TASK 3.c Sources of Information

Sources of Information

When beginning this task I must admit I struggled to think of five different sources as it seemed to me that most of my information has come from the internet. I decided to peruse the blogs of my fellow BAPP Arts students to see what they had chosen. Upon reading only two blogs my train of thought began and I realized that I actually have a wide variety of sources. Some of which I had not thought of as sources of information but rather a casual conversation between colleges and friends.

My Boss/ Colleagues

I am very fortunate to have a number of inspirational and intelligent people working above me that are extremely approachable and very resourceful. I make a conscious effort to build working relationships as I feel it not only makes your professional life more manageable but more enjoyable too. The head of the performing arts department at my school is a wonderful woman with a brilliant mind and an open door policy, I find in times of need I will always go to her. She always makes time to sit down and go through any schemes of work and discuss ideas I may have. I can always go to her with any questions or problems however big, small or relevant to my work. Even the simple things like how to use the copy machine and what the codes are, she is always ready and willing to help. I consider myself very lucky to be surrounded by so many talented and experienced professionals as the performing arts department in my school is one of the best departments I have worked for. Everyone has so much experience and knowledge of the industry and the working world I feel I am a sponge in their presence and everyday though general and casual conversation I learn so much. I make an effort to ask as much as possible and extract as much information about their experiences and opinions whenever I possibly can.

The Internet

Anything I want to know I can always rely on the internet, I have always been a very proud person and asking for help about the little things always bothered me. Then came the internet, an endless open book with all the answers you could possibly need. Della Estlin says on her blog: there is so much to be learned from research that can be done via the internet. She says she uses the internet for things such as:

• ·         Inspiration for ideas regarding class  work and choreography
• ·         Buying books, syllabus and dance equipment
• ·         Reading articles relating to work
• ·         Gathering sources
• ·         Sending and receiving email
• ·         To keep in contact with people in the same profession
• ·         Searching for jobs

The internet is a brilliant source of information from all of the above and like Della I use it for the same reasons. Understandably you may have to sift through a few wrong sites before you find a creditable and reliable answer, but the internet for me is by far my biggest source of information. If I don’t understand something, if I need an answer urgently, if I want to read into the night about a topic then the internet is the place for all that. I am not one for reading books and going to the local library, I love that the information I need is but a click away. Obviously with the internet you have to make sure your information is correct and you can’t always accept the first answer you find. As a teacher I have to ensure that the information I pass on is correct as that is my job, so when gathering information for the web I always make sure I visit plenty of sites and look up published facts. There have been times when I haven’t done as much research as I probably should have and my information has been a little wrong, at that moment there is always a student ready to point out your mistake, which leads on to another source of information I have, my students.

My students

As I am a secondary school teacher I mostly work with teenagers, teenagers talk and surf the web more than any other age group and their supply of random information is endless. At the start of everyday one of my students with walk in the class room and say “miss do you know.....” and 50% of the time it’s something I didn’t know. Students are a great source of information for me and I will always ask their opinion on schemes of work I am teaching and ask what they enjoy learning the most. Students will often fill me in on the latest music and trends which is important information for me as it helps when planning lessons or choreography. If I know what the students like I have a better chance of motivating them and developing their ability. Having students as a source of information not only keeps me up to date with the latest trends, but allows me to build teacher- student relationships, which are important to my work.

YouTube

YouTube is one of the most important sources of information for me with regards to choreographing. I can spend hours watching new music videos to better educate myself on the current trends and styles. I believe as a choreographer you must have a vast knowledge of choreography and always be up to date with the latest styles and trends.  I will also use YouTube to research styles I am unfamiliar with for example:  I had to do a dance piece for a ball scene set in the early 1900s, I am confident that without the use of YouTube I would have got the style completely wrong. It’s also helpful when you have to choreograph a style that is unfamiliar to you and you are struggling for inspiration or ideas, watching YouTube videos inspires me and I always come away with ideas of my own. It’s like your own little muse for whatever or whenever you need a little inspiration. YouTube is also brilliant as a quick fix for a problem, For example, when setting up this blog I struggled for about an hour setting up the display page, I decided to search for a video on setting up your blog and I found one. Ten minutes later I was fully informed and ready to go, from then on whenever I had a blog query I would just Google a specific video for that problem.

Events

As a working member of the Arts I feel it is important to attend as many shows and performances as possible. Pip Spalton says in her blog: I extract information and gather experience from going to watch performances. I completely agree with this and whenever there is a performance in town I will always go if I can. Liverpool is a very creative city with so many plays, musicals, arts shows, fashion shows and dance performances to see that there is always an opportunity to learn something new and be inspired. As most of my friends are in the Performing Arts Industry I never struggle for company to events, it is great sharing the experience with someone who understands and being able to discuss in depth your opinions and new ideas.

TASK 3b Concepts of the Professional Network

The Networked Professional

A professional network is a group of people who share common interests and come together to discuss ideas and opportunities; this can be an important part of current and future professional life. A person’s effective engagement and participation of a professional network can impact the outcome of success for the individual and also result in development of promotion and a sense of fulfillment and job satisfaction. A supportive network can also lead to a more enjoyable working experience and a greater sense of self worth and achievement.

Concepts of Professional Networking

Cooperation

I am a strong believer in cooperation especially when you are finding your feet in a new job. I am very passionate about my work and always have many ideas, being strong minded it is sometimes hard to cooperate especially when you believe your ideas or ways of doing something are better. When I was younger I would always speak my mind and push forward any ideas I had, however becoming an adult and entering the working world meant I had to learn how to compromise until I was in a position to be able to speak my mind without consequence. Working at a school meant I was working with a majority of older and more experienced professionals than myself which at times would bring about a class of ideas from time to time. Respect and compliance is key in my profession and my early months at the school were very much like the Prisoners of Dilemma game, I had to cooperate and comply until I felt I was in a position comfortable enough to ‘defect’ and go against the gain. This strategy worked very well for me as I agreed and was very polite about ideas in the first few months, I worked on dance pieces and drama selected by others and did the best work possible. Once I felt I had shown enough good work and had gained the trust of my peers and head of faculty I began expressing my ideas and sharing my opinion.

The prisoners of dilemma game got me thinking a lot about cooperation and how having worked in the past for me I should take time to consider the positive effects this could have on future opportunities.

Affiliation

I personally enjoy the benefits of an affiliation and the support that can come from a network of people sharing common interests. I love nothing more than to sit with my performer friends and discuss shows we have worked on and new opportunities. I enjoy my own company but I have always been a very social person and I find I retain information better when it comes from a person through casual conversation. During my teen years I had a lot of different friendship groups for different social gain; I believe this allowed me to dive into different passions and gain experiences that I would not have had through socializing with one group of friends. Adolescents spend 75 percent of their time with other people and a lack of affiliation can have a lasting negative impact (Larson, Csikszentmihalyi and Graef 1982).

 As an adult I now have many different friendship groups and networks of support that I often rely on for answers and help, I am always looking for ways to expand my professional network and my socializing circle of friends. According to psychologists our tendency to seek out others and form close relationships is an inherited trait that helps us to survive and reproduce providing a network of support that will help us when we are in need (Crisp & Turner 2007).

Seeking affiliation can be fraught by discomfort and anxieties as we may not always have the criteria for attraction others seek (Crisp & Turner 2007). Being a very social person means I have not often encountered anxiety when meeting or confronting new people, however my brother is the opposite of me and has always kept a very small social group of friends conversing only with people when needed. This has always been fine for him as he enjoys his own company and that of his very close friends however I know he has struggled going into a professional world when it comes to asking for help.

Theory’s of Connectivity

Social Constructionism

Constructionism- the view that all knowledge and there for all meaningful reality as such, is contingent upon human practices being constructed through interaction between human beings and their worlds (Crotty, M 2005). Learning something new every day through interaction is something I was taught from a young age. If I were to write down every time someone told me something I didn't already know I would probably be surprised at how much I have learned. This is almost unconscious learning through experience and it wasn't until I thought about it that I realized how important it is for development professionally and personally. However this has to make you ask the question, are we gaining knowledge of the world or just a collection of formed opinions of it? Just because we take meaning from our surroundings doesn't mean that they are right, and how do they differ from country to country and community to community. After all it is just jointly constructed understanding of the world, will this differ in 10 years? What we know and believe now could be wrong tomorrow.

Connectivism

Connectivism is a leaning theory for the digital age and suggests that our classrooms, networks and the web are all populated with information from which we learn and make sense. Whenever there is something I don’t understand I will search the web, in fact this is the first thing I do. Informal learning is a significant aspect of our learning experience. Formal education no longer comprises of the majority of our learning, learning now occurs in a variety of ways through communities of practice, personal networks and completion of work-related tasks (Siemens G 2004). Learning is a process of connecting specialized nodes or information sources, a learner can greatly increase their knowledge by connecting with a network. Dance forums are how I managed to find out about the BAPP Arts course and through specifically designed networks for professionals like myself I managed to find exactly what I was looking for and educate myself on how to achieve it. I will often search for specific forums to discuss ideas I have or find out information I need, they are a brilliant way to get talking to the people you need to and access the information you require. Without networks of professionals I would never have been able to find a course that was right for me.

Overall I found the course reader on networking to be very insightful and it has fuelled my desire to look into this subject further. Upon reading and researching the different concepts of professional networking I was surprised at how many I am already using unconsciously, however it has I feel opened up my eyes and I am now more aware of these strategies and will be conscious when apply them in the future to better analyse the results. 

TASK 3a The Networked Professional

After Reading the course Reader on Networking and doing a little research of my own I have discovered networking is something I do a lot of without even knowing. A conversation among colleagues in the staff room at dinner has often lead to new opportunity's and more importantly new ideas. I am currently in the process of setting up my own Performing Arts company so this task on networking could not have come at a better time. After researching different ways of networking I now have many new ideas of how to get the word around about my company and the best ways in which to go about it. 

Networking in the Staff Room
When I first started teaching in a secondary school my mind was blown with all the rules and regulations, even with all my notes and the school handbook I found myself in a panic everyday. I would spend my dinner time making notes and highlighting parts of the handbook, I soon realized this was not the best way for me to retain the information. After overhearing a conversation in the staff room between two teachers I soon realized the best way in which to learn these rules and regulations was to discuss problems and concerns I had with my peers. Everyday I would hear teachers discussing story's that I could relate to or ways of resolving problems I had not thought of. I soon put the handbook down and began making friends and socializing. I found the staff at my school to be very supportive and any questions I had I would ask them, I find it is much easier to remember rules and regulations when you have a face to go with the information. Networking in this way has been an enjoyable learning curve for me and my days at the school would have been much harder without the support of the staff around me. 

Networking Via Facebook 
One way I have been able to keep in  contact with all the professionals I have met over the years is Facebook. It almost feel kind of tacky saying my source of networking with professionals is Facebook but it is undeniably a good way to communicate and stay in touch, and almost everyone has Facebook these days. In the early years of my career I traveled a lot and worked in many different places so Facebook has been a social and friendly way of keeping those contacts and being able to causally call upon them when needed. Posts and videos on the news feed can sometimes inspire new ideas for me and its nice to see how other professionals are getting on and what they are working on . I would love to be able to set up a separate news feed for my friends on Facebook that are professionals in the performing arts industry, that way I wouldn't have to scan through hundreds of other posts when i'm looking for videos or posts about professional work. 

My Current Network of Colleagues
Most of the jobs and opportunity I have had over the years I have been informed of or recommended by a friend or old colleague. Word of mouth is an important part of the performing arts industry and is the reason I make sure I get to know my colleagues and build relationships and contacts where ever I can. Being a teacher at a Theater school allows me to network with singing and acting teachers which has opened up new doors for me in the past and created new ideas and job opportunity's. 

Building A Network Through Classes
I attend regular dance classes around Liverpool to enhance my technique and ability but more importantly to network and meet new people in the industry. This is a great way to hear about private auditions and events taking place in the city and also the opportunity to show case your talent and perhaps be spotted for an opportunity you couldn't have know about. Attending dance classes around Liverpool  has lead to many performing jobs and events for me over the years, however it wasn't until I read the course reader that I realized while I was socializing and developing my ability I was also building a Network. 

Some professionals that I admire and follow have their own websites and YouTube channels for posting their work, this is my idea of the perfect networking tool for promoting and connecting. A website and professional YouTube channel is something I am working on developing at the moment and I am currently trying out different ways of documenting and recording my work. As some of my work is with children it is hard to record or document material in any way and the ethical considerations are something I am looking into at the moment. One way I have found is using my assistant to perform choreography I create so that I have some form of it documented and available to share, however this isn't possible with group choreography or evens I am a part of. Forums and research has widened my knowledge on this matter and I am currently refining methods and ways in which best suit my work and projects to make a website and YouTube channel work for my own professional networking.