Inspiration from the senses
Paula talked about how we can get inspiration from everywhere for our work and about remembering the importance of the senses as stimuli in the creative thought process and as tools for reflection.
We discussed reflective journal writing and the fact that it isn't just a diary of events but more a collection of ideas, thoughts and feelings that can include images, videos, hyperlinks to websites and anything else that you want to write about.
We did some exercises to illustrate the role of the senses as stimuli. These were as follows:
SMELL
1. Paula told us to close our eyes and she handed out paper bags and asked us to smell them. We had to say what we thought the smell was and what it made us think of.
The idea behind this was that different smells can trigger memories that in turn cause us to reflect on past events. Reflection is key to part two of Module 1, and, in fact, to the course in general, so anything that can make us think about things we have done in our work and about what we have learnt from our experience is valuable.
TOUCH
2. Paula shook hands with each of us. She has a firm handshake that she said was instilled into her by her father. We talked about touch and how something as simple as a greeting can speak volumes about the person. This led on to a discussion about body language and the fact that 70% of the way we communicate in person with each other is via our body language.
Myself, Sarah and Lisa who attended the session are all from a dance background so touch is an integral part of our work. Our bodies are our instruments of communication and we use them to channel thoughts and feelings through the medium of dance.
We did a brief mime of a morning routine to illustrate communication via body movement.
HEARING
3. As a means of using sound to stimulate the imagination we created an improvised Halloween story. Paula began and we all added a section to it. We were listening, interacting and feeding off each other's ideas to create our own.
SIGHT
4. Paula shared some of her Instagram images with us and talked about some of the inspiration behind the images she had created. She asked us to take some photos once we had left the campus session and see whether any of the images we collected provided inspiration for our work and in turn for our reflective writing.
The above image is one I took on my way home. It was taken at King's Cross station. It made me recall a dance I had choreographed called 'Remembrance' which was a contemporary piece about a young girl losing her sweetheart during the first world war. It also thought the image was appropriate because it will soon be remembrance day and it is the centenary of WW1.
The fact that I took the photograph at a train station made me think about all the journeys I had taken in my life and the different routes I had embarked upon and made me wonder where the current BAPP Arts journey might take me.
TASTE
Paula asked us to do our own exercise on taste after the session. I ate a bar of chocolate on the train. I'm supposed to be on a diet so this sent me on a guilt trip and provided the inspiration for a dance entitled 'Forbidden Fruit'!
I found the session really helpful. As well as all of the above we got chance to ask questions and talk about where we were up to on the course. It gave me food for thought- literally!
My computer crashed and died and had to go in for repair so I turned to my backup pc but, within minutes, it too gave up the ghost. The same day I went in to the bank for a statement and was told the bank's computers were down so I couldn't get one; someone was definitely out to get me- or so it felt!
It was very frustrating and made me reflect upon how dependant we have become on technology. It's great when it all works.When it malfunctions it is not only inconvenient but can cause huge problems, like for example the recent chaos caused at Heathrow by computer meltdown which left passengers stranded on runways, departure boards not updated and flights minus luggage.
For me being without my computer meant that I had to resort to good old fashioned pen and paper for my business administration which was much more time consuming. A few years ago I wouldn't have missed my computer as I only used it periodically for looking online. Now, however, being it is really problematic as my computer is my virtual office. I do all my business administration on my computer and also rely upon it for finding, downloading and creating and editing music for my pupils to dance to. Without my computer my business can't fully function.
I had to rely solely on my phone for the internet. How did we ever manage without mobile phones? My pupils seem to be permanently attached to phones and tablets in between classes and that isn't just the teenagers. A child of three years of age in my Beginner's Ballet class recently came and showed me with pride her new mini iPad!
This reminded me of a report on ITV news I had seen which was about whether we are too reliant on technology. It stated that two fifths of children under the age of two are already using smart phones and tablets every day. Below is the link to this article:
http://www.itv.com/news/tyne-tees/story/2014-05-06/are-we-too-reliant-on-technology/
I do think that we are too reliant on technology, but, as a self confessed technophobe, I tend to see technology as a necessary evil and things like my computers crashing don't help to change that view.
Being minus my computer also caused problems for my work on BAPP Arts. It meant I couldn't join Adesola's Skype session. A good samaritan leant me a laptop for the occasion and I sat there, in eager anticipation, waiting to connect to the conversation to no avail- there were technical difficulties and I couldn't join the session. Thwarted yet again by technology!
Fortunately Adesola repeated the session the following week and this time, on another borrowed laptop, I succeeded in connecting.
SKYPE SESSION
It was very interesting to hear the thoughts and opinions of others on the course. I found it useful to hear from Chiara on Module 3 as it enabled me to see where the course was leading and talk to someone who had already completed the Module I am currently doing.
I discovered in this session that the tasks on the course are not compulsory. They are a means of guiding the learning process, but you can omit some if you feel that you would not be learning anything new or helpful to your professional development by doing them. I hadn't realised this, but it makes perfect sense, as this is a personal learning journey, that certain tasks will be more relevant to each of us than others.
Rachel mentioned that she had uploaded lots of videos to Youtube so felt that she would not be benefitting by doing this task. I have also uploaded videos in the past, but, as I have now purchased a new Mac (in the hope that this might prove more reliable than my pcs) and haven't yet used iMovie, I want to use this task to learn more about iMovie as I do it.
The key thing I took away with me from this Skype session is that you don't have to give all the tasks equal weight; you can adapt them to suit your own professional needs and, if you can't find a way of learning something new by doing the task you can omit it altogether and perhaps write about your reasons for doing so, either in a blog or in your reflective journal.
