More Thoughts on Networking

I found the following article on Anonymous Networking:


http://techcrunch.com/2014/12/18/few-winners-in-anonymous-social-networking-and-secrets-not-one-of-them/


I didn't know there was such a thing. Surely networking anonymously defeats the object doesn't it? It takes the concept of homeostasis to a whole new level!

It really goes to substantiate the basic principal of Affilation- that being man's innate desire to connect and interact with fellow man. The people who are involved in anonymous networking are obviously worried about privacy issues and don't want to have their personal details hacked, yet feel the need to express their views and connect with other voices on the internet.


Thinking about Axelrod's  Game Theory I suppose you could liken the idea of bouncing comments back and forth on the internet, without revealing your identity, to a version of the Prisoner's Dilemma. You could play Tit-for-Tat and voice extreme views without fear of reprisals.

It occurs to me that this has the potential to become a powerful political propaganda tool- a way of indoctrinating young minds without fear of being taken to task for your actions. It could in fact open the floodgates for all kinds of abuse.That is quite a frightening thought! 

My imagination is in overdrive- time for some more research!

I 'googled' Anonymous Networking and was surprised by what I found.

To all those who, like me, thought that GAP was just the name of a well known clothing store think again- it stands for Gnunet Anonymity Protocol. Take a look at the site below.

http://grothoff.org/christian/aff.pdf


Just when I think I am beginning to get to grips with the concepts of networking and connectivity and making inroads into making sense of it all, I discover something new to baffle and confuse me. It just goes to prove that the world is a bewildering place and Web 2.0 is forever changing, forever challenging our view of it.

Networking -un grande viaggio inizia con un piccolo passo

  Greetings from Italy. The above Italian phrase in the title of this blog, which means 'a large journey begins with a little step' describes how I am currently feeling about my networking efforts in Italy. I feel that I have made a bit of a start but have a long way to go.

Having just moved to a new country this networking section of the BAPP course is particularly pertinent to me. Although I have always valued relationships with my family and friends and always kept in touch with professional acquaintances, I have preferred to maintain contact face to face or, when that wasn't possible, to speak on the phone. I have not been a fan of virtual communication, so have never really engaged with social networking sites. Now that I am in a different country, however, I can fully appreciate the need to do so.

Suddenly I find myself Skyping and FaceTiming people back in the UK, so as not to lose touch with my connections there, and also joining sites such as LinkedIn, Meetup and Anglo-info in an attempt to make new connections here in Italy.

I have found the latter two sites particularly helpful. I use Anglo-info to find out about how things work in Italy for British people living here. It has information on matters such as health and taxation. It also keeps me informed about events in the region and has contact details for various societies, schools, theatres etc. 

 I am currently working peripatetically, delivering dance workshops to some of the International schools in France and Italy. In the future I hope to connect, not only with the International schools , but also with the ordinary Italian schools and arrange school performance opportunities, so this site will be useful in finding the schools' contact details.

I use Meetup to join specific groups that are of interest to me where I can meet like-minded people. Unfortunately there are no groups close by, so I am having to travel to socialise with the people in the groups that I have joined. I am considering setting up a local Meetup group for people interested in the arts, as the only one I have found is a two hour drive away.

Networking in a foreign country presents several challenges, not least of which is the language barrier. Until I moved to Italy I didn't speak a word of Italian. As the region I am in, Liguria, is in close proximity to the Cote d'Azur, a region of France that I have previously lived in and where there are many English people and most French people have some level of spoken English, I naively assumed the same would be true for this region of Italy. It is not the case. It was therefore quite difficult initially to make friends and contacts and I found that I need to use my French, which is a little rusty, in order to communicate.

 I tried to connect with other expats by writing a post on the expat forum and the anglo-info forum to see if anyone local got in touch. Unfortunately, the people who replied lived quite a distance from me.

So far the only people I have found, in the town in which I am living, who have a good grasp of English, are those either studying it, or teaching it, at the language schools. I have consequently enrolled at one of these schools to learn Italian. It has proven to be a very good thing to do, as, not only am I learning the language, but I have also made some more friends and through them, have been introduced to some useful contacts.

Another aspect to consider when networking in a foreign country is that of cultural differences. In the UK, for example, I gave many Musical Theatre workshops, but in both France and Italy they don't have a history of this in their culture, so I had to take this into consideration when contacting people with regard to workshops to make sure that I was targeting them correctly. 

When I first started looking at which social networking sites might be useful to join I was astounded by how many there are. I had heard of popular sites like Facebook, Bebo, LinkedIn and Twitter, but wasn't aware of the existence of all the others I discovered. Below is a link to one of the sites I found helpful in giving a brief description of some of the networking sites I found:

http://www.socialmediatoday.com/content/40-most-popular-social-networking-sites-world?page=1 

I intend to take a look at Xing which is supposed to be a good professional networking site that operates in Italy.

Ethical Considerations

I have written, in a previous blog, about my reservations concerning the use of social networking sites. I have so far not joined Facebook because I disagree strongly with the fact that they can use your photos and information and pass it on to third parties. I recently found this link via a blog on the subject:

http://asmp.org/fb-tos#.VJK0M74-DR1

I have also spoken to other dance teachers who said that they have stopped using it, because they were constantly bombarded by friend requests from their pupils and they simply didn't have the time to correspond with them all, but found that the pupils were offended if their friend request was denied. I wouldn't have the time to respond to all my pupils on Facebook, so again this is another reason for not using it.


Before doing some research on networking, I was aware of the popularity of Facebook and realised that it was a good way to advertise a business or service. I was not aware of the statistics regarding the extent of its use for advertising, however, until I found the site below:

http://expandedramblings.com/index.php/by-the-numbers-17-amazing-facebook-stats/


In the future I may have to consider using Facebook for advertising purposes. I still would not have a personal page because of the reasons mentioned above.

As an examiner I also have to be extremely careful about the online image I am presenting. I have already written about this in a previous blog.

At one of the BAPP Skype sessions concern was expressed by one of the dancers who had discovered some old dance photographs of herself on the web. Someone had got hold of them from her Facebook account and she wasn't aware of it until she 'googled' herself and these photographs appeared She was concerned that a potential employer might see these photographs and get the wrong impression of her because they are out of date and do not represent her as she is now.

I tried 'googling' myself and was amazed by the extent of information that came up and the way the internet had managed to link to newspaper articles, Youtube and all sorts of sites that I had visited in the past. It is quite frightening to think that anybody, anywhere, can access your personal information.

I am currently very torn between the need to increase my online presence professionally and the need to try to keep my personal information private.

Inquiry Task

I have begun to look at possible subjects upon which to base my inquiry. My problem was not in finding themes for the inquiry, as I had so many ideas about subjects I would like to write about; my problem was in narrowing these ideas down to focus on a few that might generate the sort of questions I could raise for an inquiry.

I looked at the question and answer approach suggested in the handbook, but I actually found concept mapping more helpful for me on this occasion. I imagined possible answers to the question posed. 

Below are some of the topics I have narrowed my choice down to:

WHAT MOTIVATES TEENAGE BOYS TO TAKE UP DANCE?

• Watching sister dance
• Inspired by a performance they have been in at school
• Inspired by a performance they have seen e.g. Billy Elliot
• Advised to take up dance to help with movement for drama
• Pop videos- see dance as helping with a possible career as a pop star
• Girls- attracted to the fact that there are a lot of girls and few boys in a class- physical contact
• Gay issues
• Virtuosity- boys like to show off so are attracted to the virtuosity in dance

I have had a lot of experience teaching teenage boys to dance. Several of these have been late starters and have gone on to have very successful careers in dance. I could interview them as to why they started dance.

I know male dance examiners and ex professional male dancers so I could get their views on the subject.

I could question boys who are currently studying dance at vocational colleges.

I could seek the opinions of other ex male dancers on BAPP Arts.

I am interested in exploring this topic because there is still a shortage of male dancers in the profession so we need to continue to attract boys into dance. Now that I am in Italy I would like to see if dance is viewed any differently by teenage boys here as opposed to the UK and look at the implications for the future of male dance in Europe

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ARE DANCE COMPETITIONS A GOOD IDEA?

Positive Aspects

• They can improve technique as you have to practice
• You gain confidence performing alone
• Can promote a sense of achievement
• Give enjoyment
• Make you push yourself more
• Enable you to compare yourself with others
• Give you a goal to aim for
• Allow you to meet other like minded people
• Provide more chances to perform
• Exposure- a chance to get your dance seen in the dance world
• Prizes- sometimes in larger competitions there are money prizes  or scholarships awarded for further training

Negative Aspects

• Pressure to do well
• Pressure to practice
• Time - have to dedicate a lot of time to practice and compete so can't socialise as much
• Costs- can be expensive with lessons, costumes, entry fees and travel
• Pushy parents
• Fear of failure
• Increased risk of injury due to extra training

As a child I entered dance competitions, so I can talk about my own experience. I also enter pupils for competitions, so I can question my pupils, past and present, about their experience and thoughts on the subject.

I have adjudicated dance competitions, so can look at it from the other side of the fence.

I know dance adjudicators, so I could get their views

I could get the views of parents, both of those whose children compete and those who don't.

I could seek the views of both professional dancers and ex professional dancers.

I could seek the views of other dance teachers.

I could ask the opinions of fellow BAPP Arts students.

This would be a pertinent line of inquiry for me as I help with the competitions run by the Imperial Society of Teachers of Dance in my role as an examiner. Also the schools I am delivering workshops to have inter house dance competitions and inter school dance competitions so it would be interesting to explore the psychological impact upon the pupils who take part.

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Does Image Projection Add to ,or Detract from, the Dance on Stage?

Positives

• Images on screen can convey more meaning
• Can transport you to a different place/time
• Fusion of digital technology and dance can create experimental art
• Motion capture implications in film

Negatives

• Can be distracting - watch the image more than the dancers
• Costs involved
• Time constraints
• Practicalities of rehearsing with the finished projection

One of my hobbies is videoing and editing, so I would really enjoy exploring this area, but I haven't got a great deal of experience in using image projection and dance. It is something I would like to know more about and an inquiry into it would, pardon the pun, 'throw more light' onto it. I have used projection for my choreography in the past, but technology has advanced so much and I feel I am getting left behind in this area so, for the development of my future development as a choreographer, this would be a very valuable area to explore.

I will have to give a lot more thought into who I would be able to interview to get viewpoints for this inquiry. A brief internet search has revealed a lot of articles on the subject however and I would really enjoy watching performances as part of the research.

This task has made me focus on the above three topics as possible lines of inquiry to follow and I have collated quite a lot of material on Evernote to use as background information for each of the above topics. I will continue to explore these themes to see which one emerges most strongly as the one to use for my final BAPP Arts inquiry.

``Reflection"

     

I had never encountered the terminology 'reflective practice' before embarking upon the BAPP Arts course, so it was necessary for me to gain a thorough understanding of the meaning behind the words in order to be able to apply them.

John Dewey says that there are:

      certain subprocesses which are in every reflective operation. These are: (a) a state of perplexity, hesitation, doubt; and (b) an act of search or investigation directed toward bringing to light further facts which serve to corroborate or to nullify the suggested belief.(Dewey,1933)

I was particularly interested to read that he mentions hesitation and doubt as being inherent to the reflective thought process, as these were feelings I encountered most strongly when first asked to do some reflective writing about my own professional practice. 

Initially I went into blind panic, not knowing what was expected and worrying how my thoughts and feelings on the subject would be perceived by the reader. Despite having researched the subject of reflection, I seemed unable to put pen to paper.

I was reminded of Ted Hughes poem 'The Thought Fox' in which he likens the blank page upon which he struggled to write to a blanket of snow and the words upon the page to the footprints the metaphorical fox makes in the snow.

I was therefore very interested to read Twyla Tharpe's chapter on The White Room in 'The Creative Habit' in which she compares the dance studio to a blank piece of paper or a blank canvas on which to create.

I found her theory that we can practice creativity very interesting . She states that:

      Creativity is a habit, and the best creativity is a result of good work habits. 

I personally really struggle with creating a dance to order, so as an experiment, I tried this week,when designing choreography,to put a repetitive structure in place as Tharp suggests.

My strategy was as follows:

1. Listen to the music
2. Think about the ideas it suggests
3. Jot down the ideas
4. Set up the video camera on a wide angle on a tripod
5. Improvise some movements and record them
6. Watch the video and see which movements to keep and which to discard

I did this for two hours at the same time every day to see whether the theory worked for me - unfortunately it didn't. Some days I managed to produce some choreography that I could use and on other days I didn't manage to produce anything at all.

It was an interesting exercise, but I deduced from it that what works for one person doesn't always work for another. I could therefore easily identify with Gardner's concept of 'multiple intelligences'  -the notion that we are intelligent in different ways and therefore think and respond differently to given situations.


Boud and Walker state that:

      Reflective activities may lead students to focus on personal distress, oppressive features of the learning environment, the programme of study, resources provided, assessment practices and so on. There is no way that these can be barred, and facilitators of reflection need to be aware that any activity can tap into such issues. (Boud et al, 1998)

Reading Boud's words made me realise that I was not alone in my feelings of anxiety and apprehension with regard to writing about reflective practice. 


I realised, after a while, that, to paraphrase Helyer, I was allowing the potential fear of my work being assessed by others to get in the way of my enjoyment of the learning process.


This made me reflect upon my own drama pupils. I have observed how some children struggle with improvisation. In some cases they clam up and don't speak at all. In other cases they employ a defence mechanism and attempt to turn the piece into something comic by exaggerating and playing the clown, because they think this will curry favour with the rest of the class. In fact they are frightened of what their friends will think of them and are worried by the criticism they may attract. 

I always make a point of telling my pupils that, improvisation can't ever be wrong, because it is their own interpretation of the subject and that, sometimes it will work well and at other times it may not be so successful, but that it doesn't matter because they are learning all the time by watching each other's work. I tell them they are not being judged, they are merely sharing ideas.

With some pupils this concept helps, but, if they are particularly inhibited, it doesn't and they still worry about what others will think of them.


I have overcome this, in the past, by initially giving lots of guidance and suggestions to these particular pupils as to what to say and what to do in the improvisation. I have found that this gives them the confidence to perform better, because they are doing what the teacher has told them and therefore think they will get a positive reaction from their audience. Because their performances is stronger, it does result in more positive feedback. I have found that they tend to approach the task next time with more enthusiasm. 

I was interested to read about what Boud and Walker refer to as the:

      tension between guidance which leads to the problems of recipe-following  and a lack of structure which can lead to a loss of focus.


This made me question whether, in giving guidance to my drama students in the above way, I was in danger of 'recipe' giving. I think that, on reflection, I must be striking the right balance, because I am getting positive results from my pupils.


In thinking further about this subject, I realised that it is often the fear of the unknown which can prevent us from fully engaging with subject matter and that, like my own pupils, I was using my preconceived notion of what my audience might think of my reflective writing as a barrier to creativity.


Boud states that:

      reflection is not solely a cognitive process: emotions are central to all learning. 


I had discovered something about myself just by acknowledging my feelings and that was: that I was afraid of the judgement of others. I resolved to try to see this discovery as something positive, not negative, because, once identified, I could begin to address the problem and try to do something about it.


I determined to view the process as a voyage of self -discovery, during which I would also explore a whole new area of learning.


I was, unwittingly, already engaging with the reflective thought process and, in relating to the past experience of my pupils and recognising similar feelings in myself, I was, in Moon's words:


      learning from the meaningful representation of learning


I decided to look at some of the ideas my fellow students on BAPP Arts had shared about their reflective practice in their blogs.

This made me more positive about beginning my 'reflective writing' task, however I sat poised at the computer screen thinking, but still unable to write for hours. I didn't know how to begin as:


      knowing what to reflect upon out of the whole of one’s professional experience is not a clear process. The more it is focused upon, the more the truly important issues become elusive

I often write material for my pupils to perform. It ranges from short monologues for use in drama lessons to plays and musicals. I have also written a novel which I hope to publish. Whenever I experience writer's block, I write a working title on the pages and then write down any ideas associated with it; I then begin writing anything about each one to see where the ideas take me.

I didn't realise that this was a technique which is used in reflective journal writing known as 'concept mapping', until I read Moon's 'A Handbook for Reflective Writing'.

I thought back to Tharp's notion of the 'creative habit' and realised that, in using 'concept mapping' I was actually employing the concept of using a repetitive pattern to help creativity in my writing. It was interesting to note that I had developed this strategy without realising it and that this strategy worked for me in terms of being able to produce creative writing, but hadn't worked for me when creating dance.

I wondered if one possible reason for this might be because I use my mind in different ways when I dance. I perhaps switch from a more 'verbal-linguistic' state of mind that I adopt for writing into a more 'bodily kinaesthetic' state of mind that I use for dance and maybe what works for one state of mind doesn't work for another. I realised that, in my work as a dance examiner, I adopt a more logical-mathematical approach. This is in line with Gardner's multiple intellligences that I mentioned above.

I have always found, in my teaching experience, that it is necessary to find different ways of teaching a particular dance movement, because what works for one pupil doesn't necessarily work for another. Reflecting about multiple intelligences has made me realise why this is so and made me even more determined to continue to explore different teaching techniques.

I decided to do a concept map for my 'reflective writing' task and, having done so, I was finally able to make sense of the ideas I wished to discuss.

Initially I wrote the critical reflection article from a personal perspective, but then, looking back again at the BAPP Arts Handbook, I realised that it had to be written as an academic piece of writing so I restructured it. Writing it first from a personal perspective made me focus on the concepts which I considered most pertinent to me in my professional practice. Writing it again from a more academic viewpoint made me look at the wider picture of "reflective practice".

I have just published my "critical reflection on reflective practice" to a separate page on my blog. My biggest dilemma in the end was not what to include, but what to leave out. There is such a wealth of information out there about 'reflective practice' that it is a bit mind-blowing. I found using 'Evernote' (which I was prompted to use after reading Kim Morrison's blog) to collate the material very helpful.

Task 2b My Journal Writing Experience

This image is taken from my Reflective Journal. I found it when I was first doing some research on reflective writing as part of the ROL for BAPP Arts. I liked it because the tentative step that the foot is making in the water was akin to the tentative step I was first taking into experiential learning. The reflection in the water made me think of the reflections I was making about my work for BAPP Arts.

Jennifer A Moon, in her book Learning Journals: a handbook for reflective practice and professional development, talks about the fact that journals can be in any form, e.g. they can be audio or visual, not just written. They can include, images, online material, in fact, they can include anything that is relevant to the person producing the journal. I thought back to the campus section on 'finding inspiration from our senses' for our work and for our reflective journals, that I have written about in a previous blog, and realised that: 'the sky's the limit' when it comes to journal writing.

 I have often got inspiration for dances from images and from music and written about the ideas I have had in note form; I had not considered this to be any form of diary, until I read about reflective journal writing.

I video my dances and look back at them, think about what I might like to change, sometimes incorporating suggestions from colleagues, or from the dancers themselves, and then implement the changes. I then video the dance again and compare the new version with the original. 

I hadn't realised, until I did ROL that videoing my work was, according to the concepts put forward by Moon, also a form of diary, or that I was, in fact, engaging in the reflective process when I was stepping back and looking at my work. Donald Schon refers to this process of thinking about your work after you have done it as: reflection-on-action.

As a dance teacher I am also frequently engaged in the process of what Schon refers to as: reflection-in-action; this is the concept of 'thinking on your feet' that is very necessary for any teacher of any subject. You have a lesson plan, but, if it isn't working, you have to change it during the lesson. Sometimes it can be that it is working better than anticipated and the pupils want to spend longer than you had planned on a particular subject so, once again, the lesson plan has to be changed. 

When I am choreographing, I occasionally have to change the work I had planned while I am teaching it, because, whilst conveying it to my dancers, I realise that it doesn't look right on their bodies. I frequently experiment with an idea that has just emerged on the spur of the moment, so, once again, I am adapting to the situation as it happens and employing Schon's reflection-in-action.

Kottcamp thought that reflection during action was much harder to do than reflection after action. BAPP Reader 2 makes the point that this is possibly because, as an academic, he is used to theorising, so finds this process easier, whilst someone in the performing arts might find reflecting during action easier, because they are used to doing it. This made me think of my own teaching experience. 

I have taught all ages and abilities dance and drama. I have worked with professional dancers and trained dance teachers and I have found that it is certainly not the case that all people in the performing arts find 'thinking on their feet' easy. I have encountered many dancers who find improvisation really difficult and teachers who are not able to adapt their work on the spot and need to meticulously plan it and then stick to it. I made a few notes in my journal about this and thought that exploring the value of improvisation in dance might be a possible line of inquiry to think about.

Moon talks about four levels of reflection in relation to journal writing. They are:

• Descriptive Writing- writing which tells a story but doesn't reflect upon what's written
• Descriptive Writing with some Reflection- writing which gives a basic account and poses some questions but doesn't really attempt to answer them or analyse events.
• Reflective Writing(1)- Writing which is focused and has a sense of being 'mulled over' and has evidence of external ideas.
• Reflective Writing(2)- in which Moon states the account shows deep reflection and it incorporates a recognition that the frame of reference with which an event is viewed can change.

I think that, during the course of writing my reflective journal for BAPP Arts, my own reflection has deepened. I have always been someone who questions myself and my work and always looked at the work of others for inspiration, but, I find myself reading more about what other industry experts are doing than I ever used to, and making notes about ideas that emerge, as a result.

For example I recently read Christopher Bannerman's article In Curation: The development of Dancscross and walking with Zhuangzi. I also found the following Youtube video on the subject of Artscross.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-23PaL7Ric

I found Bannerman's comments about the collaboration with ResCen Research Centre and Beijing Dance Academy fascinating. Reading about his comments on the cultural development of China made me think about a book I read called Mao's Last Dancer.

This book is the autobiography of professional dancer Li Cunxin and follows his struggles to become a professional dancer in China. He actually trained with the Beijing Dance Academy before his defection to the United States where he danced with Houston Ballet Company. 

The book had a profound effect upon me. I read it at a time when I was teaching a set of teenagers who had low self-esteem problems and a mentality of giving up at the first hurdle with dance movements they found difficult. 

I read these pupils a few excerpts from the book, to show them how perseverance was paramount to Li's success and to the training regime he endured. 

He mentions, in his book, about the fact that he practiced pirouettes in the dark to improve his kinaesthetic awareness. One of the things these particular pupils were struggling with was double pirouettes in open positions, so I tried getting them to turn in the dark in a couple of Ballet classes.They found the concept innovative and it generated fresh enthusiasm. In some cases I noticed a definite change in attitude in their dance classes and a much more positive approach to trying difficult dance movements.

I wrote in my reflective journal about how Christopher Bannerman's article had made me reflect upon a previous teaching experience. I also questioned what could have caused the pupils to have developed such a negative attitude and wrote about the possible reasons for their negativity. 

Moon talks about different techniques to aid journal writing such as:

• Free Flow Writing - the process of just starting to write random thoughts down and seeing what emerges
• Day notes- gathering ideas and jotting them down in note form
• Rehearsal Technique- holding an imaginary conversation with yourself, in which you pose questions and answer them as if you are the other person; for example, practicing what you imagine might happen in a conflict, or in a confrontation with someone.

She discusses different styles of journal writing. One of those is  Dialogue writing, in which two people give their thoughts to the journal. I thought this was an interesting concept.

I decided to rewrite my account of my negative pupils mentioned above from the perspective of one of my pupils. I then developed it further into a scripted, short duologue to use at a future date with my drama students.

 After I had written this imaginary pupil's version of events, I realised that I had never actually sat my pupils down and talked to them properly about their negative feelings. I had tried to present them with a solution without really knowing the root of the problem. My approach had helped some, but not all, of the pupils. I made a note in my journal to talk more to my pupils and take on board their comments.

I also realised that I had actually used this technique of looking at something from another perspective many times in my drama classes as topics for improvisation. For example, I recently gave my pupils the topic of imagining they were someone famous being interviewed. They then had to change it round and become the interviewer. I had just never considered this concept in relation to journal writing.

I have found the task of looking at different approaches to journal writing very thought provoking. It has made me far more aware of the world around me, because I find I am looking at every day things for inspiration. 

I also found it helpful to read some other blogs by people on BAPP Arts. I was very interested to discover, while reading Kim Morrison's  blog, that she used Evernote as a digital diary. I had never heard of this, so I looked into it further, and decided this would be something really useful for me. I spend hours looking at websites and finding interesting articles and it would be great to gather the information I require from them in one place, instead of having to search back and remember where I found them. 


 When looking at journals written by other people and comments they had made, these words, by Virginia Woolf, struck a chord, as I thought they summarised my idea of what my own diary should be:

       I should like it to resemble some deep old desk, or capacious hold-all, in which one flings a mass of odds and ends without looking them through. I should like to come back, after a year or two, and find that the collection had sorted itself and refined itself and coalesced, as such deposits so mysteriously do, into a mould, transparent enough to reflect the light of our life, and yet steady, tranquil compounds with the aloofness of a work of art. 

Task 1D - The Importance of Audio-Visual in Social Media

       Audiovisual communication breaks down the traditional barriers of written communication to ensure that your audience understands the message easily, resulting in better discussion and collaboration in business, education and personal applications.

The above quote summarises the importance of the use of audio-visual in communication today. 

• Social media uses audio-visual as an effective means of advertising. People use social media to view television programmes and interact with them. Digital technology has revolutionised the way we view film, changed the way children are educated, in fact it has impacted greatly on the way we live our lives in the developed world.

• The following quote from the article Virtual Community: No 'Killer Implication'(Andrew Feenberg and Maria Bakardjieva New Media Society 2004) reflects the fact that the internet has become, not only a means for communication but also a means for creativity:

      what the internet offers is a flexible communicative space that can be construed and bent in an infinite number of ways by sufficiently motivated groups of people. The implications and significance of what these groups build depends on the shape that they give to the space they create, and the relationships produced within it.  

Audio and visual are very effective tools for creativity.

• I often video the choreography I create on my pupils. I do so as a memory aid, but also I find it useful to look at what I have created a couple of days later and see whether I am happy with it, if not I make changes and then video these and compare them with the original choreography. I find it useful to be able to do this as it enables me to step back from what I am doing at the time and give my work a more considered opinion. It also enables me to show the choreography to my colleagues and get their views.

• I also use video to show my pupils their faults. I have found that it has a greater impact on them than merely telling them about their faults and, if they can see what they are doing wrong they are more likely to try to correct it.

• I take the video on my phone or tablet as it is so easy to do so. I have in the past sent copies to my pupils on their phones, but, having done some research on copyright in relation to my work on BAPP Arts, I no longer do this.

Below is one of the sites I visited about copyright:

https://www.americanexpress.com/us/small-business/openforum/articles/what-you-need-to-know-about-sharing-photos-and-videos-online/

• As part of my work for BAPP Arts I uploaded some photographs of my past pupils to Flickr. I used images from my website that I had previously obtained permission to use. 

This is the first time I have personally done any photo uploading, as my website photos were uploaded by the person who created the website. I found the process very straight forward. It is not something I would use for my own personal photographs as I hate being photographed and the thought of publicly displaying photographs of myself fills me with horror. 

Posting these photos did make me reflect upon all the pupils I have taught who have gone on to perform professionally and I enjoyed looking at the photographs and remembering the pupils.

Below is the link to my flickr photos:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/128213425@N02/sets/72157646687009643/

• I use Youtube a lot to look at dance and I have uploaded videos of my pupils dancing and linked it to my website for advertising purposes. I have all the relevant licences,such as PPL and PRS, for the use of the music but, I have had to request that my pupils do not upload any of their dances because of possible copyright consequences.

I had an incident a few years ago where I had taken a group of pupils to perform at Disneyworld. One of the parents had videoed the performance and, unbeknown to me, uploaded it to Youtube. I received an email telling me to take the sound off the clip because of music copyright infringement. I asked  the parent in question to take the video clip down.

• I started to think about all the showreels that are on Youtube and Facebook. It is one of the key ways in which performers and choreographers advertise their work. I wondered how people managed with regard to copyright if they didn't all have the relevant licences and permissions, so did some research on the topic.

• In my research I discovered the site below which mentions the fact that there is a clause about 'fair use' in Youtube's contract. I wasn't aware of this, or of the fact that you could dispute the copyright claim if you felt your video came under this 'fair use' clause. The link to the site is:

http://www.actonthis.tv/2012/05/rights-showreel-fair-use-youtube/

I found the information on the above site very helpful and, if I have anymore notices regarding infringement of copyright when posting video clips in the future, I will certainly consider challenging them.

• The European Commission recognises the importance of audio-visual in today's digital communication world. It has developed a digital agenda to look at the developments of audio-visual in the media. Below is the link to the site:

http://ec.europa.eu/digital-agenda/Convergence


I found the following figures taken from the European Commission's 'Green Paper Preparing for a Fully Converged Audiovisual World: Growth, Creation and Values' very interesting:

Internet video users are expected to increase globally to 1.5 billion by 2016, up from 792 million in 2011. 72 hours of video footage is uploaded to Youtube every minute

• The above image is one I discovered on Pinterest. It is advertising the speaking photo app that enables you to add audio to photographs you have taken. I love this idea as it is a great way of remembering exactly where and when the photo was taken but also how you felt at the time.

It is evident that the role of audio-visual in social media is an important one and one that will increasingly affect our lives as Web 2.0 continues to expand and develop.

Task 1b - Comments on Reader 1

I read Reader 1 as part of my research before I first set up my blog in order for me to get to grips with the concept of Web 2.0. I have read it again in order to gain further insight into the way web 2.0 works. 

• The reader refers to the: three particular competencies that are relevant to the positioning of Web 2.0 within professional practice and the workplace, i.e 'Architectures of participation', 'Remixable data and transformations' and 'Harnessing collective intelligence'. I decided to take a look at what these terms meant and then relate them to my own work as a dance teacher and examiner.

ARCHITECTURES OF PARTICIPATION

• The reader explains this as the way in which we both absorb information on the internet and also create it, so that we are at times passive and at other times active when we use Web 2.0. We communicate, interact and therefore contribute to social networking sites like Facebook. Hamilton's concept that: "participation is a function, in part, to the reduction of the barriers to access", had a particular resonance with me in light of my recent computer crashes that caused me so many problems in my work. It is fortunate that we have other devices, such as Smartphones, so that we can still participate in using the internet if our main computer fails. 

• Ullrich talks about the fact that social media sites make data and functionality accessible as they wish to promote a widespread use of their sites. Smartphones are a prime example of how easy it is for people to participate in Web 2.0 with the sites like Facebook,Twitter and Youtube being already placed in your phone settings so that it encourages you to join theses sites and facilitates the means for you to do so.

The fact that it is easy for people to participate in Web 2.0 means that more and more people are using it. 

REMIXABLE  DATA AND TRANSFORMATIONS

• I use music editing a lot for teaching and choreography and source some of that music from sites such as Spotify. I didn't know that when I was creating a new piece of music, by editing different sections together, I was creating a a 'mashup', or that this was terminology linked to Web 2.0, used to describe mixing up information from more than one source to "generate a new service displayed in a single graphical interface" until I read the article below:

http://books.infotoday.com/books/Engard/Engard-Sample-Chapter.pdf

•   I sometimes share music I have found with my pupils and other teachers. Until I read about remixable data in the reader I hadn't realised that, when I was sharing music, I was participating in one of the central ideas of Web 2.0, that being the notion of exchanging images, music, text and opinions and creating an open platform for discussion.

  "These interactive and participatory aspects of new media objects further erode the distinction between artists and audience and offer a model which has been termed the rise of the prosumer, i.e. the consumer is also a producer"

The above quote by Valtysson reflects upon the idea that in Web 2.0 there is no real difference between the person creating the material and the person using it, because the sites rely upon the interaction of their users for the development of their content. Bruns refers to the concept of simultaneously producing and consuming work on the internet as 'produsage'.

• I hadn't really given any thought to the fact that every time we   leave a comment on a blog or a social media site we are changing it by doing so and it is constantly evolving as a result. Ullrich refers to this as perpetual beta.

Harnessing Collective Intelligence

• In gathering together people's thoughts, ideas and comments Web 2.0 is harnessing collective intelligence. Social networking sites and sites like Amazon and Ebay feed upon the data they collect from their users. Amazon, for example, looks at what we buy and suggests other similar products that might be of interest to us. These sites are using Gruber's three processes of: 

a social system - in which people communicate via computer technology.

 a search engine -  which is capable of gathering and processing the information and finding questions and answers.

intelligent users- who know how to search and obtain the information they require.

• One of the ways that internet sites gather information about their users is by placing 'cookies' on their sites. While I have heard this terminology before I didn't fully understand what internet 'cookies' were,or how they worked, until I read the following article:

http://lifehacker.com/5461114/fact-and-fiction-the-truth-about-browser-cookies

• I thought that cookies created spam emails, but, having read the above article, it appears that this is not the case. I wanted to understand how spam emails are created, so I did a bit of research and found the following link:

http://www.private.org.il/harvest.html


Ethical Considerations

• This got me thinking about the ethics involved with internet use. Most of us use the internet on a regular basis, but what are the implications of having this technology at our fingertips?

 You only have to glance down any high street to see the amount of people on their phones or sit down in a cafe and see people tapping away on their phones or tablets. For many it seems to be something of an obsession.

I have already commented, in a previous blog, about my own pupils' frequent use of their mobile phones and tablets. There certainly seems to be an increasing dependency upon the use of internet devices.

• I found an interesting article, taken from the Varsity newspaper, recently on the subject of student dependency on technology, written from two different student perspectives. 

The first student has a more negative outlook as she considers the impact of the use of technological devices upon the environment. She also is of the opinion that meeting in person is much healthier than a passive use of social networking sites.

The second student is of the opinion that: "when it comes to new tech and social media the benefits outweigh the costs for students." The link to the article is:

http://thevarsity.ca/2014/10/05/are-students-too-dependent-on-technology/

• This article provided the inspiration for a drama workshop with my pupils aged 11-16 years on the pros and cons of social networking. I was interested to get the viewpoint of the students I am teaching. 

We began with a brainstorming session in which my students put forward their views on using social networking sites. We then took some of the things they had mentioned and developed them into improvisations. Some key topics that emerged were: 

1: Peer pressure - some of my younger pupils said that they felt obligated to join sites such as Facebook because their friends were all using the site so they had joined even though some of them were under the age of 13 that Facebook imposes as a requirement to join it's site.

2: Cyber bullying- a couple of pupils said they had been victims of this and talked about how it had affected them. Interestingly, they had not stopped using social media as a result, they had just blocked the people who had sent the hurtful messages.

3: Socialising- all of my pupils were of the opinion that it was a great way to keep informed about events and arrange meetings. 

  

4: Photo sharing- all of my pupils had posted photographs of themselves on their social networking pages and enjoyed looking at each other's photos.

• I was unaware, until I read the article below, that, once you had posted a photograph onto Facebook, you no longer owned the copyright to that photograph and Facebook were at liberty to use it:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/social-media/9780565/Facebook-terms-and-conditions-why-you-don't-own-your-online-life.html

I asked my pupils if they were aware of this- none of them were. I personally strongly disagree with the fact that a social media site can take ownership of your photographs and data in this way.

• Although there are privacy settings on social media sites and you can restrict who sees your profile, you can't fully control who gains access to your page as someone that you have granted access to could show other people what you have put up there.

We discussed this in the drama workshop and nearly all my pupils said that they had been shown the pages of people they were no longer friends with via other friends who still had access to the page. 

My older pupils also said that they had often been sent inappropriate material on their social media pages by teenage boys who were friends.

• We discussed the fact that parents can put controls onto the computer to restrict their child's access to inappropriate material, but they have no idea what they are accessing on their phones and tablets and sharing with their friends via social media.

• I did some research on the statistics surrounding the access of inappropriate material online by children and discovered the site below. I found it very alarming.

http://www.guardchild.com/statistics/

• The UK government is taking steps to try to make the internet a safer place for young people. It has commissioned reports from Ofcom to look into child safety on the internet. Below is a link to a news article about this:

http://media.ofcom.org.uk/news/2014/internet-safety-measures/

This article made me question whether the government should be taking greater steps towards imposing controls over appropriate internet content, but then you could argue that that might be an infringement of our democratic rights. 

Countries such as China and Iran place certain restrictions on their citizens' use of the internet and in North Korea ordinary people are not allowed to use the world wide web at all. 

• As I thought about this I was reminded of the words in Reader 1 : democratisation of the web. If we impose too many restrictions are we in danger of creating a situation akin to that in China? 

• I did not realise, until I discovered an article online about it, that the USA uses something called PRISM as a means of intent surveillance and that there have been suggestions that the UK government also uses PRISM. The link to the article is below:

http://www.theverge.com/2013/6/7/4405906/uk-government-is-allegedly-involved-in-us-internet-spying-program

I find the thought of someone being able to access the content of a person's emails and monitor the sites they visit a gross infringement of one's privacy.

• I am also concerned with the fact that anyone can post anything they like on Youtube. I have had pupils post videos of themselves practicing their dances and have had to ask them to take them down, not only because they were using my choreography without permission, but also because they were infringing copyright by using the music in this way.

At a recent examiner's meeting I attended the question of social media was brought up. A teacher had posted one of her pupil's examination reports on Facebook. In this instance the pupil had attained a very high result and the teacher wanted to show people, but it opens up the whole question of confidentiality and professionalism; had the teacher asked the consent of the pupil and parent before posting this, for example? If a bad report had been put up, would it have opened the floodgates for criticism of the examiner in question?

It was also mentioned that one of the examiners, who also has a dance school, had an incident where one of her pupils had watched exercises from the Modern dance syllabus demonstrated by a child in her living room.The examiner's pupil had then taught it to herself.The exercises were incorrectly demonstrated and consequently she had learnt an inaccurate version of the syllabus, which her teacher then had to correct. This is potentially damaging on several levels:

1. Copyright- this was not given permission by the society to be put on Youtube

2: The work was inaccurate so someone copying it was also learning it incorrectly

3: Potential heath and safety issues- trying to learn something without applying the correct technique could cause injury.

It was concluded at the examiner's meeting that social media is an effective tool for our work and a good way to gain a target audience but that, as examiners and teachers we are in a vulnerable position and have to be extremely careful in the use of it. 

This task has really made me think about the wider picture of internet use. While I like the the fact that I can gain access to any information I require via the web and appreciate that Web 2.0 opens up so many opportunities for communication and networking, I am also worried about the privacy aspects.

• I read an interesting article by Jake Davis recently in the Evening Standard. He was one of the LulzSec hackers who was imprisoned at the age of eighteen for hacking into confidential government files. In it he said:

      "people need to think about the process of a needle moving around on a hard-drive and inscribing their data. Where is it stored? What happens when you send an email? how long-lasting is a picture? How far do people have to be pushed to give it up to other people? People don't think of the net as a physical thing - they imagine it's all in this ethereal cyberspace. It's a lot more personal than that."

Whilst I was concerned by his words, I was interested to discover that it had inspired a play entitled 'Teh Internet is Serious Business' (NB the misspelling of 'The' is deliberate in the title). It was performed at the Royal Court theatre. I would really like to have seen this play. Just reading about how we leave a giant footprint of personal data when we use the internet that other people can access is a frightening thought. It seems it really is a case of :