Rethinking the Crit – Fostering a professional mindset as a way to promote inclusivity
(Research question: What practice-based interventions can make crit sessions more inclusive, while fostering professional readiness?)
Situating my progress
Focusing on the issues examined in my Case Study 1 on the TPP unit [link] I’d like to further examine the challenges that students with invisible disabilities encounter in classroom performance, through continued development of delivery design, making crit sessions more inclusive and accessible. Responding to the statistics (HESA) on the rise of learning differences and mental health conditions through Covid, I feel that implementing changes in delivery design and curriculum, to better tackle these issues, is key to good pedagogic practice. A holistic approach is illustrated in the text by Ghosh and Coppola:
‘Readers of this work and others in the field should consider this a small step towards more equitable and inclusive practices in design education and strive towards making their own additions and designing adaptations in their own courses driven by student needs.’,
(Ghosh & Coppola, 2024)
The authors propose the concept of a ‘Pedagogy of Care’, promoting a teaching/learning model that explicitly centres accessibility, flexibility and participation on equal terms in recognition of the diversity of needs.
With this in mind, I implemented a trial intervention in the IP unit last academic year. I wanted to explore a theoretical approach in relation to inclusive practices as an angle for better understanding of the intersectional core that may be shaping students’ learning journeys. For more context, here is my Intervention Summary [link] and Intervention Report [link]. The primary aim was to introduce teaching strategies that provided a less pressured environment through implementing small interventions to the crit sessions.
Resuming investigation and breaking new ground
With the current class, this crit session intervention will be different in structure from the previous one, now shaped in a more traditional set-up with the whole cohort (~40 students) presenting in front of a panel of staff. Due to room availability, I will have only one teaching space, rather than two. This may pose issues in regard to presentation pressure, and I aim to find solutions to this in planning.
Drawing from the outcomes of the intervention trial last summer, I have identified improvements that could be implemented this time round. The feedback process will be altered, and implementation of the ACE model (Appreciation/Consideration/Extension) will require a scheduling strategy to accommodate a balanced peer/teaching timeframe. Evidently more scaffolding of the session will be helpful, an element that was reflected upon in my Intervention Report as it was not previously actioned, and is now a key objective. Additionally, I aim to re-frame the student presentation element as a professional pitch with the aim to encourage familiarity with professional realities. I sensed that previous exposure to professional environments was a privilege enjoyed by only a minority of students, typically from higher socio-economic backgrounds, and felt this might help level-up the playing field.
Bibliography
Ghosh, S., Coppola, S. (2024) ‘This class isn’t designed for me: Recognizing ableist trends in design education, and redesigning for an inclusive and sustainable future’, International Journal of Art & Design Education
HESA, www.hesa.ac.uk, CC BY 4.0
Shulman, L. S. (2005) ‘Signature Pedagogies in the Professions’. Daedalus