Recently we were invited to contribute workshops at the
Towards a Creative Curriculum conference held at the Barbican. The event was
co-produced by Royal Shakespeare Company Education and Barbican GuildhallCreative Learning.It was a hugely enriching and empowering day which
highlighted the current situation for the arts and creativity in education and
what steps we can all take to tackle the issues and celebrate successes.
There were fascinating key notes speakers, panel discussions and a 'market place' of best practice settings, all incredibly useful in illustrating both the problems and potential solutions. The Global Teacher Prize winner AndriaZafirakou's key note speech was an absolute highlight of the day - her passion, heart, love and wisdom about teaching and the sharing that it is, was wonderfully inspiring.
Our SDD workshop sessions were about enabling and supporting teachers and artists to explore, experiment, learn and develop through movement and choreography. We received some wonderful feedback from these sessions (see the pictures below)
The day was full of recognition that our creativity is the conduit for expressing our humanity and indeed Bob and Roberta Smith, the wonderful visual artist and another contributor to the day, aligned the arts with some of the 50 UN Rights of the Child. He also instigated his own Constitution for the Arts to motivate a political recognition of the importance of every child's right to be able to access and experience an enjoyment of high quality arts provision. Our challenge is how to, through effective research and evaluation, fully capture and highlight the benefits of being physically creative, in order to prove what we already know to be true.
There were fascinating key notes speakers, panel discussions and a 'market place' of best practice settings, all incredibly useful in illustrating both the problems and potential solutions. The Global Teacher Prize winner AndriaZafirakou's key note speech was an absolute highlight of the day - her passion, heart, love and wisdom about teaching and the sharing that it is, was wonderfully inspiring.
Our SDD workshop sessions were about enabling and supporting teachers and artists to explore, experiment, learn and develop through movement and choreography. We received some wonderful feedback from these sessions (see the pictures below)
What seems very clear is the need for accessible, appropriate and quality CPD dance provision in schools which can offer confidence, skills and understanding to teachers. Being physically creative is a fabulous learning tool which is adaptable, energising and enabling. It gives opportunities to explore and develop ideas, celebrate different outcomes, practice finding solutions and recognise the power of movement and non verbal communication.
The day was full of recognition that our creativity is the conduit for expressing our humanity and indeed Bob and Roberta Smith, the wonderful visual artist and another contributor to the day, aligned the arts with some of the 50 UN Rights of the Child. He also instigated his own Constitution for the Arts to motivate a political recognition of the importance of every child's right to be able to access and experience an enjoyment of high quality arts provision. Our challenge is how to, through effective research and evaluation, fully capture and highlight the benefits of being physically creative, in order to prove what we already know to be true.
