It then considered the impact of this and the package of training, resources, spaces and facilities required to run a regular residency programme and develop a transferrable model of CPD.
Schools have been invited to base one class at the gallery for a week, delivering their usual curriculum and activities but in new spaces. The research seeks to explore what training, support and resources would be required for teachers to be able to do this on a more regular basis, without learning being led by a gallery educator. This could offer a more sustainable model for future school engagement with cultural venues. It is also hoped that it will celebrate the expertise of teachers and reposition them and gallery staff as learners alongside the children involved. This new way of working embeds practice that regards children and teachers as experts-in-residence, developing new knowledge and understanding of the gallery’s collection.
A participative action research methodology was chosen to ensure that the voices and experiences of participants were visible and to inform further stages of the research and the proposed model. Data includes observations from field notes, reflective journals, notes from interviews and focus groups, and photographs and films documenting the project. Throughout, the children were invited to see themselves as researchers, learning more about what research can mean and how it is relevant to their lived experience.
For example, the reflective journals allowed the teachers to look back on each day, noting what they were pleased with, what questions they had and what they might do differently the following day. All this reflection was based upon their developing understanding of the space, and these journals became creative working documents that they wanted to spend time on in their busy day. The photographs captured moments that were impossible to note in observations or reflections. They showed children’s responses, levels of engagement and their methods of building relationships with the gallery space and individual pieces of art.
Findings to date in Phase 1 show that increasing ownership of the physical spaces in the gallery brought some challenges for teachers. They were sometimes limited in their use of artworks as curriculum resources. In interviews, they reflected that the main reason for this was that they felt they needed specialist knowledge. They felt that they needed to know artworks in this way before they could connect to or discuss them with the children, maintaining a traditional teacher/learner dynamic rather than facilitating the children’s own ideas or adopting a position of learner alongside the children.
Over time, the teachers did report that they felt freer and more able to be spontaneous. One teacher described how she felt more creative because of the experience. Examples included using pieces of art as a stimulus for writing, reading, history or, in one case, music. Even when the curriculum topic being covered could not be directly related to the art available in the gallery, the lessons still took place in the gallery space, encouraging the children to feel confident there. It was not uncommon to see children working independently on mathematics under a Lowry painting or their favourite piece of art.
The children involved were hugely positive about the experience and there was evidence of increased ownership of the gallery spaces. The focus groups showed that the children felt that they had been given increasing freedom and responsibility throughout the residency and had learned in a more engaged and dynamic way. One child said that going to the gallery everyday was ‘like we were stepping into another world’.
The headteacher, who visited the classes on numerous occasions, observed that he felt that the children had more time for themselves. Interviews and focus groups corroborated the fact that both teachers and pupils viewed these opportunities to engage personally with the artwork in the gallery positively. Several children who teachers reported were not particularly confident at