Record of Observation by Carys Kennedy to one of my sessions.
Link here https://ual.cloud.panopto.eu/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=e0df46c1-bba5-4bc1-a461-b10701388eef
Session/artefact to be observed/reviewed: Colour & Fabric with Joao Maraschin
Size of student group: pre-recorded online for 120 students
Observer: Carys Kennedy
Observee: Joao Maraschin
Part One
Observee to complete in brief and send to observer prior to the observation or review:
What is the context of this session/artefact within the curriculum?
This is a session that is part of the unit Aesthetics & Identity for Y2 BA Womenswear students at London College of Fashion. This is a pre-recorded lecture that students watch on Mondays as a “week briefing” ahead of their design and sample room classes which will rely on this knowledge to unpack further.
How long have you been working with this group and in what capacity?
I’m their design tutor. I teach them since Y1, but this unit is 10 weeks long and this is presented in week 6.
What are the intended or expected learning outcomes?
Students should be able to develop a basic understanding of theoretical knowledge about colour and fabric, but also foster a creative response to how they engage with these two design fundamentals in their practice/project.
What are the anticipated outputs (anything students will make/do)?
They will incorporate this knowledge in their responses to the design workbook.
Are there potential difficulties or specific areas of concern?
No. It should be quite straightforward.
What would you particularly like feedback on?
The pace of the delivery, how the content was articulated and presented, the accessibility for different levels.
How will feedback be exchanged?
Online meeting to be recorded and transcribed by me later.
Part Two
Observer to note down observations, suggestions and questions:
Thank you for sharing this pre-recorded lecture with me, Joao. I watched the first half of the recording, which focused on colour.
You explained that this was a Monday briefing session for your group. You said that usually these briefings are in-person, but this one needed to be online for logistical reasons. You explained that in your in-person teaching, you make efforts to ensure that teaching is not wholly tutor-led, and that you make efforts to ensure students’ voices and viewpoints are brought into the space.
You asked for feedback about the pace of delivery, I appreciated your calm and clear pace, which was in no way rushed. One advantage of video lectures is, if students prefer a faster pace, they can watch at 1.5x speed – and I found that this speed worked for me well once I had an understanding of the subject matter. At 78 minutes, the video exceeds the length recommended by the LCF pre-recorded video guidance, and had limited direct student engagement, in contrast to your usual style of delivery. In our one-to-one call, I asked if you had any thoughts about how you could incorporate active learning techniques. You suggested building in asynchronous Padlet activities. We also talked about treating the videos as smaller chunks, and inviting some student activity at the end of each smaller chunk; a simple way to build this in would be to ask them to pause the video and do a task, which could be shared on the Padlet or brought to class. The pre-recorded video guidance makes other suggestions about engaging students in asynchronous video resources.
You asked about the accessibility for different levels. One strength here was that you provided clear definitions of key vocabulary and concepts, not assuming any prior knowledge. Key concepts were clearly defined and expanded upon, and you used layout and font (e.g. bold text) to signal meaning (as an aside, bold font is best for emphasis as italics can be hard to read for some people). Recorded lecturers are very valued by disabled students (see Disability Inclusion Toolkit: Recording Taught Sessions leaflet for examples), so it is great that this resource exists for students to work through in their own time. In our one-to-one, you also confirmed that PDFs of the slides are provided; this enhances the accessibility further, as students can review the PDFs if that format works better for therm.
We discussed a few potential access barriers too. Panopto provides auto-captions and a transcript, which can be very valuable – however, at times there were errors in the transcript that would affect the meaning (e.g when you talk about the Harajuku Girls and the V&A). Although it’s not always possible or realistic to clean captions fully, I’d encourage you to think about how to ensure student viewers can access key terms such as names (e.g. embedding more information onto the slides). Also, at times, the font size could be a little small, so I’d encourage you to review the guidance on Canvas about creating accessible documents.
You also asked for feedback about how the content was articulated and presented. I really liked how you clearly signposted what would be covered in the session, and used a clear convention (1.1, 1.2, etc.) so students can both be clear on the current focus, but could navigate easily to any section they want to review. Similarly, you demonstrated consistency in your delivery which can be very helpful: providing key concepts and terms, before moving through worked examples based on images, providing a wide range of historical and contemporary examples. You also address the student viewer directly with prompts to think about their own work: this worked well, and I would encourage you to do this more.
Part Three
Observee to reflect on the observer’s comments and describe how they will act on the feedback exchanged:
Overall feedback was clear and well structured, forward-looking, and constructive. I will elaborate on some aspects below based on feedback shared on Part Two above.
Feedback about the pace of delivery
- Feedback was positive but to improve, I will review structure of delivery moving forward and bear in mid length recommended by the LCF pre-recorded video guidance of 6mins. This is challenging, when there is quite a lot of content to be delivered, but I plan on creating smaller sections with activities or contemplation/reflection time in between to make sure that audience remains engaged.
Accessibility for different levels
- Positive with acknowledgment of good practice in terms of not assuming knowledge, building from the bottom up, using font/layout to signal meaning and offering a PDF after session for students to study/review further at their own paces.
Barries
- Captions from Panopto can sometimes capture the wrong pronunciation and present an extremely different word. I found useful feedback on writing the key words that are being said on the slides, which will support the verbal delivery and help those who might not have understood the term.
- I will also review the document on Canvas to continue improving on accessibility and inclusion for every new session both online and in-person.
Students’ Work
- I was happy to hear that the observer enjoyed my prompts linking to students practices and how they can unpack ideas and build knowledge from their own bodies of work.
Please refer to original word document if necessary: