Contextual Background
I am comparing two teaching sessions which I helped prepare and deliver for the MA course Graphic Branding and Identity. The first session “Brand Identity” consisted of a convoluted and thematically challenging task around brand social justice and decolonisation. I used the second session “Brand Audience” in the following week as an opportunity to address the problems of the first session, deploying alternative teaching methods.
The first session’s workshop and homework task were based on an asynchronous lecture and contained a vast amount of brand references to critically unpack the topics ‘Social Justice’. The examples given were relevant,but seem to not connect with the students. Additionally the task was bolted on the previous week’s “Brand Experience” session whereby the students were asked to revisit the said brief and analyse the cultural references of their designated experience brands. We asked students to assess whether they appreciated the brand references they encountered during their brand experience as authentic or appropriated to then interrogate any issues related to decolonisation and summarise their finding using the What, So What, Now What model (Rolfe, 2001).
Evaluation
Many students seemed confused as the task blended many different elements. On reflection, I realised the lesson dynamic was one of information selection and transfer: the knowledge in the presentation lacked a clear angle and used very academic language. The task was not well scaffolded, the outcome not fully clear and there was limited opportunity for meaning-making activities. A better scenario would allow space for students to “participate in their own information-to-knowledge transformative processes” (Morrison, 2014).
Moving Forward
Together with the course team we drew on the negative experiences of the first session and made the following changes when planning the second session:
- To help them empathise with the audiences, we created a workshop series which was based on Gen Z as the student cohort expressed they feel a sense of belonging with that generation.
- We limited the amount of case studies in our presentation to four and we took them from Social Media to make it easily relatable.
- We asked them to work collaboratively in small groups and explore their own subcultural tribes they identify with which validated their social/contextual knowledge and connected it to the lesson topic. Robin Canniford explores the concept of tribal consumption, emphasizing the “linking value” that emerges when individuals seek social connections through shared consumption experiences fostering a sense of belonging and shared identity. (Canniford 2011).
- We asked them to work in small groups and set the time limit for the task to 30 minutes and share their draft findings via a pre-set up Padlet board. Padlet’s flexibility of pace, place, and mode allowed them to “[take] more responsibility for their own learning” (Gordon, 2014).
The second session was more enjoyable and meaningful for the students. I will continue to make future sessions more student-led by favouring group activities and creating opportunities to engage with the material in more relatable ways.
References
Gordon, N. (2014) Flexible Pedagogies: technology-enhanced learning. Advance HE. Available at: https://www.advance-he.ac.uk/knowledge-hub/flexible-pedagogies-technology-enhanced-learning (Accessed: 1 April 2025)
Morrison, C. D. (2014) ‘From “Sage on the Stage” to “Guide on the Side”: A Good Start.’ International Journal for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning. Available at: http://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/ij-sotl/vol8/iss1/4 (Accessed: 1 April 2025)
Orr, S. and Shreeve, A. (2018). Art and Design Pedagogy in Higher Education: Knowledge, Values and Ambiguity in the Creative Curriculum. London: Routledge.
Rolfe, G., Freshwater, D. and Jasper, M. (2001) Critical Reflection in Nursing and the Helping Professions: A User’s Guide. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.