NAAIDT CONFERENCE 2001 REPORT
RAISING STANDARDS
IN
DESIGN & TECHNOLOGY
The 2001 conference was held
between March 29 and 31st at Eynsham Hall Oxfordshire. Ninety-one
delegates attended by and twenty exhibitors displayed their products at the
trade exhibition. Keystage Design sponsored the conference.
The conference took the issues of
creativity and designing subskills and sought to support members in improving
these in the curriculum area.
This report details the
following:
Ø
The Educational Focus – Page 2
Ø
Conference Programme – Page 3
Ø
Key Note Speakers – Pages 4 to 6
Ø
Workshops – Page 7
Ø
Workshop Providers – Pages 8 to
11
All workshop materials and PowerPoint
presentations are on the NAAIDT website in the ‘Leadership & Management Database’ at www.naaidt.org.uk
RAISING STANDARDS IN DESIGN & TECHNOLOGY
The paper stated ‘If we are
to prepare successfully for the twenty-first century we shall have to do more
than just improve literacy and numeracy skills … We intend to modernise
comprehensive education… that recognises the different talents of all
children…’ This gave rise to the
publication of ‘All our Futures’ that places creativity clearly on the
educational agenda along side literacy and numeracy. This conference seeks to
support inspectors and advisors in helping teachers understand the ways in
which the Design and Technology curriculum is a major contributor to this
aspect of a child’s development.
Over recent years the ‘lack
of teaching of designing skills and sub-skills’ has been reported by Mike Ive HMI,
D&T subject advisor to OFSTED as a major contributor to pupil
underachievement in D&T. This conference focuses on this area and seeks to
support inspectors and advisors in their work to improve teachers skills in
this area.
Research has always
indicated that a sharp and accurate assessment of what pupils can do and where
their areas of weakness are aids effective teaching. This conference seeks to
support inspectors and advisors in helping teachers identify the ‘designing sub
skills’ and teach them more effectively. In so doing teachers will be able to
improve individual pupil performance through setting targets for pupils on
certain sub skills and linking these against N.C. level descriptors.
With a national educational
agenda to provide for all pupils in mainstream education the need for
appropriately pupil focused activity has never been more important. Through a
clarity of ‘designing sub skills’ this conference seeks to support inspectors
and advisors in helping teachers to devise work that is appropriate for a range
of pupils. The workshops will identify a range of ways that different pupils
might be encouraged to engage with clarifying the task, generating and
developing ideas and planning and communicating their intentions.
NAAIDT CONFERENCE 2001
RAISING STANDARDS IN DESIGN & TECHNOLOGY
CONFERENCE PROGRAMME OUTLINE
THURSDAY
MARCH 29th 2001
|
|
|
|
|
|
12.00 |
Registration |
|
13.00 |
Lunch |
|
14.00 |
Developing Creativity through designing for making - Richard Kimbell |
|
15.00 |
Tea |
|
15.30 |
Exhibition opening and
viewing |
|
17.00 |
QCA pilot project on
‘Creativity’ and ‘D&T for Gifted & Talented pupils’ |
|
18.00 |
Free |
|
19.30 |
Dinner |
|
21.10 |
The ‘band’ |
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FRIDAY
MARCH 30th 2001
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|
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|
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9.00 |
Designing sub-skills from
a professional designer - Graham Lacey PDD |
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9.45 |
Workshops Session 1 |
|
11.00 |
Coffee / Exhibition |
|
11.30 |
Workshops Session 2 |
|
13.00 |
Lunch |
|
14.15 |
Workshops Session 3 |
|
15.45 |
Tea |
|
16.00 |
Thinking Skills – Gina
White |
|
17.30 |
NAAIDT AGM –
extraordinary items |
|
18.00 |
Free |
|
18.45 |
Sherry Reception |
|
19.15 |
NAAIDT annual dinner |
|
|
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SATURDAY
MARCH 31st 2001
|
|
|
|
|
|
9.15 |
NAAIDT AGM |
|
10.15 |
The New NAAIDT website –
Geoff Howard |
|
10.45 |
Focus for the association
2001/02 – Graham Cooper |
|
11.00 |
Coffee |
|
11.30 |
The state of the D&T
nation - Mike Ive |
|
12.30 |
Lunch |
|
13.00 |
Conference ends |
KEYNOTE SPEAKERS
Professor Richard Kimbell has taught design &
technology in schools and been course director for undergraduate and
postgraduate courses of teacher education. Having launched several curriculum
research projects in the late 1980s, he founded the Technology Education
Research Unit (TERU) at
Goldsmiths College London that is running a wide range of funded research
projects in design & technology and information technology. He has
lectured and published widely in the field and his latest book 'Assessing
Technology' won the 'Outstanding Publication Award' at the International
Technology Education Association conference in Minneapolis 1999. He has been
commissioned to prepare reports for the Congress of the United States, UNESCO,
NATO and several UK government departments. He has written and presented
television programmes and regularly lectures internationally
Developing Creativity through Designing for Making
Professor Richard Kimbell
Two forces at work in
schools, not panic and chaos
(1) inertia (the dominant force)
(2) vision (things seen in your imagination)
Two states exist in
continuous tension. In an ideal world
we would have more vision than reaction.
This can result in progress or regression. Look at D&T over last 30 years. We have not stood still or gone backwards. We have created something unequalled and
unthought of. D&T in 1960 did not
exist. D&T is an astonishing
achievement. I could talk in length
about some of the key features of D&T.
Ø
Unpacking ‘wicked’
tasks
Ø
Identifying values
Ø
Creative exploration
Ø
Modelling futures
Ø
Managing complexity and
uncertainty.
A model represents a child’s
thinking. David Hargreaves at QCA is a
fantastic appointment for us. Children
in D&T learn complex management skills.
D&T curriculum in 3 years is original. I want to talk about the next 30 years. Where are the new visions.
Think about what we’ve done and how we are to move on.
Student – Dan Davis –
planning in the classroom five-year study.
Working with student teachers – identified three types of planning:
How did D&T get to where
it is today? By individuals having new
thoughts. What was process going
on? Teachers saying I know we can do ……..
but I wonder what would happen if we did …….
Advisers, associations fed
off sparks from individuals – the process is endless - experimentation, rationalisation and dissemination.
In December ’97 assessment
book started central dictate could
never have done this. They help to
structure and manage what others have created.
They do not create the sparks.
How do we get teachers to think creatively? We want to look back and see continuous creative change. All the literature on creativity tells us
that:
Ø
We are in a risky
environment.
Ø
Needs to be an
environment of trust with support intellectual challenge, creative space,
ownership and confidence.
Ø
These are the
conditions of creativity.
We give students masses of
resources. A centralised resource could
be dangerous, e.g. QCA materials – If you accept Dan’s thinking there are
different types of layers of thoughts – which has increased?
Pragmatic increased. Less thinking about conceptual
structured. In Dan’s study pedagogic
stays more or less the same. The
student teachers are concerned with the classroom. What should we do to address this? Pragmatics is increasingly driving activities. There are all types of activities that
happen in DT that I haven’t seen for years – work environment like bridge over
the Thames. Essential point I want to
make – we need centres of innovation and imagination everywhere. We mustn’t lose the creative sparks. In the future will we have rapid prototyping
linked to pro-desktop and no workshops as we know it. Is that your vision?
Designing on screen, never holding a pencil or working with
materials? Will you watch students
feeding everything down the line? How
is the teaming different? What ought
we to be doing? Pro-Desktop has thrown
a real wild card into the curriculum.
We should be doing this with all types of initiatives.
Who are the ‘dream-weavers’
for design and technology? We are at
the leading edge of teaching at QCA.
Hargreaves is excited about what he sees. We have that responsibility at the teaching edge promoting a
radical view of D&T – We don’t want students to play safe.
Every teacher has the right to be a ‘dream-weaver’ it’s up to us to encourage them.
Ian worked as a D&T
teacher, mostly as a head of department or faculty for eighteen years. He
was seconded to the APU Design Technology Project for the year of their
national research into the design and technological capability of fifteen year
olds.
He has worked as Curriculum Leader for D&T with the London Borough of
Hillingdon TVEI Project and as Adviser/Inspector for D&T in Swansea Neath
Port Talbot LEA.
He was appointed as SCAA Principal Officer for D&T in 1997 and after the
amalgamation with NCVQ, is now Principal Officer, Design and Technology at QCA
where he has responsibility for all aspects of the subject.
Louise Davies is Principal Officer for Design and
Technology part time at QCA. Previously, she has taught food and textiles
in mainstream and special schools. Recently she has also worked in teacher
training at Brunel and Bath, OFSTED ITE inspection, developing ICT NoF course materials
for the Open University Learning Schools Programme, and was deputy project
director of the Royal College of Art Schools Technology Project. She is
on the editorial board of the DATA journal, is chair of the DATA special needs
advisory group and has published over 40 D&T textbooks.
Graham Lacy is currently Head of Technical Design at
PDD, one of the UK’s leading Product Innovation consultancies, based in
Hammersmith, London.
Graham first graduated in
Engineering from Birmingham University.
He then went on to study Industrial Design Engineering at the Royal
College of Art and Imperial College where he was awarded the Major Travel Scholarship
for Design.
Graham worked as an
Industrial Designer for Baker Perkins and APV in the eighties before joining
Isis, an innovation consultancy that he later directed for 5 years prior to
joining PDD 4 years ago.
Graham specialises in the
innovation and development of new products and those with demanding performance
requirements. Many of these have
involved handling fluids, such as showers, medical pumps and valves, or
polymeric structures such as sports equipment, building products and rugged telectronics.
As a consultant he has
worked for companies such as Gillette, Reebok, Aqualisa, Baxter Healthcare,
VTech and Aventis. He has filed over 14
separate patents, been awarded the DBA Design Effectiveness Award and has designed
4 Millennium Products. He is a
Chartered Engineer and a fellow of the Institution of Engineering
Designers. In 1997 he was awarded their
Kathbert Trophy in recognition of a tangible and commercial contribution to
society.
Graham is responsible for
the technical design work of the 65 strong company. He recruits and manages the team of Product Design Engineers and
is additionally responsible for technical business development, quality, CADCAE
and PDD’s Intranet.
Gina White is currently
General Inspector for Wirral LEA with responsibility
for Design & Technology and ICT in all phases and a link inspector to a
range of 8 schools. Prior to this Director of the Wirral Science and
Technology Regional Organisation for two years and acting Inspector for
D&T. Has a range of teaching experience in Schools in Suffolk, St Helens,
Berkshire, and Humberside teaching Design & Technology and in FE as
Lecturer in Three Dimensional Design. Gina is an OFSTED Inspector, Chair
of North West region NAAIDT and a member of Executive. She is also
undertaking an MA in School Effectiveness at Keele University. In her
spare time she undertakes hobbies such as washing the car and mowing
grass.
After teaching in schools in North East London and
introducing technology courses for examination at both 16+ and 18+, Mike took a
post in teacher education at what is now Middlesex University. He was joint deputy director of the Schools
Council Modular Courses in Technology Project before joining HM Inspectorate in
1980. He has been based in London, the
Midlands and the South West. He is now
Subject Adviser for Design and Technology to Ofsted. The development of technology education in other countries is a
particular interest and Mike has inspected schools in Holland, Germany, Italy,
Greece, Austria, Israel and the USA.
Mike is a regular visitor to our conferences and is a great supporter of
NAAIDT.
NAAIDT CONFERENCE 2001
RAISING STANDARDS IN DESIGN & TECHNOLOGY
WORKSHOPS – FRIDAY MARCH 30th 2001
WORKSHOP A - Clarifying
the task - John Lee & Rowan Todd
enable pupils to identify appropriate lines of research systematically.
It
explores ways of supporting pupils in developing a clear specification that
defines what their product must be like or can do;
WORKSHOP
B – Generating Ideas - John Smith &
Bhavna Prajapat
Host – Paul Shallcross
encourage pupils to consider a broad range of
relevant possibilities for development that are clearly referenced to their
design specification. It develops ways of improving a range of thinking skills
through the process of designing;
WORKSHOP C - Developing
Ideas - Paul Taylor
motivate
students to rigorously analyse the strengths and weaknesses of their ideas in
terms of:
function; technical aspects;
aesthetics; economy.
WORKSHOP D – Communicating
Intentions - Simon Badcock
select
a range of appropriate drawing, modelling, presentation and other communication
methods that are accurate and of high quality;
WORKSHOP E – Planning - Ali Farrel
assist
pupils in planning the necessary stages in a working procedure to ensure a
successful outcome and to organise time, effort, money and resources;
assist
pupils to meaningfully reflect upon the product they have made, making a
comparison against their original design criteria
John Lee initially studied Design and Technology at
Nottingham Trent University before completing his MSc in Designing for
Manufacture at Manchester Metropolitan University. He has 10 years experience
of teaching Design and Technology to ‘A’ level in Sheffield prior to moving to
Sheffield Hallam University where he has been a Senior Lecturer in Design &
Technology Education for the last 10 years. He is currently Route Leader for
the 3 Year B.Sc (Hons) in Design and Technology Education.
Rowan Todd initially studied Design and Technology at Brunel University before completing his MSc in Industrial Design Management at Loughborough. He has 9 years experience of teaching Design and Technology to ‘A’ level in and around London prior to moving to Sheffield Hallam University where he has been a Senior Lecturer in Design & Technology Education for the last 8 years. He is currently Route Leader for the Professional Year.
John Smith
John Smith is a Senior Lecturer in Design and
Technology Education at the University of Brighton. He is presently the PGCE, 2
Year BA (Hons) and Fast Track D&T route leader and is a member of the
Faculty’s School Liaison Management Group. He has led in-service both
nationally and internationally, and has been a member of several working groups
for the TTA. His current doctoral studies focus upon the role of
self-evaluation and school improvement. Prior to joining the University of
Brighton, he was the head of a design and technology department in an
inner-city Sheffield Comprehensive School.
Bhavna Prajapat
Bhavna Prajapat is a Senior Lecturer at the University of Brighton. Presently she is the route leader for Design and Technology Education for the 4 Year BA (Hons) Secondary and 4 Year BA (Hons) Upper Primary and Lower Secondary Courses. Currently she is working on her Masters Award, carrying out a research project on Teaching and Learning with ICT. She has worked in a very successful Design and Technology Team in an East Sussex School. Formerly, she was an Interior Designer involved in designing Commercial Office Space.
Paul Taylor
Paul Taylor is Design and Technology Pathway Leader
at the Centre For Design And Technology Education (CDATE) in School of
Education at the University of Wolverhampton. Paul started his teaching career
in 1972 after training at Loughborough. Having taught Art & Design, CDT and
Technology in a number of secondary schools in Warley, Sandwell and Dudley he
moved to the University of Wolverhampton in 1991. His present responsibilities
include the teaching, monitoring and coordination of the professional elements
of student work at CDATE. PGCE, 3Yr BA with QTS and 2Yr B.Ed are the courses
that Paul is mainly involved with but he also teaches subject modules on the BA
D&T course. His work involves the development of curriculum materials for
trainee use in partnership schools. These curriculum materials also form a
significant part of his work as CDATE’s TEP Fellowship Centre Coordinator.
Planning, delivery and coordination of TEP events such as the annual Summer
School allows me to link subject and curriculum developments in Technology.
During his career at CDATE
Paul has also contributed to numerous In-service activities including UK tours
by the Technical Foundation of America, professional development courses for
Sandwell, Dudley and Birmingham and Overseas B.Ed courses. He has taught on
Summer Schools at Virginia Tech. USA, Hong Kong Polytechnic and has acted as
Liaison Tutor with PTH Eindhoven in Holland. He has also delivered papers at
PATT and ITEA conferences. His subject expertise includes Design History,
Product Design, ICT, Graphics and Resistant Materials.
Simon Badcock
Simon is currently the Head of Design and Technology
& ICT at Theale Green Community School, near Reading in Berkshire. He has
been departmental head for 12 years. He was trained at the University of London
and the College of St Mark and St John Plymouth. Simon was the Dyson Design and
Technology Teacher of the Year 2000. Simon was chosen for this national award
for his work in transforming a traditional department into a fully integrated,
highly dynamic and very a very successful one.
The department has developed a national reputation for its annual
exhibition of work and introduction of new technologies, especially
computer-related work.
The department was chosen
to represent the secondary sector nationally at an exhibition at the NEC in
1998. Simon was chosen for the Toplink program, funded by the Design Council.
In December 1999 he had a major feature article in the Times Educational
Supplement on CAD/CAM. He also featured in an article on training technology teachers
in the Guardian in April. The department is hub centre for the DfEE CAD/CAM in
Schools Initiative and Simon is an Accredited Trainer for Pro/DESKTOP and
Art/CAM Pro. He is also a Teacher Consultant for West Berkshire.
Ali Farrell
Ali Farrell was previously
a food technology teacher and Head of Department in secondary schools. Ali
moved into curriculum development and advisory work in 1989 to take up a post
at Goldsmiths, working on D&T assessment (APU and CATS).
For the last six years Ali
has been working as an independent technology education consultant, nationally
and internationally. Her clients
include DfEE, DoH, QCA, DATA, NATHE, Design Council, OU, British Nutrition
Foundation, Consumers’ Association and the food industry. She is a respected
keynote speaker and conference contributor, and has authored numerous
curriculum materials to support the technology curriculum, including ‘Food
Technology in Practice’ and ‘The Assessment Handbook’ for DATA and ‘Optional Tasks
and Tests for KS3 D&T’ for SCAA. In
2000 she established www.foodforum.org.uk - a
web site offering a professional development service for teachers. This year Ali received a DATA Award for
Outstanding Contribution to D&T Education.
Lorraine Johnson
Lorraine is responsible for delivering the Bluefish
enriching literacy through design project for EAZs. Before joining Bluefish,
Lorraine was D&T adviser for Middlesbrough
Spencer Herbert
Spencer is responsible for
designing and implementing secondary workshops throughout the UK. Before
joining Bluefish, Spencer was a D&T teacher in a Kent secondary school.