Part of the process of consulting members our community about the vision for Thomas Tallis School has involved posting a link to a survey on Facebook asking the 650 members of the Alumni group to respond to 4 key questions:
What excites you about the future of Tallis?
What is the most important feature of the school that you would hate to see lost?
How can we ensure that every child at Tallis grows, develops and excels in the future?
In your opinion, how might the school community become even stronger?
There have already been some fascinating responses (I'll wait til a few more appear before attempting to communicate them) but I was particularly gratified to read this response to question 2:
It's personality and ethos. I would hate to see it become a school where only grades come first. As long as creativity continues to be encouraged and the brilliant care for the student's personal AND academic development continues then hopefully Tallis won't go down the same route as many other schools where students a barely considered as individuals.
Mr Hawes and I have begun a new project with the Year 9 Tallis Lab students entitled Space2Cre8. The project, sponsored by Berkeley University in California USA and the London School of Economics in the UK, aims to create a social network of students from around the world who share their stories using a variety of digital media. Yesterday afternoon, we had a Skype call with colleagues from the USA (California and New York), South Africa and India where we introduced ourselves and found out about their schools and students. We also heard an amazing story about a group of girls from the Indian school who have formed a new organisation battling domestic violence (see video above). It was also really interesting to hear about different perspectives on safety and poverty. The kids from New York and India had exchanged film stories and poems. Both groups had learned a lot about their friends in the other country but, fascinatingly, both developed a different view of their home neighbourhoods. The Indian girls, in particular, began by feeling slightly envious of their New York counterparts but soon realised that they were much safer in India than the Upper West Side, despite the threat of sexual and domestic violence and their relative material poverty.
This is such an exciting opportunity for our students to share their stories about the challenges they face and the opportunities they enjoy. We can't wait to get started!
I saw this today doing a search on Vimeo for videos tagged with learning. Strangely, it articulates an idea that is quite prominent in a book I'm also reading by Ivan Illich called 'De-Schooling Society'. Remember our Pop Up School concept that we presented in Oklahoma and our failed Skills Swap experiment from last year?
What all of these things have in common is a question about the role of schools in the 21st century. What are schools for? Where does learning take place? What is the purpose of education? These are the vital questions facing us in thinking about our move to the new school.
I visited the Whitechapel Gallery today to see the new Paul Graham photography exhibition. Upstairs was another small show featuring portraits of gallery staff by young people. Here's what the gallery has to say about it:
In the corridors of the Houses of Parliament and the back rooms of third division football clubs, hang portraits of heads of state and treasured past employees. Artist LadyLucy follows in this tradition, and uses portraiture as a process for communication and interaction. She encouraged a group of people aged 16-19 to set up a portrait studio, where staff from the Gallery were invited to sit and reveal aspects of themselves and the institution.
What I liked most about the show was the informal way it had been hung. All the portraits were in vivid green frames at various heights. These were linked together by hand painted coloured lines with written descriptions of the staff names and the department where they work. It all looked like a wall sized mind map. I wondered if we could attempt something similar in the gallery we will have in the new school?
In the context of our revision of the Manifesto for a Creative Tallis, this advice for graphic designers (recommended by Billy) might be really useful. As well as some great advice for anyone hoping to be creative, like No. 34 above about the value of limitations, the addition of fantastic little line drawings really brings the ideas to life.
What makes a good designer? What is visual literacy? What habits of mind are useful in the world of visual design?
Michael Wolff is a designer who values his creative muscles - curiosity, appreciation and imagination. As the man says, "Seeing is a muscular exercise".
Steve Jobs misquotes Robert Frost in this well-watched film about the lessons of his life: "Follow your heart, even when it leads you off the well-worn path, and that will make all the difference." Inspiring stuff.
