaching skills and personalily traits.)
Does this then mean that children will not be given the opportunity to participate as much in lessons that teachers are not so interested in? Would the teachers still try to make lessons fun if she or he didnt enjoy teaching this specific subject.
Aims
I personally feel that I would benifit from doing my dissertation on this topic as I want to do a post graduate course in primary teaching once i have completed my degree in Graphic communication. I feel that this will improve my design practise as I think it will give me a better knowledge and understanding about the many different ways of communication, from body langauge to visual. I also feel it will give me a better understanding on how the mind works and the differences in communication with people of different ages. It will benefit other people such as teachers, student teachers, and also people that work with children in general as it will give them a better understanding of working with children and also the relationship that is formed between them.
Objectives
During researching into this topic I will be visiting primary schools throughout the summer to see for myself how children react in different classes and also to see how different lessons are taught. Whilst visiting the schools, I would like to talk to teachers about effective communication and find out what they think about it, what they know and if they have any specific ways of communicating with their pupils. I will also create an effective questionnaire to give to teachers and also student teachers studying at university. I think it would also be beneficial if i could talk to some of the children of all ages and ask them what their favourite subject is and why. I feel this would be one of my best research methods.
Keywords
· Primary education
· Communication
· Body language
· Visual methods
· Lessons
· Age
· Personality
Bibliography
Ambrose, Gavin, Harris, Paul. (2010) Design Thinking: the act or practice of using your mind to consider design. / Gavin Ambrose, Paul Harris.
This book explores key areas of design through a series of case studies. The book goes through different stages step by step. Reading this book is helping me break down everything I am reading and I am finding it quite helpful.
Ardaiz-Villanueva, O, Nicuesa-Chacón, X, Brene-Artazcoz, O, Sanz De Acedo Lizarraga, M.L, Sanz De Acedo Baquedano, M.T. (2011) Evaluation of computer tools for idea generation and team formation in project-based learning. Computers and Education 56: (3) p. 700-711.
To some extend this had valuable information but again it is focusing on university students and not children so its only been partly helpful, but also interesting.
Bakkenes, Inge, Vermunt, Jan.D, Wubbels, Theo. (2009) Teacher learning in the context of educational innovation: Learning activities and learning outcomes of experienced teachers. Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences, Utrecht University, Heidelberglaan.
This article was quite interesting to read but wasn’t really relent to what i am wanting to find out, as it focuses more on how teachers learn as appose to children.
Bazalgette, Cary, Buckingham, David. (1995) In front of the children: screen entertainment and young audiences / edited by Cary Bazalgette and David Buckingham.
This book contains thirteen different essays and within these they talk about children’s movies and whether they liberate or enslave the imagination. Quite an interesting read to find out how the Childs mind works, this will be useful to me as I am trying to find out who they learn.
Butcher, Christopher. (1951) Designing learning: from module outline to effective teaching /Christopher Butcher, Clara Davies and Melissa Highton.
This book is full of interesting information and facts about how to teach and design lessons, but it mainly focuses on designing lessons of university and college students and only has a small part on primary education. It is relevant but only a small section throughout the book.
Christensen, Pia, O’Brien, Margaret. (2003) Children in the city: home, neighborhood and community / edited by Pia Christensen and Margaret O’Brien.
The aim of this book is exploring children’s life’s in contemporary cities. This is interesting as it talks about children from big cities and children from villages and the different ways in which they live there life’s. It would be interesting for me to research into how the two different groups learn at school.
Drew, Sarah E, Duncan, Rony E, Sawyer, Susan M. (2010) Visual storytelling: A beneficial but challenging method for health Research with young people. Qualitative Health Research, vol. 20, no. 12, pp. 1677-1688, Dec 2010.
An interesting article that talks about how images are seen as a powerful medium for communicating. Very relevant to my topic and is also a really interesting article to read.
E how, Tax time [Online] Available at: http://www.ehow.com/way_5171235_effective-communication-tips-classroom.html.
An interesting website as it talks about tone of voice when teaching in the classroom. It also covers a lot of other topics that are relevant.
Fuller, Bruce, Coll, Cynthia Garcia. (2010) Learning From Latinos: Contexts, Families, and Child Development in Motion. Developmental Psychology, vol. 46, no. 3, pp. 559-565, May 2010.
This article is not really relevant at all, I thought I would of got something from it but it focuses on Latino children and families through out the whole article.
Grosse, Gerlind, Behne, Tanya. (2010) Infants Communicate in order to be understood. Developmental Psychology 2010, Vol 46, No. 6, 1710-1722.
This article talks about the communicative process of infants before their first birthday. It is interesting to read but doesn’t really have any relevance to what I want to find out as its only focusing on children between 0-12 months old in the article.
Hall, Kathy. (2004) Making formative assessment work: effective practice in the primary classroom /Kathy Hall and Winifred M. Burke
This book is of most relevance to what I am trying to find out. It focuses and talks about the primary classroom and effective communication within it. A very interesting read, and will be very useful throughout my dissertation.
Hotaman, Davut. (2009) The teaching profession: knowledge of subject matter, teaching skills and personality traits. Faculty of Education, Yildiz Technical University, Istanbul.
This article is again relevant and very useful to my topic. It is very interesting to read as it talks about the personality traits of the teacher and how it relates to children when in class.
Macleod, Katy, Holdridge, Lin. (2006) Thinking through art /: reflections on art as research / edited by Katy MacLeod and Lin Holdridge.
In this book the author talks about understanding the relationship between art and thought, and what kind of thought comes from art practice. I am finding this book very interesting and useful so far and think it will be of great use as I am looking into a similar topic.
Markson, Lucy, Paterson, B Kevin. (2009) Effects of gaze-aversion on visual-spatial imagination. British Journal of Psychology, vol. 100, no. 3, pp. 553-563, Aug 2009.
This is quite interesting on the aspect of how children avert their gaze at certain points, especially when questions are difficult. This is interesting as teachers can sometimes pick up on this and help the children when there are struggling in class.
McAlhone, Beryl, Stuart, David (1996) A smile in the mind: witty thinking in graphic design / Foreword by Edward de Bono, designed by The Partners.
A great book for my dissertation topic, the book looks at witty understanding and thinking techniques behind images. This is helping me with the visual learning aspect of my topic.
McCall, Catherine C. (2009) Transforming thinking: philosophical inquiry in the primary and secondary classroom /Catherine McCall.
This book is considers philosophical inquiry, an empowering teaching method that can lead to significant improvements in classroom life. A very interesting book, and is relevant if I want to go down the philosophical road.
Reardon, John. (2009) Ch-ch-ch-changes: artists talking about teaching. / Interviews by John Reardon: edited by David Millin and John Reardon
An interesting read as it is full of interviews on artists teaching in the whole of Europe. The interviews provide an insight into the artist’s different teaching methods. This book is not so relevant to me as it is just focusing on art and not all subjects, but it is still helpful.
Sandars, John, Murray, Christopher, Pellow, Andy. (2008) Twelve tips for using digital storytelling to promote reflective learning by medical students. Medical Teacher, vol. 30, no. 8, pp. 774-777, 2008.
An interesting article as it gives tips on how to plan effective evaluations of educational programs.
SlideShare Present yourself, 2009. [Online] Available at: http://www.slideshare.net/Babalou/effective-communication-in-the-classroom
Interesting website as it shows me a power point presentation about effective communication in the classroom.
Stamatopoulou, Despina. (2011) Symbol formation and the embodied self: A microgenetic case-study examination of the transition to symbolic communication in scribbling activities from 14 to 31 months of age. New Ideas in Psychology 29 (2011) 162-188.
This article is quite interesting and useful although it is focusing on children aged between 14 – 31 months; it still is useful in talking about the scribbling process and how it pushes the Childs primary reactive space.
Tamietto, M (2009) Unseen facial and body expressions trigger fast emotional reactions, Proceedings of the national academy of sciences of the United States of America 106 (42): 1766-17666
In this article it talks about emotional contagion. I find this interesting as it all starts by how facial expressions and body gestures induce highly similar expressive responses. I think it would be interesting for me to relate this to the classroom life and the relationships between the pupil and teacher.
Walling, Donovan R. (2000) Rethinking how art is taught: a critical convergence. Art – study and teaching – schools, Art education, Education – art and design
This book explains how to use art education to improve critical learning. Very interesting as it helps me compare how different lessons are taught.
Wang, Xiang-Yang, Wang, Ting, Bu, Juan. (2011) Color image segmentation using pixel wise support vector machine classification. Pattern Recognition 44 (2011) 777-787.
This article is interesting, as it looks into how different minds portray different images and thoughts as others when looking at the same picture. I think it would be quite interesting to research into this aspect further as I think it will be a good topic to cover when doing my Dissertation.
Wrathall, J (2009) Body language. Sight and Sound, vol. 19, no. 5, pp. 40-42
In this article the author describes the experience of being a writer on a film set when his screenplay "good" was filmed. I find it interesting how the author finds it interesting that a great actor can speak the lines he wrote and really make the role his own. I think it would be interesting for me to research into this topic more and find out whether the personality of the teacher is genuine or if it is put on for the job.
