Kevin Graal’s notes from his workshops

1. Roughly, what was the structure of your sessions?  Broadly speaking, I adopted the same structure for each of the 3 schools: [1] Introductory teambuilding games & summary of project’s themes through riddles & songs. Emphasis on entente cordiale/friendly agreement between nations and how this can be reflected in the culturally diverse make-up of the children in each school. [2] Fleshing out project’s historical context with information about chronology and content of White City exhibitions 1908-1914. Information presented in fun, storytelling format made vivid with imagined details & anecdotes about & descriptions/glossy colour photos of particular attractions or exhibits. (At SS, emphasis on children themselves distilling information from informational texts presented to them). [3] Book-making activity in which each child creates their own, 8-page book using a piece of A3 paper, 4 folds and a cut! Children then design their own front cover with title & illustration. [4] Children presented with a summary of 10 or so White City attractions/exhibits and invited to write about and illustrate their favourites in the first 2 pages of their books. In WM, the emphasis was on creating persuasive descriptions so that the reader would want to visit the White City and see the attractions for themselves. Each school invited to complete follow-up tasks to fill all 8 pages of the children’s books: 2 pages with first person Diary Entry from the point of view of a chosen historical character and (in WM) the final 2 pages with ideas for a White City 2008 Exhibition. [5] Recap of introductory games with additional game from one of the countries featured in the White City exhibitions 1908-1914. Day rounded off with traditional folktale slanted towards some of the project themes.  2. What worked and what didn’t in terms of the strategies you used to work with the children? What did they respond to? Was anything too difficult?  The children selected for this project in SS are a small (11) group of very bright, independent and articulate 10/11 year-olds. They found some of the teambuilding work quite challenging but were very inspired by the riddles and had a whole load of their own, which I was very happy to let them share with me! They responded well to intellectually challenging tasks and were also full of creative ideas of their own. The 19 extremely mixed ability 8/9 year-olds at WL needed far more guidance, clear instructions and very firm boundaries. One or two children in this group have particular (immediately evident) difficulties in working as part of a team, taking turns and conforming to classroom conventions like putting their hands up before responding to questions. I don’t believe that they should be encouraged to shout out! They responded very well to the multicultural aspect of my work with them – songs & games – but some of them found the book-making task – folding and cutting paper – quite challenging.  The group at WM consist of 28 8/9 year-old children selected from 2 classes. I though this was going to be the most difficult group because of its size, but the class teacher I worked with (Katie Brown) has extremely successful and subtle techniques for encouraging the children to focus. So this group was able to achieve quite a high standard of work. They loved all the drama-based activities and worked with great concentration and imaginative flair on the book-making task.   3. Were there any unexpected outcomes or specific concepts/creative outcomes that can be used and built on in subsequent sessions? What do they children want or need to happen next for the project to be successful? Children at SS can be given quite a lot of autonomy in making decisions about the kind of work they want to do. I think that WL & WM – partly because they’re younger and also very mixed ability – need far more guidance. On the other hand, all the children responded well on their own levels to the creative challenges they were presented with. And as long as there’s a clear and achievable goal for each session, I believe that all the children can gain a great deal from the final stage of the project.  4. What practical information is essential to pass on?  See Sara’s useful summary of start times, etc. The parish hall space I worked in at SS is great because there are no distractions and plenty of room to stretch out. Such a shame they’re going to knock it down soon! At both WL & WM, I worked in the classrooms (overheated and at WM right next to another class with no door between them) but also in the school halls for introductory fun and games. The teaching staff in all 3 schools are very supportive. Kevin Graal

29.02.08