A2 Evaluation of teaching practice: Teaching & Supporting Learning
I teach second-year BA Fine Art students at the Camberwell School of Art. My teaching focuses on the development of students’ art practice and studio-based learning. As a tutor, I support students in the studio and exhibition environment. In this case study I will be discussing group crits. This activity I co-run two to three times a year, these are usually formative crits. Group crit usually takes place at the interim stage during a project or module before work is submitted for summative assessment. My planning alongside my colleagues involves preparing the studios for an exhibition context for a group crit, students hang and display work, for groups to view the work and speak to each other in a spacious space to have good eye contact when discussing their work. Students are scheduled for 20 mins each for morning and afternoon sessions.
I find crits enable students to display and share their work with peers and improve their presentation skills. Insights from ‘Critiquing the Crit’ Report (2007), by Margo Blythman, Susan Orr and Bernadette Blair, examine group crit as a teaching and learning method. Supported by research from National Student Survey (NSS), and compiling experience and views of students, staff and staff when they were students. In my experience of working with students in this setting the conversations are constructive, encouraging, and supportive, it brings the artwork into sharp focus, and students provide individual interpretations and perspectives.
‘Critiquing the Crit’ Report outlines the strengths and weaknesses of group crits.
Strengths are:
- Group work
- Presentation skills
- Problem-solving
- Peer learning
- Instant student feedback,
- Fun because it’s communal
- Human contact, building relationships between staff and students.
- Enables students to benchmark themselves against peers.
Weakness is:
- Students feel nervous before a crit
- Unformattable, emotionally impacted
- Some shy and quiet students found crits difficult
- Students whose English is a second language find participating difficult.
- Non-constructive critique
- Difficult art language
- Time pressure
- Talkative students dominate
In my experience crits can improve students’ confidence and get students used to critical judgements on their work. This helps develop skills in critical thinking and discussing their work. Students give informal qualitative feedback, an opportunity to learn from others and to discuss and debate. Art Crits: 20 Questions A Pocket Guide, Featuring Interviews with UK Fine Art Staff on The Topic of the Art Crit by Sarah Rowels, Q-Art (2013), explains, know what to expect in a crit.
Being unsure of the purpose of any given crit can cause anxiety. From Art Crits: 20 Questions A Pocket Guide, here is a staff talks about ways that they support understanding and ownership of crits amongst participants. “I spend time explaining the process of the crit beforehand to give students a sense of expectations. I say, well it’s your project and you are in control of it. What you are really doing now is using the group as a focus group, as a way of testing out ideas, of what it is that you are doing”. Peter Day (University of Wolverhampton)
The term ‘crit’ is a problem since it easily gets confused (by both staff and students) between critique and criticism in the exclusively negative meaning of the word. For some students the word ‘crit’ can be daunting,
I would look to re-frame this to make it inclusive, both research I refer to demonstrate how crits are an integral and important part of art school pedagogy.