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Parklife researchers spread the word the People’s Day Festival!

Note the Parklife billing at 2pm!

Last Saturday, 16th July 2022, our intrepid young Parklife researchers braved the heat and delivered a blistering performance of their work on the Climate Action stage.

It was a truly memorable experience. I arrived early at the People’s Day Festival, but it was already teeming with people. This festival, possibly the most famous ‘free’ festival in London, had not run for four years, so this year it was special. Funded in part by Lewisham Council as part of their London Borough of Culture year, it featured some of the most notable young artists of recent years: reggae star: Grammy-nominated reggae singer Tippa Irie, Hollie Cook with her own brand of ‘tropical pop’, South London’s favourite disco band, All Day Breakfast Café, Homegrown grime MC Novelist headlines, singer-songwriter Nina Ros, Lewisham-raised 1Xtra DJ Shahlaa Tahira curates a line-up of local musicians, alongside rappers Koder and Sharna Cane and CassKidd. So there was stiff competition!

Nevertheless, the young co-researchers in the Parklife Project really rose to the challenge of the heat, the crowds, the other distractions, and produced a marvellous performance which showcased the poetry which they have written as part of the project. The Parklife project has been innovative because it has used the poetry, art, pictures, photographs and films which these young people have been created as the basis for research into local parks. In this case, Fordham Park. Fresh from the success of their Advocacy Day, where these young researchers held local councillors, park management and other community organisations to account and presented their work (read this blog), the young people shared their work in a much truncated form, no less interactive. Watch performance poet, Laila Sumpton, introduce them here (please ignore my annoying whooping):

Here Laila reads the Parklife poem (again ignore my annoying contributions, apologies about that):

Here Anna Stewart explains the project in more depth:

The poems that the young people read were hard-hitting and focused upon the themes of litter, safety and youth engagement. The Parklife researchers had found out a great deal by writing their poetry, creating their art, making their films, and conducting more formal research such as surveying staff and pupils’ views about their local park, Fordham Park, at Deptford Green school. They were supervised by their teacher, Ms Alice Player, who is also a wonderful leader singer and guitarist of the Sundries.

The Goldsmiths’ students who were part of the project, and absolutely instrumental in training up the young co-researchers in various creative research techniques, as well as making the Parklife film, also presented at the festival. They explained the project’s aims and approaches, and also involved the audience in a fun ‘Parklife’ quiz, which I took part in as a contestant. I received some sweets because of my efforts!

The whole project was funded by the Goldsmiths’ Strategic Research Fund and supervised by the Head of Civic Engagement, Michael Eades, who supported us on the day too. Goldsmiths put on a great show overall: they had a tent which highlighted the incredible work they’ve been doing connected to South London history, and the Windrush generation. You can learn more about this here on the ‘living memory’ webpage they’ve set up to highlight their research.

Goldsmiths’ invitation for Londoners to share their histories highlighted in a marquee near the stage where the Parklifers performed.

Here is the whole Parklife Team assembled at the end of what was a triumphant performance:

The Parklife Research Team. I am sitting down in the silly shirt.

If you haven’t done so, watch the wonderful Parklife film which the young people and Goldsmiths’ students made:

A Goldsmiths’ student writes about she and other students helped pupils improve their local park

Goldsmiths’ student (Fine Arts 2021-22) Cherelle Angeline writes:

I was starting my foundation year of Fine Arts at Goldsmiths when I received an exciting newsletter announcing the SHAPE Park Life Project, and I thought of being involved in engaging with local issues outside of my studies. I was immediately interested because it bridges my interest of education in raising the awareness of environmental and social sustainability through creative engagement, where I can connect with my local community to talk about important issues around us, bridging the social gap between university and junior school students. It is difficult to get into schools and work with them, but our group leader, Dr Francis Gilbert, had strong links with Deptford Green, where he supervises PGCE students for his PGCE course, and he put us in touch with a Secondary teacher at the school.

Picture 1 The video team experimenting with the devices (iPad and 360 camera) for the first time

We started with a goal to develop innovative creative research methodologies with young people to raise voices about local environmental and social issues. Our research questions that we are exploring are: How do students at Deptford Green School engage with their local park (Fordham Park)? How would students/teachers/parents like to improve Fordham Park?

On the initial stage of the project at Deptford Green, our decision to recruit secondary students from the school as co-researchers led us to be invited to school to host creative workshops with 12 students (ages 11-15) running over 7 weeks.

We have undertaken survey by collecting discarded trash on the corners, recording the point of view of animals underneath the trunks, overlooking the piled trash. In this process, conversations were built with the students as co-researchers, giving them space to explore their voice and creativity through direct research in the park.

We carried the wooden sticks from the park back to the school, then we drew our ideas for construction of the wooden sticks into sign “Save the Planet”. It was very alarming and ambitious in which throughout the project, we disseminate the big concept of sustainability by implementing it in the lives of the children which begins to appear actionable and closer to reach for all of us. We started discovering sustainability in daily life and how it can be learnt and talked about between peers.

Picture 2: Initial presentation of the visual arts team

Picture 3: Visual arts station doing painting

Picture 4: Visual arts station doing collaging activity

Picture 5: Paining and collage

Towards the mid-point of our workshop sessions, we have initially planned to respond to the poem the other group wrote. However, Katherine, insisted that she wanted to paint something that is not about the park. They opened up with their emotions more on this session. Katherine has painted a portrait of a non-identified person with a dark background, showing the struggle of mental health and anxiety. She opened about her experience in being self-consciousness in the park, of being seen by people and questioning. They were very honest in their personal emotions which is one of our goals. Saraiah painted a phrase “Boring in the park” with a sad face, and dull colors smashed around the paper. Reglina painted a bright orange and yellow sunset with dark hills. She drew hills continuously on the daily basis which to me sounds like her imaginary safe space and hope to dawn of the day. We were bonding through conversations and as we were painting abstractly. It has brought a realization that a less structured class affects the kids’ decision on mixing paint more loosely. They have shared about their dreams. It is a precious gift to facilitate the children’s personal development while also realising their dreams. Katherine wants to be a psychologist to talk to people about mental health and help them. Reglina wants to be an artist to paint and draw.

Through collaboration with young students, there is hope in creating a safe creative space within and outside the classroom and larger Deptford Green community for conversations about what matters to them through artistic expressions. This way, field research is more than gathering data and academic outputs, but it is about engagement and growing relationships between generations of different backgrounds that will last in the children’s minds and whole community. I hope that the children have felt that they have been listened to and given the platform to make real changes in their school community.

Looking to work in community arts and education, this experience has inspired me to use the creativity of the hands to engage with young people, echoing their joys, fears, hopes, and dreams for a better world. It has fueled my motivation and determination in creating a difference that lasts.

Resources for further reading

Jónsdóttir, Á. (2017) Artistic Actions for Sustainability: Potential of art in education for sustainability. Ph.D. degree and a Doctor of Art degree in the School of Education and Faculty of Art and Design. The University of Lapland. Available at: https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/132157571.pdf

Desai, D. (2020) ‘Educating for Social Change Through Art: A Personal Reckoning’, A Journal of Issues and Research 2020, 61(1), 10-23. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/00393541.2019.1699366

Heras, M. (2021) ‘Realising potentials for arts-based sustainability science’, Sustainability Science, Vol. 16 (6), 1875-1889. Available at: https://link-springer-com.gold.idm.oclc.org/article/10.1007/s11625-021-01002-0.

How to teach creative writing: Niall Bourke’s key note address at the Inspire Conference

Niall addressed these key questions: What does it mean to write creatively? What are the barriers to facilitating creative writing practices in the current educational landscape? How might we overcome them? Why should we bother? Can writing creatively be means to a wider academic end? Does this matter? Should we, as educators, try to justify creative writing as having tangible benefits for students? Can we afford not to? Is it important that educators make time to be creative themselves?

His keynote address sought to answer these questions and more, while also providing practical ideas, exemplars and resources to help educators of all persuasions facilitate creative writing exercises with their students.

You can find his PowerPoint here and his notes here. Please note you will need a OneDrive account to open these documents.

Niall’s reflections

It wasn’t long ago that I was a Goldsmith MA student myself, so it was a great pleasure and a privilege for me to deliver this keynote speech for the Inspire Creativity conference.

My focus was to look at some of the barriers to fostering creativity (and particularly in the domain of creative writing) in the current educational landscape, and then offer ideas, resources and suggestions as to how educators can foster creativity in students. Although I stressed that, in general, educators should resist pseudo-justifications encouraging creativity (i.e. – being creative is almost always a valuable process in and of itself and regardless of outcome), being the Head of an English department myself I was particularly keen to be pragmatic when acknowledging the pressures teachers are under. Therefore, I sought to suggest creative exercises which, while excellent in their own right, can also be used to develop understanding of some of the core threshold concepts of English Literature and Language curriculums. Through a series of short activities, I looked at how educators can encourage ‘low-stakes’ creative exercises, and then go on to foster creative response from students by using high quality style-models. The extracts used on the day included the Lyrics of Barrie Louis Polisar’s ‘All I Want Is You’, Leone Ross’s ‘The Woman Who Lived in A Restaurant’ (from her collection ‘Come Let Us Sing Anyway’ – Peepal Tree Press, 2017), John McGregor’s ‘The First Punch’ (first published in Granta Magazine) and ‘The Red Wheelbarrow’, by William Carlos Williams. It was a lot of fun!

Biography

Niall has taught English for sixteen years (in Ireland, New Zealand and the UK) and is currently Head of English at St Michael’s College, in Bermondsey. He completed the Teacher/Writer MA (as it was called then) at Goldsmiths in 2015. His writing has been published widely in magazines and journals, in both the UK and Ireland, and his poems and short stories have been listed for numerous awards, including twice for the The Costa Short Story Award, The ALCS Tom-Gallon Trust Award, The Mairtín Crawford Short Story Prize, The Hennesy New Irish Writing Award and the Fitzcarraldo Novel Prize. In 2017 he was selected for Poetry Ireland’s Introductions Series. His debut poetry collection Did You Put The Weasels Out? was published in April 2018 and was longlisted as one of The Poetry Schools’ books of the year. In April 2021 Tramp Press publishied his debut novel, Line. In 2020, The Arts Council Awarded him a grant to develop a ‘Choose Your Own Poetry Adventure’ collection called The Erection Specialists, which will be published by Broken Sleep Books in 2022. He is represented by Brian Langan at Storyline Literary Agency. He blogs on his website about both creative writing and education.

www.niallbourke.com

Twitter: @supersplurk

Note about the Inspire conference and anthology

‘Inspire: Exciting Ways of Being Creative’ was a conference hosted online by Goldsmiths’ Centre for Language, Culture and Learning, on 15th and 16th April 2021, 9.30am-4.15pm.

The conference explored through a series of dynamic online workshops and lectures how we can inspire people of all generations to be creative. It was in part a celebration of the publication of Inspire: Exciting Ways of Teaching Creative Writing (ed. Brankin, Gilbert & Sharples: 2020). You can access a free copy of this wonderful book here: https://research.gold.ac.uk/id/eprint/29515/

Mark Kirkbride’s reflections upon the Inspire Conference

Please note: Mark was an attendee and workshop leader at the online Inspire conference (details below)

The timeline of my experience of the ‘Inspire: Exciting Ways of Being Creative’ conference begins at 9:30am on Thursday 15^th April when I get to attend the introductions from Dr Vicky Macleroy, Dr Francis Gilbert and Carinya Sharples, then promptly have to log off to give an online workshop elsewhere.

In my lunch break, I catch Jake Smith’s presentation on ‘Re-writing Narrative’, championing nonlinear narrative, and wish I could adopt a nonlinear approach myself because by then it’s time to switch platforms and deliver another workshop. That finishes at 4:30pm, by which time the first day of the conference has already ended. I’ve missed so many great sessions with fascinating topics but at least I’ll be able to catch up via the videos and while I wish I could have been present for the whole day, the dipping in and out has certainly had an energising effect on the external workshops.

The second day starts with Camilla Chester’s presentation on ‘What Makes A Successful Author Visit?’ As well as being informative, it’s also hugely entertaining, with the highs – effectively being treated like a rock star – sounding like they make up for the lows.

At 9:30am it’s time for my presentation on ‘Promoting Active Learning’, exploring the dilemma inherent in teaching creative writing that knowledge acquired second-hand doesn’t have the same impact as discoveries made for oneself, and setting out to demonstrate that if as much learning as possible is embedded in prompts and exercises, that sense of discovery can still be retained. I illustrate what I mean by running through how I would teach characterisation for beginners. We each construct a character from two or three traits, together with a flaw, then describe that character as if to a friend. The workshop is even more interactive than I’d hoped with some really astute comments in group chat and complex characters emerging. For example,

Bill enjoys the company of others but often overshares his thoughts.

Sadly people avoid him. He has no idea this is happening.

Next we convey our characters’ qualities without describing them at all. Instead, we dramatize them, using action and dialogue, and more work comes through in chat, including

I rap my knuckles against the reception desk as they continue to sift

through my belongings, removing a laptop, pens and a six-pack of

Dr Pepper. The sign next to me says, ‘Please keep noise to a

minimum on arrival.’ I rap a little harder, the micro-rebellion

thrilling me.

The tiny red-head manager pulls one final item from my case.

‘Oh, come on, I’m not allowed biscuits?’ The words slingshot out,

high-pitched and pink-cheeked.

In just this mini-scene, one really gets a sense of a fully-formed person acting and speaking for themselves.

The half an hour goes quickly, so I race to the conclusion. While new writers might think, perfectly reasonably, that adding more and more layers of detail to the description of a character will bring that person to life more vividly for the reader, they demonstrate, to themselves, that characters live or die on the page by what they do and say. The trial and error involved in writers working in isolation and figuring things out for themselves is designed into the workshop, so that they have a sense of making their own discoveries. Loading prompts and exercises with key knowledge, so that the lightbulb moments happen during the writing, enables new writers to become active participants in their learning, thereby increasing engagement.

The half an hour comes to an end and it’s time for me to introduce Emily Davison’s presentation on ‘Using social media and fairy stories to inspire creative writing’. I at least get to enjoy all of that before having to rush off again, this time to take a family member to a hospital appointment, a trip that takes longer than expected, meaning I once again miss a lot of the day but at least get back in time for the Plenary. It’s a privilege to witness the progress of Emma Brankin’s drama pupil and be there for the launch of Niall Bourke’s book.

Somewhere between work and life, we reflect.

Biography

Mark Kirkbride is the author of two novels and a novella published by Omnium Gatherum in LA. His most recent novel was a semi-finalist in the Kindle Book Awards 2019. His short stories have appeared in Under the Bed, Sci Phi Journal, Disclaimer Magazine, Flash Fiction Magazine and So It Goes: The Literary Journal of the Kurt Vonnegut Memorial Library. He teaches creative writing and writing for wellbeing and is currently an Arts Facilitator for OPEN Ealing arts centre and a Creative Workshop Tutor for the University for the Creative Arts.

https://markkirkbride.com/

Note about the Inspire conference and anthology

‘Inspire: Exciting Ways of Being Creative’ was a conference hosted online by Goldsmiths’ Centre for Language, Culture and Learning, on 15th and 16th April 2021, 9.30am-4.15pm.