Task 2D - Inquiry

• What in your daily practice gets you really enthusiastic to find out more about? Who do you admire who also works with what makes you enthusiastic?

I enjoy lots of things about my daily practice from organisation to team management but most of all I enjoy watching people grow as they learn from me as part of my team, this is why I want to teach full time.  

I love nothing more than passing on skills and information that I am passionate about to someone who will in turn develop and use that skill in their own way. 

I have always been passionate about teaching but someone who really inspired me to pursue it as a full time career is Sarah Benton, a professional singer, teacher, mentor and good friend of mine. 
She developed, started and runs her own company Step Up and Sing with more joy and  enthusiasm than I have ever seen from anyone!  

Her company helps others learn, grow and better themselves via confidence building in singing, dancing and performance. 
I have been lucky enough to work for her company, fresh out of college, as a Dance coach and mentor for kids Primary and Secondary school age.
Her passion always rubbed off on me and was a great help in shaping what I wan't do be with my own life. 

Please check out the links below to see a fraction of the work she does for her community. 

http://www.stepupandsing.com

http://www.sarah-benton.com

https://www.facebook.com/StepUpSing/

• What do you love about what you do?

There are lots of things I love about what I do on a daily bases, what I have done as a teacher, what I have experienced as a performer and as a student, but one resounding thing that is a constant is my love of theatre. 
It is the one place I have always felt at home, whether I am performing or watching a production there is nowhere else I love more. 
The feeling I get from watching a performances is one that stuck with me from an extremely young age and is one of the things that first sparked my love of the arts. 
There is no feeling in the world quite like it.  

• What gets you angry or makes you sad? Who do you admin who shares you feelings or has found away to work around the sadness or anger?  

Something that makes me extremely angry is how some people seem to believe children are less intelligent and not as capable as adults. 

When a carefree child who still hasn't been made aware of "acceptable social behaviour" is talking aloud, running around or behaving in a way some people may find irritating they are often followed by an apologetic parent making out as though their child is misbehaving. 

I believe this could be one of the reasons so many children can grow up to be under confident teens.
The idea that children should "be seen and not heard" may be one that could be said to be outdated but I have been surprised by how often I observe this kind of behaviour in parents not only only from my experience as a teacher but in the street, coffee shops and just general life.  
In many situations I personally feel children can be a lot more observant and confident than most adults as they seem have a better understanding of things on a more primal level, without any of the "social niceties" that are drilled into us as we grow up. 

I am also speaking from a personal level on this point. Having been an extremely confident child myself, never nervous and stating that my favourite thing was meeting new people, I now sometimes feel this is only a fraction of my personality and I can really struggle with things like confidence and meeting new people. 
Now of course each person has different experiences in life and develops fears and emotional issues in different ways, but I do feel this is something that could be lessened by the way we are treated in the very early stages of our lives. 

I really enjoyed reading Lois-May Hunt's blog on this question. She writes about how bad parenting angers her and I feel she really echoes some of the points I am trying to make. 

http://lois-mayhunt.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/task-2d-inquiry.html

• What do you feel you do understand? Who do you admire who does seem to understand it or who has  way of making not understanding it interesting or beautiful, or has the same question as you? 

I don't understand why being a teacher isn't considered a first choice career option by most performers.
I understand that most people go into performance arts because of their love or performing, but why should wanting to enable other people with this skill be considered less important or less worthy than say working in the West End or on a cruise ship. Most people within this industry use teaching as a 'fall back' or 'plan B' career option.   

When I was in my final year at college we were all asked what we intended to do after we 
had graduated and what are dream job would be. 
No one in the whole year (apart from me!) said teaching. I found this a very interesting observation as many of my peers will have probably ended up doing teaching in some format at some point in their careers.  

The idea that "those that can't do, teach" is totally absurd in my opinion. It takes a very special kind of person with very specific skills to be a good teacher and I feel it is strongly underestimated as a career choice. 

I really enjoyed this article by Peter W. Klein "Those that can't do, teach? Think again" 

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/those-who-can-learn-certainly-do-teach/article24818663/

I really love his closing statement as I feel it truly describes that point I was trying to make.

"Those who can’t teach, just do – and that’s a shame." 

P. W. Klein

• How do you decide the appropriate ethical response in a given situation? To what extent are disciplinary responses different to that you might expect more generally in society? What level of physical contact would you deem appropriate from another professional that would would find unacceptable more generally? 

I find this a difficult question to answer as I feel each situation would require its own very specific "appropriate" ethical response. 

For example, a teacher has very specific guide lines for how to discipline students in their class. These will be set out by a formal body, like the school board or government. 

Things get more tricky when lines between pupil and teacher are more blurred like within a work force or colleges working in a team. 

I am the manager where I work and I feel I would be within my rights to point out and discipline behaviour that I thought was inappropriate or destructive to my team. 

Such as bullying or putting down co-workers, inappropriate clothing, rude language and attitude, that kind of thing. But there is no real code of conduct that states how to go about doing this, it is within each work force to create there own boundaries and guide lines. 

Another way that this can become more difficult is through friendships within the work place, especially if, like me, you work with/teach people you're own age. 

For instance something I may feel confident disciplining within the boundaries of work or school, where I hold more responsibility, could immediately vanish the second we are in a social "out of hours" environment.  

I have done a little research into this and found some interesting reads, mapping out guidelines of "rules" to follow within the workplace and more interestingly how best to implement them. 

http://www.hr.ubc.ca/administrators/employee-relations/discipline-in-the-workplace/

I also found this video very informative within the point I was discussing.

 

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So far my inquires have lead me to some interesting talking points, 

• Discipline within the work place and amongst peers 
• Why do some believe teaching is a less important career 
• Parenting vs teaching - how to treat young children
• Influence of theatre on young children 
• Organisation of a company 
• How to get into teaching full time - PGCE vs other 

I'll be exploring these ideas along with some reoccurring themes from my daily journal to further develop my professional practice learning.