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Blog

Very occasional musings about
photography education

How I see things: Meg Wellington-Barratt

15/1/2020

3 Comments

 
'How I see things' is a new series of posts from guest contributors. The idea is to present an individual viewpoint about some aspect of photography education. The way we teach is intimately connected to our experiences, our knowledge and our interests. We are delighted that Meg Wellington-Barratt has kindly agreed to kick us off with a thoughtful post exploring her own photography education, her experiences as a student and teacher, her research interests and a plea for more and better photoliteracy in schools. 

I collected anything when I was younger: thimbles, stamps, things with Mr Blobby emblazoned on them, beanie babies. If things came in a set, I was there. ‘Collecting’ or taking photographs didn’t start out as an intention of mine, but when I began taking photographs, I realised I wanted a document or record of everything I was experiencing. My first real photographic experience was an excellent photo of a mouse that I took when I was a child. I don’t remember taking it, but my maternal grandmother (Nanny) told me the tale time and time again of me in her garden, crouched down with a 35mm point and shoot camera and the mouse photograph came from that roll of film. 
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I started out wanting to photograph animals. Travelling around the world capturing wildlife was the dream. As a teenager I was besotted with American punk rock and the culture that accompanied it. Then it was extreme sports. I carried disposable cameras everywhere, compelled to photograph and not really knowing why. ​

The photographic education I received was mixed, mostly because I wasn’t a brilliant student. Studying A-level Photography was the key to developing my knowledge of genre, technique and image analysis. I had no breakthrough moment, no big ideas and I still wasn’t sure if it was something I wanted to pursue beyond school. Like most 17-year olds, I was pretty lost. I’m glad of this experience now as a teacher because I can empathise with students’ struggles.
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I fell into photography as a degree choice and decided to combine it with psychology at a middle of the road university. I received no help with UCAS and, coming from a small seaside town, it was an unwritten rule that we had to leave quickly or resign ourselves to being there forever. I chose the former, rushed my university options and attended no open days. Despite not having flashy facilities, or being top of the league table, we were given the bones of an excellent photographic education - we were taught to stop and look. Tom Wood was one of my visiting tutors and, after a gruelling group critique, he invited me on a shoot in North Wales. He turned up to the shoot with 3 decorators’ lamps and camera kit in a Tesco trolley. He doesn’t drive, so seeing him lugging this kit with him to a student charity shop photoshoot really helped me pay attention. He took every moment of every shoot as seriously as the last and placed no more or less value on this day despite the grim weather. I was full of admiration for this. Gobsmacked in fact. It was there and then I started to take my work much more seriously. He spoke to me at length about my degree project, a study of my grandmother. I read in an article recently that photography students often focus on safe spaces or stories before trying out their skills on unfamiliar subjects. This is what I did. I lacked confidence and was dragging my heels. Tom Wood said, “She won’t be here forever”. With that, photography became my obsession.

I adore photobooks. Currently, I love Stephen Gill’s books. I attended his excellent talk at Martin Parr’s BOP festival in Bristol. It helped me understand his process. The Pillar was a Christmas addition to my growing library and is as valuable to me as Tom Wood turning up with his trolley. I feel photography departments should all have a copy of Nan Goldin’s Ballad of Sexual Dependency. Students are always in awe of Goldin’s images when they are first introduced to her work. It means so much more to them seeing it in a book than on screen, although it’s good to remind them that the project started life as a slideshow with music! Photobooks always inspire students. Choices about types of paper, scale and binding help students see that photobooks can be a vehicle for delivering their visual stories.

I don’t see as many photography exhibitions as I would like to. The last one that I really enjoyed was last year’s Format Festival in Derby. I enjoy a group exhibition much more than a solo exhibition. I enjoy thinking about curators’ choices, how context affects the meaning of photographs. Craig Easton’s Sixteen was poignant and benefited from an unusual location. It screamed first job, first social experiences, first memories as a teenager. Seeing the work of Kensuke Koike at Format helped me get a stuck student out of a rut. I approach exhibitions as both a photographer and a teacher. I am thoroughly looking forward to seeing Hannah Starkey at the Hepworth Gallery.

I feel that students get the most inspiration from looking at physical books and photographs, seeing work in exhibitions and experiencing life. However many Pinterest boards they look at, however many photographers I give them, the most powerful influence is often something they’ve discovered, seen or been through themselves. I highly recommend students listen to Ben Smith’s A Small Voice podcast. I discovered it last year and it has really helped fill a gap. The process and experience of a photographer making work is something I spend a lot of time thinking about. Hearing them talk candidly for an hour with brilliant host Ben is particularly refreshing. I often have it on in the background during A-level lessons. The best thing about discovering it late is that I have so many back episodes to get through! The Daniel Meadows episode was an enjoyable listen, as was Ian Weldon’s. The Photographer’s Playbook is a brilliant resource for students who want to expand their practice, but it works equally as well for students who have no ideas and for me when I’m short on ideas for assignments. Photography magazines are a widely overlooked resource too. They combine the fresh practitioner perspectives and thematic curation with tactile presentation and decision making. I subscribe to British Journal of Photography, Foam, and Source but there are dozens more.

Carving out research in photographic education is difficult. There isn’t a whole lot out there but I knew I wanted to contribute my own work to the field. I originally started a practice-based PhD exploring themes of domestic representation in family albums, but quickly became lonely and disenchanted. It was working in schools and colleges that spurred me on. I have taught the subject for eight years now, and it was what I was seeing in the classroom (or not seeing perhaps) that helped me decide to research photography education.

There are no set models for teaching photography and most of what exists is based on art and design practice or historic pedagogies. Photography is so important for students but not only as a standalone subject. Students need to be able to analyse and interpret the imagery they see every day, and photography skills help them do this. Equally, learning how to analyse photographs helps make them better photographers. I am interested in the process of photographic education - what is taught, who is teaching it, what the students are taking photographs of and why. There are several related strands.

For example, a recent paper I have been working on explores the use of photography across the wider curriculum. Another examines the educational backgrounds of the teachers teaching the subject. I plan to work with Source Magazine’s Graduate Photo Online to conduct research into themes and patterns across higher education student work. The collector/obsessive in me wants to know everything, so a doctorate helps to placate this need.

As a teacher of photography, I notice daily what students lack in terms of knowledge and skills and this encourages me to try and fill these gaps with my research discoveries. Students sometimes cannot interpret meaning in imagery, even on the simplest level, and it is my belief that this has come from a desensitisation caused by the sheer number of pictures they are exposed to. A new level of visual literacy, or photoliteracy, is needed. It is also my belief that if photographic literacy was embedded properly and thoroughly across the wider curriculum, then it could pave the way for photography teachers to work together to build a strong and suitable model that suits both the needs of the wider education field and most importantly, photography students.
3 Comments

A beginner's bookshelf

7/3/2017

3 Comments

 
We recently had a visit from a newly qualified teacher keen to find out how we managed our photography resources, supported our students and designed the curriculum. She asked lots of really great questions and we had a great chat during a Year 12 lesson. Over the years we have collected quite a few photography books, some of which are kept on the bookshelf in our main teaching space. One of the things our visitor asked was which books we would recommend for a colleague starting from scratch and creating a capsule collection. This got me thinking and so here are are my recommendations for 10 essential texts for the photography classroom/library.

They are personal choices so it would be great to know if you think I've missed anything really useful and which ones in my list you also use on a regular basis. With an eye on shrinking budgets I have tried to keep the costs down. The links take you to the cheapest version of the book I could find (not surprisingly the same online bookseller in every case) and as close to or below £10 per book as I could get (if you don't mind sometimes buying used copies). This means that you could get hold of all 10 of these books for under £100. You may, of course, decide to shop elsewhere and pay a bit, or a lot, more. This site does not benefit in any way from click throughs to particular booksellers! I've also mostly avoided coffee table survey books or photobooks by individual photographers. These can be quite expensive and might be purchased later on to swell the bookshelves once you've got your collection of smaller, cheaper books started. 

Anyroadup, here goes (in no particular order):

1. 100 ideas that changed photography

Mary Warner Marien, 2012
I dip into this book fairly regularly. It's accessible, well-designed and presents useful, bitesize accounts of some key concepts, technologies and cultural shifts that help to define the diversity of photographic practice since its invention in the 1830s. Some of the information can appear a bit jumbled but I like the energy of the writing, the sudden shifts in perspective (E.g. No.42 Small Cameras/ No.43 Tabloids/ No.44 The autochrome/ No.45 Postcards/ No.46 Projection / No.47 Artificial Light etc.) and the one idea per page format. 
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2. Why It Does Not Have To Be In Focus: Modern Photography Explained 

Jackie Higgins, 2013

This is a great guide to the various practices and concerns of contemporary photographers. Taking a series of specific examples mostly from the last 20 years, the author explores the seemingly confusing decisions and strategies various artists have used to re-think photography's traditions or 'rules' in an attempt to say something new. This often involves asking questions about what we think a photograph can and should do. An entertaining primer for students of all ages.
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3. The Photographer's Playbook

Edited by Jason Fulford and Gregory Halpern, 2014

This is a gold mine of 307 assignments and ideas for photography projects gathered from some of the most interesting photographers, artists, writers and teachers currently working in the medium. I've used several of these ideas as starting points for mini projects, either for the whole class or as recommendations for individual students who might be a bit stuck. It's a great book to have alongside you in every lesson and a constant source of inspiration and guidance. If I could only have one book about photography on my bookshelf, this would be it.
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4. Self Publish, Be Happy: A DIY Photobook Manual and Manifesto

Bruno Ceschel (Author), David Senior (Author), 2015

This book is packed with images, representing the vibrant community of self-publishing photographers. It ends with a manifesto, one I share with my students when I encourage them to become self-publishing photographers. This book is the antithesis of a tasteful, coffee table tome. It is noisy, joyful and anarchic. A great addition to any bookshelf.
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5. The Nature of Photographs: A Primer

Stephen Shore, 2010

In a few carefully chosen words and images one of the great photographers guides us through some of the problems and possibilities of photography with grace, intelligence and a gentle wit. There are so many beautifully phrased observations and revelatory sentences that it's worth spending slightly more than £10 to get yourself a copy. A wonderful book in every way.
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6. Photographs Not Taken: A Collection of Photographers' Essays 

Will Steacy (Editor), 2012

This is perhaps an unusual choice since it's a book of stories, not photographs, about the ones that got away, those pictures that, for a variety of reasons, were not taken. There are some delightful anecdotes in here which often raise some really interesting issues for the beginner photographer as well as the more experienced. When is it not OK to take a photograph? Can photographs hurt people? One for the ethically minded.
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7. Photography (The Key Concepts)

David Bate, 2016

I haven't included many books about photography theory but I'm happy to make an exception for this one because it's so well written. The new edition, which I still haven't managed to buy yet, promises to update some of the debates about the history, theories and meanings of photographs. Bate is a photography teacher and practitioner who helps us get to grips with photography's big ideas or what we like to call its Threshold Concepts. Without this book, we would have struggled to articulate our concepts quite so clearly. One for the teacher and interested A-level student.
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8. Alternative Photographic Processes: Crafting Handmade Images

Brady Wilks, 2015

This is a really informative survey of contemporary photographers who are investigating a wide range of alternatives to the conventional photographic print. Many of them are testing the boundaries of what a photograph can be, sometimes looking backwards in order to find new approaches and also probing photography's materiality. 
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9. 30-Second Photography: The 50 Most Thought-provoking Photographers, Styles and Techniques, each explained in Half a Minute

Brian Dilg and  Adiva Koenigsberg, 2015

This book, part of a series promising introductions to all sorts of subjects in 30 seconds, is better than its name suggests. Cogent, carefully considered but utterly accessible, this is a great book to prompt initial investigations, setting students off on adventures of their own lasting much longer than 30 seconds (hopefully).
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10. Photographers A-Z

Hans-Michael Koetzle, 2015

It's amazing that you can pick up a copy of this beautifully designed book for a few coppers. The idea is simple and elegant - significant photographers arranged alphabetically and represented by a key photobook. It's a great way to browse through some amazing photography publications, especially if students are planning to make their own photobooks and need to know a bit about what's gone before. It's also a lot cheaper than the three volume Parr and Badger survey (although that's also great).
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There are hundreds of great photography books out there. What are your favourites? Please leave a comment below...

Jon Nicholls, Thomas Tallis School

PS. You can currently get all 10 of these books for £89.32.
3 Comments

Questioning and taxonomies of learning

6/4/2016

1 Comment

 
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Recent discourse in UK education has been shaped, in part, by the place of the arts in the curriculum. Should STEM become STEAM? Should the arts be relegated to extra-curricular, so that the 'core' or EBacc subjects can be given pride of place? These questions go right to the heart of what is valued in education. Phrases like 'mastery curriculum' and 'powerful knowledge' tend to emphasise cognitive ability and epistemic access over other forms of intelligence. 'Traditional' subjects and disciplinary knowledge are back in vogue, admired for their perceived rigour and foundations in the Enlightenment values of logic and rationality. 'Teaching' and 'research' also feature prominently in discussions about pedagogy. Alongside this is a new emphasis on character education, particularly notions of resilience and 'grit'. The world of education is often divided into the 'hard' and the 'soft' with no prizes for guessing which subjects are given time, resources and status.

Teachers of arts subjects, like photography, can consequently feel embattled, belittled and marginalised. What place does a subject like photography have in this brave new world of what works? What role does knowledge and cognitive ability have in photography? What are the particular affordances of photography? How might it develop a student's character? What do photography teachers teach? Is photography 'hard' or 'soft'? 

One of the ways we might want to theorise about teaching and learning in photography is by referring to various educational taxonomies. Our most recent addition to this website is a page devoted to Photo Literacy. It is a parallel development to our Threshold Concepts and related resources. Rather than viewing this as narrowly focused on language, we prefer to define Photo Literacy as follows:
a specific type of understanding that combines visual, linguistic, emotional and physical acuity.
It is precisely this combination of intelligences that makes photography such an important part of the curriculum. Photography students must find ways to combine their knowledge, technical understanding, imagination, physical and emotional control and personal values in order to succeed. In photography it is as important to feel empathy as it is to know about Depth of Field. Photographers need to develop a wide range of abilities from a variety of domains. They need to be good self-managers as well as collaborators. They need to understand the history of the medium as well as imagine their own contribution to its future. Teachers of photography are as interested in developing axiological (values) and ontological (orientation to the world) awareness as they in developing intellectual strength. This is real rigour.

By exploring the various taxonomies of learning we outline ways in which photography teachers can remind themselves (and others) of what and how students are being taught in their lessons. By deliberate questioning in lessons we can draw attention to this vast range of skills and abilities, making the implicit explicit.

There are certainly limitations to these taxonomies. They tend to suggest that learning is hierarchical - that students can't be creative, for example, until they have 'mastered' knowledge and understanding. It's important to be too literal in the interpretation of them. We are all aware that learning is complex, interwoven, iterative and cyclical in nature. We should not expect photography students to progress through the stages of Bloom's Cognitive Domain in any kind of logical sequence. We should not delay opportunities for students to be creative until we have instructed them in the whole history of photography. Likewise, an over-emphasis on writing or memorisation of facts, will not lead to greater Photo Literacy. We must resist attempts to limit photography. 

We must defend and celebrate the particular affordances of the visual, emphasise the importance of intuition, of feeling, of not knowing and unlearning. Students' breakthrough moments will be unpredictable. They may struggle with some aspects of the course (taking what seems like an inordinate amount of time to emerge from a particular threshold) but may take like ducks to water in other aspects of their programme of study. However, we hope that by outlining some of the ways in which educationalists have theorised about learning, by shining a light on taxonomies other than the cognitive, and by providing some ways in which teachers can use questioning and dialogue to draw out their students' learning, we can all better argue for our rightful place in the curriculum - right at the very heart!

​-- Jon Nicholls, Thomas Tallis School
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