On Teaching 3 – Online Learning

I wrote the first two of these after a bad online teaching experience.  During the last quarter I had an OK online experience.  Most of the classes I take are online.   It isn’t necessarily because I prefer them – but they are typically more convenient.  As with any class there are many differences between classes and schools, even within a college or university.  I consume a fair amount of content – much of it online.  Obviously it varies in the way that it is conveyed, but it is clear to me that online learning – actively with enrollment, semi actively via online sites like Lynda.Com, or open source university classes, or just casually with many of the articles and white papers available.

Generally speaking, most of this learning occurs much more passively than traditional classroom learning. 

Generally speaking online learning is typically not as effective as classroom learning and retention is lower.  Considering the fact that online learning, in my opinion will only grow, finding a way to fix this is important.

My online classes have generally been 1 of three types. One is a live recorded actual class, in which the online portion participates asynchronously with the rest of the class.  One class gave you the option of watching it live (this was a fairly good online class).  One type provides pre-recorded lecture materials.  One of the best classes I ever took online had this - his lectures were full length, insightful, and on point.  The third, may have online recordings but they are short and no where near lecture length.

The other differences in classes of course is the assignments.  To "mimic" in class discussion, many (poor) online classes require an absurd amount of reading and writing posts relating to the topic and the commenting on other posts. Hopefully, they at least provide a rubric on what these posts should include to be meaningful, but they often don't.  And the amount of work that goes into this far exceeds that of a normal classroom discussion and sometimes equals a paper (some require resources).  I understand that it is more difficult to see what students are doing in a virtual world.  I find that discussion groups work better than doing whole class discussions, and that case studies and actual papers and analysis also work well.

Also what I find is that not only is the lecture material not the same as an in class discussion, but neither is the reading material.  When I first started taking online course it seemed like teachers just simply made their in class course into an online version (minus maybe the video).  I'm not really sure of that though - just as students seem to put less work into an online course - so does, it seems the professors do.

I realize that all of these thoughts on teaching may seem off topic to theatre, but frankly, especially in areas like Cad, I feel like there are things that could be taught online.  and I don't think that online courses will go away, because ultimately they do save time, even if they are made to be high quality.

So here are my thoughts :
1. Provide lectures.  I am taking a class to gain specific knowledge, but I am paying someone for that opportunity and feel like I deserve some sort of personalized experience and that includes relevant, and full length lectures.  I can find a list of books to read on my own, and probably even fine a discussion group.  The teacher aspect is lost in online learning and needs to front and center.
2. provide meaningful books, articles, etc.  not overwhelming, unless it is clear what is required and discretionary and check that the links are active.  (providing does not mean that we won't purchase materials, just in terms of choosing resources).
3. have meaningful assignments.  do case studies.  Have small groups discuss issues.  Busy work isn't productive, takes alot of time, and is meaningless for long term learning.  Focus on projects or papers. realize that while we are all using technology that group projects are still painful (not that I ever expect them to go away).
4. Use other technology.  There are spaces for virtual collaboration where people can put up PDFs and text chat, or mark up what is on the screen.  Resources are constantly changing, stay up to day.  have virtual office hours.  Be responsive.  Give students feedback.  Be clear what you expectations are.
5. tests and quizzes vary from class to class. i don't typically find them effective (they are usually from the text book company and are "tricky" just to be more difficult.  Though in one of the best classes I had we did have an in class essay final.  Obviously this will depend on the type of class being taught, but projects and papers can be viable options.  Don't make choices because they are easy, and don't use the teacher questions out of the text book because it is also easy for you to deal with.

As I mentioned, I dont  think this trend will go away, but I think it can be much better if approached differently!

Below are a variety of sites that talk about online learning in more depth.

http://www.onlinelearningsurvey.com/reports/changingcourse.pdf

http://www.westga.edu/~distance/ojdla/spring141/boston_ice_gibson141.html

http://elearningindustry.com/7-tips-elearning-professionals-enhance-knowledge-retention

http://lytics.stanford.edu/datadriveneducation/papers/lindseyetal.pdf

http://uscgboating.org/assets/1/AssetManager/NASBLA.1002.17.pdf

http://er.educause.edu/articles/2010/12/enhancing-student-learning-and-retention-with-blended-learning-class-guides

http://scholarworks.uvm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1103&context=hcoltheses

http://www.onlinelearningsurvey.com/reports/changingcourse.pdf

http://info.shiftelearning.com/blog/bid/247473/18-Mind-Blowing-eLearning-Statistics-You-Need-To-Know

Online Research

I write about many things here, but one topic that I like to engage in, and write about is research.   Usually my first step is Google Scholar.  You can configure it in many different ways, and even provide your school information to help make the process smoother (you typically have to log into many research databases with an ID, which you do through you school log in if you have one). Otherwise, some of these site will require payment (or sometimes they have a certain number of free articles allowed).   Google Scholar is also very useful in terms of looking up patents for theater technology.

I also frequently use the New York Times.  I was reading a book about a murder in NYC, and it dawned on me while reading the book that the reason I could not get earlier information about technical direction, technical theatre, and such from the times (late 1890's I think is the earliest that I have), is because they were not the dominate newspaper in NYC before that time.  The others that were are not as easily searchable, but I have not spend a significant amount of time following those leads.  I will say that newspapers and trade magazines are helpful in terms of tracking down industry trends and shifts.  For instance, many of the large scene shops switched hands over the years.  It is published that Variety was purchased by Showman Fabricators, but following the trail back can be tedious.  I have been looking at this history trying to trace the historical changes in the technical side of theater in the US.

New Mexico State University has a variety of PDF's available about doing research and using the library.  I know that all of the schools that I have attended have the same.  Connection to a college or university is nice because you often will have access to digital copies of articles that you may not otherwise have access too.  Many articles will not be available electronically though, so you still have to use the actual library!

Internet Scout Project  seams to be an online content knowledge management system where users can create their own database, but also provides databases to the public.  One such site is the Electro-Mechanical Library available which has a large collection of knowledge about devices.  This particular source is not necessarily research in terms of academic writing, but very helpful in terms of looking up information on specific electrical and mechanical devices.

Obviously, there are many, many, many more sources out there, but these represent a few that I have been using.

Project Place PM Software and Training

Project Place offers a range of services from webinars, a blog, to PM software.  They offer quite a bit of services and is free for small projects - but also have enterprise opportunities.
I have been looking for an opportunity to use it for a small scale project and try it out. Implementing technology to a project team is always an interesting and challenging circumstance.  You need folks to buy in and use the software.  You can only test out a piece of collaboration software by yourself to a certain extent.  But all software packages have good points and bad, some may be able to work out - sometimes you may need to test other solutions - but care needs to be taken as multiple changes in technology can be even more difficult to manage.

At any rate, I like the information this company provides, I think that helps adoption, and knowing if it is a good fit for your environment in the first place.  Further, even without adoption there is a wealth of knowledge that is useful in terms of PM techniques that are worth exploring.

Teaching Take 2. Bad Teaching

This sounds bad, and to a certain extent I apologize for that.  On the other hand – I find it frustrating.  As a student I believe that a teacher has a certain responsibility to their students (regardless of the cost of tuition, but tuition is costly).  My belief of a responsibility doesn’t discount the responsibility of the student to be an active learner.  Just that they should be responsible not just for disseminating information, but making sure that real learning occurs.  I don’t know the answer to this question.  I know that in many cases teachers are hired because of what they have accomplished in their careers (frequently common in business).  Depending on the institution they are hired because they do research (and/or have many publications) and that in both cases, the high profile of the “teacher” can bring in funding to the school.  Neither of these situations have ANY bearing on the capacity of the individual to be a successful teacher.  It is critical that a teacher has domain knowledge.  There are theories out there where this is a debatable criteria, but let’s assume that it is true, for the sake of argument. While I know this may work in coaching, teaching and coaching are not vacantly the same thing.  I’m not an educational theorist – but I don’t necessarily need to be one to say that regardless of any of those theories, bad teaching exists.

Just to be clear, I don’t think that teachers mean to teach poorly.  I think I have seen a lot of reasons over the years for “poor” teaching.  Poorly treated adjunct professors may be working at double or triple the load of a normal professor with no benefits -   Poor teaching in this case could simply be an issue of not having time – or capacity to be as thorough as potentially them may need to be.  Maybe they are burned out from striving to teach and do committee work, publish, and chase tenure. 

But I think, in my opinion, the issue is that teachers are not hired for their ability to teach, they are not taught how to teach after being hired, and that successful teaching is not a primary concern for maintaining their employment.  And I think that it is a problem.  Teachers should be mentored, and taught (assuming they have mentors how are successful teachers) about pedagogy.  They should be able to engage with students in multiple ways.  I don’t have an issue with a class that is a lecture class – but then the lectures should be done well. 

What I see that frustrates me the most are mostly simple things:

-          Poor public speaking, not being audible (even after being asked).  Not repeating student’s questions (this is a huge issue in some online courses). 

-          Lack of clear expectations and feedback to the students.  What is a quality response?  And I spend an hour to make a quality response to a question online and another student say’s yea me too – are we graded equally?  Intrinsic motivation aside, I don’t need to spend hours doing “busy work’ for an online participation grade while have the class gets the same grade for agreeing.  (Except that I do, which is probably why I get mad). 

-          Teaching skills that you don’t demonstrate as a teacher.  If you are teaching a course about creating a learning environment, then create a good learning environment.  I have had multiple classes where slides were published with poor grammar and incorrect information.  It’s hard to learn something when the provided materials are not correct.  Then of course, how do you have any credibility in the first place….

-          Class format, topic, and online versus in person all have different costs and benefits.  Teachers probably have preferred styles, but learners do too.   I have learned a lot from classes that were all lecture.  Unless the teacher is very skilled at leading a discussion, I find learning to be more difficult when it is only discussion – seminar style – unless, the students are very vested.  But generally mixes of styles work best for me.  Discussion is valuable. I like case studies.  I think group projects can be important (though I typically don’t care for them).  But it isn’t a one size fits all situation.

-          Last, but most wrong to me are classes where the teacher tells you a certain percentage of what you need to know to be successful (and it typically occurs in classes where you cannot easily research the remaining information), and expect you to figure out the rest – because they thing that proves that you are learning.  Examples:

o   Teach someone how to draft, tell them to design a house, but expect them to design windows, doors properly without showing them what the symbols mean for those elements (as they can just figure that out on their own).  Better yet, teach someone auto cad, even if they have no drafting experience.  Technically possible – but it comes with a loss of quality.  Or teach a French class, and expect someone to know what a library is called because they know the work for book.  I’m not saying that a student should not be able to put 2 and 2 together.  Students should problem solve, but teachers need to allow that to happen, and to give them the framework to build upon (or, conversely not expect the student to come up with the teacher’s “correct answer”.  I have seen a recent trend where teachers hold back information and tell students to figure it out, and that that if they wouldn’t give them any more information it would be “cheating”.  I don’t get that.   

There are other issues at play of course.  Do students rate easy teachers more highly than hard teachers?  There a third factor of fairness at work – hard but fair is okay, but hard and unclear is different?  I have heard that easy teachers are not necessarily ranked better – but in my personal experiences, there does seem to be a correlation between easy = higher ratings.   

On Teaching v1 Why do you want to teach?

As you can see by my use of v1, I have a lot of thoughts about teaching swirling around in my head.  This comes from 2 sides.  First, my goal when I got an MFA was to teach.  I don’t mind getting my hands dirty, but I also wasn’t looking for an entry level, staff position where the best I could hope for was a stagecraft class while I was TD for all of the shows – I want to actively teach (and have a role in curriculum development).  Those positions are not as ready available, and frankly if I ever went back to teaching (which I hope, in some way that I do, eventually) I think my current work will probably help in adding to my effectiveness as a future teacher.  Second, I’m in the midst of a MS degree (middle mostly in that I haven’t applied for graduation yet, and have not completed “thesis” component of the degree.

Probably more so is that yet again, I have encountered what I believe is a fundamentally poor teacher.  Part of this problem is institutional in higher education.  Professors are hired not because they teach well, but, often, since they are “subject matter experts”.  In business especially, many professors do not have doctorates, but are successful people in their line of business.  Secondly, they are often hired based on research (as this can help fund the department).  Neither of these qualities have anything to do with the skill required to be a good teacher.

Granted to get tenure (if you happen to be in a tenure track position) student assessments are taken into consideration.  Historically I have done these at the last class.  At the current institution that I take classes at the assessments are not required to be done by all, and are due a week or so before the quarter electronically.  I don’t always complete them.  I would say that typically I would expect these to come back only in highly positive or highly negative since they are somewhat voluntary, except that I know that I have missed the deadline even when I had strong opinions about a class. Thus the only student metric is not one that is reliable.

It seems to me that many poor teachers seem to want to teach because it is easy to make extra $ (as an adjunct working a full time job).  Or perhaps if they are full time, they perceive the position as having less work required than any other work since it is semester or quarter based.  It seems to be forgotten that developing course content, grading, making sure that students understand core concepts are all part of teaching, much of which happens outside of the actual onsite teaching hours that are required per course.  Granted creating and teaching a course for the first time is probably hard than teaching is subsequently, but you have to keep updated on the subject and you have to keep your content updated.  If you have a staff or faculty position there is often advising and committee work on top of teaching duties.  Further, you need to stay current on industry trends, go to conferences, potentially speak at conferences and such, and so forth.  In short, teaching is not any easier than any other line of work.  How good you are at what you do is directly related to what you put into it.

The issue however, is that I am not sure how much universities really care if the teachers they hire (especially as adjuncts) are good or not.  Part of this is the predatory trend that I think colleges have been headed down (another topic of discussion).  Maybe there are a glut of unqualified individuals.  Maybe there are a lack of positions available in all of the different specialties required, and these are reasons behind adjuncts.  What I know, are that professors who have little investment in teaching are often very poor. 

As a student – I don’t pay any less to have a poor teacher than a good one.  It doesn’t serve employers down the road you expect to hire a graduate if they were taught by poor instructors and didn’t learn what they needed to.  And ultimately this gives the college or university a bad reputation. 

None of the above is rocket science.  While being a professor is a lot of work, to be fair putting together a life as an adjunct is also a lot of work.  The pay is very poor compared to a full time position, you need to string together a variety of courses (taking on a much higher course load) to equal out to the income a full time professor might make (on the low end), and they don’t receive benefits. 

Since it is not easy to be an adjunct, and it isn’t necessarily easy – it comes back to why are they doing, and probably more to why I am writing this) why they are often poor teachers.  Is that they are too busy to do the job successfully?  Are they just looking for an extra boost to their normal full time employment and don’t feel obligated to go above and beyond what they see their duties are (showing up for class and grading?)?

I think the situation is getting progressively worst – in that it seems to be more and more common that a teacher is given 2 courses to teach – one section in person, and one online.  In my personal experience this seems to equate out to the teacher giving a lecture (which online students later have access to via a recorded session) and grading assignments (which are the same) for both groups of students.  In reality this doesn’t work.  What works well in a classroom does not work well online.  Obviously there are differences dependent on class type (discussion versus lecture), but in either case an online class should be taught differently.  Secondly, no one at the university level seem to be giving instructors information on how to teach effectively online (or at least insuring that they know).  For instance – they should speak towards the microphone.  They shouldn’t block the board that they are writing on with their body.  They should repeat student questions. These seem basic to me, but I see countless times that I have issues understanding an instructor because of one of the above reasons.  There is also technology that some professors use that allow you to join their class live (if you want), and / or that that have virtual office hours where they are online in an environment with a  white board where you can draw, message back and form, and even share documents and mark up the document live.  I know that even attending live classes that skill and teaching style varies, so of course it doesn’t online.  But the best teachers, in either location also get that students also have different learning styles.  I guess the bottom line is why colleges and universities are so lax in their regulation of quality teaching (or why it’s not a priority on the first place).

Labor Power and Organization

I read an interesting article today called Labor Power and Organization in the Early U. S. Motion Picture Industry by Michael C. Nielson.  It is located in Film History, Vol 2, No 2.  It generally is more about how theatrical workers created IASTE and that stage mechanics typically either worked on the road or specialized in building the scenery for the combination tours.  Film is a more economical model than live theatre.  I assume that it is mostly true today.  After all million dollar movies still cost 8 bucks (or so) plus concessions at a movie theatre.  Any touring show has a range of price points, but you can barely see a high school play or community theatre production for the price of movie ticket today. 

Another quote from the article stands out to me:

It occurred to us that we could use Bill (Bill Bowers was a prop man that had toured in vaudeville attractions) at the studio to take charge of obtaining all the odds and ends needed to dress the sets.  I think Bill established the principle upon which the props departments function today, namely that a director gets whatever he asks for without argument, no matter how crazy or impossible the request.  …early film craft workers set a tone of “doing the impossible” for the sake of creating whatever illusion the director wanted to produce. 

I also thought it was interesting how the article brought up that the unions were based on industrial lines (film and theatre) versus the trades like carpenters and IBEW.  It’s a conflict that still played out in some projects that I have worked on, and we end up working along beside the trades on some jobs depending on jurisdiction.  

On Being a Linchpin

First, to all Happy New Year.  My hope is to bring you many more posts this year!

I recently read Seth Godin’s book Linchpin Are You Indispensable.  I thought it was an interesting read.  It hit on a lot of items that bother me with today’s society – how people are replaceable, how schooling spits out compliant individuals that have lost their creativity and ability to think and create. When I was young I think there was still this idea that if you worked hard (doing what you were told) that you would be taken care of in return.  That isn’t true.  When I was young I worked at a lot of small theatres, many of which paid poorly. But they also operated almost like a family.  There was a community.  Once I hot larger theatres, and corporate theatre, the factory model became much more apparent. 

Godin claims that most people around us are “bureaucrats, note takes, literalists, manual readers, TGIF laborers, map followers and fearful employees.”  I want to think that I don’t see it in the places I have been in theatre, but I do.  It’s there lurking. Yes, certain individuals create – designers, directors.  Theoretically the rest of us have opportunities, but either we don’t exercise them, or they are minimized by the organization. 

When I left the world of theatre, I went to education then to corporate work.  Every place I went to I thought the grass would be greener in terms of experimentation, testing, and R&D.  What’s the difference between the 20 different ways that I know of to cover foam (foam coat, super 88, muslin cover, sculptor coat, urethane hardcoat, and so forth).  What is cheapest, what is most durable?  What is best for rocks versus trees?  Many there is no right answer.  But if you don’t look at things like this, then how do you discover something innovative, new and different?

I often hear discussions about shop standards.  I don’t necessarily disagree that these should not be developed.  I think sometime that once you have a functioning wheel, and you know how and when it works, then using it in the situations in which it applies should be done.  But that doesn’t mean that you should think about a better wheel.  But that costs money.  And it is easier for your folks to just follow instructions on using the first wheel.

At the same time as reading Seth Godin’s book, I read an article on facebook about suicides rates for kids in the Silicon Valley.  Their parents are rich.  They can afford to give the kids everything to give them a good life – lessons and schooling, and connections to give them a leg up.  But they can’t necessarily get them a job, or make sure that they are successful in the future.  So there is stress, and the kids are literally opting out at an alarming rate.

At this point, for decent paying work, you can’t just show up.  There is no miracle job.  You need to contribute and make a difference. Godin asks you to “be remarkable, be generous, create art, make judgement calls, connect people and ideas”.  I’m not good at doing this all the time, but I would like to.  I think that Godin has a lot of good things to say about stepping up.  I think there are parts where (and perhaps it is my own insecurity) that he indicates that the reader could be the next Steve Jobs, or some other similar famous entrepreneur.  But that’s beside the point. 

I also read an article on Forbes Called “Seth Godin’s Linchpin Theory: Sound advice or Career Suicide”.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/mikemyatt/2011/11/29/seth-godins-linchpin-theory-sound-advice-or-career-suicide/

It was an interesting comparison.  This article, to me over states the idea that to be a linchpin the entire company pivots around you – and that you are in a position in the company that is not at perhaps the CEO level (since at that point most entrepreneurial businesses often revolve around the creator, at least for a time).  The key, that this article makes that is very important (and very important theatrically) is that organizations need a way to manage knowledge.  When person A creates something, what happens with the knowledge that they have learned?  Without managing that knowledge, and somehow sharing it with others, that individual becomes valuable, but also problematic.  Historically that person doesn’t want to share information because that makes his job less stable.  But sharing that knowledge, is to me, pivotal with moving forward in our industry, as well as many other industries. 

Excel is a typical program to be using as a TD.  I am surrounded by users who have all used it for over a decade.  In the past month – I have had at least 4 moments where I or someone else learned a random things that you can do in excel by watching someone else.  All of us (in my example) thought of ourselves as pretty decent users of the program – but there is always something to learn.

Knowledge management, allowing people to share information, and providing space to experiment and test ideas, techniques, and so forth are critical things that I believe are necessary to cultivate in our world today.

Technology Training Free Resources

I came across IDC Technologies September 2014's newsletter technical download page, and thought that it is good information to keep as well as to pass on. The page offers a number of links ranging from project management to mechanical Design Concepts for Non-Mechanical Engineers to a train the trainer document.  They also have webinars available, that would be worth looking into.

New Stage Machinery in 1873

In an article “the New Theatre” published in the New York Times on 1873 (not to be confused with Claude Hagen’s new theatre that occurs 40 years “ish” later) also reference James Schonberg as contributing to designing the stage. The building is being done by architect, Frederick Draper. The proscenium “will be of original form and construction, the plans for it having been designed by Mr. Dion Boucicault, and will be so formed as to act as a sounding board.” The stage is described as having many improvements by Boucicault and Schonberg. The stage is described as 40 squares, each 3’ which can be raised and lowered. These could also be used to create steps. This article describes a patent by Schonberg for supporting and setting the scenery, but also describes traditional scenery (defining it by two types, English and French). The article describes French Stage shifting equipment as a truck beneath the stage with a ladder / frame that the scenery is mounted to. (Pictures below are from French Theatrical Production Nineteenth Century by J P Moynet). The article discusses advantages and disadvantages of this system. They describe the English system as having the scenery supported from above, by “grooves” or “parallel fillets”. This technique is said to be faster than the French system and able to be done in front of the audience. Disadvantages are that everything is square and that grooves must be masked. It also talks about stage screws and braces; obviously we have inherited many of these practices despite European theatrical influences. The article names Mr Flechter and the London Lyceum as advancing a system blending the techniques for shifting scenery, also including Boucicault and Schonberg. The new Lyceum Theatre (in NY) would be built with mechanisms described within the article (too lengthy to quote but freely available on the NY Times Archives Website).

In “Mr. Fechter’s Theatre”, published in the New York Times Jan 20, 1873, we see a continuation of the description of the theatre. It has a very elaborate account of the building itself. Included are items that involve fire safety such as doors that swing in both directions. The theatre was outfitted with gas lighting (that could change color and strength). The stage itself moved as well. The theatre includes a second “sounding-board” (proscenium) which moves upstage – downstage by way of stage machinery. The scenery is lifted from traps “upon what are termed parallel boats, are then attached to the stage, which, with the scenery upon it, can be moved completely out of sight of the audience.” Credit to the system was given to James Schonberg who was a stage manager at the Wallack’s Theatre, and the article states that he patented the system. W. Lester, a machinist, built the system. Absent from this account is Dion Boucicault’s contributions. Under the stage, the area is described as “a perfect labyrinth of cranks, wheels, parallel boats and other mysteries, all worked by hand”. The workshops are also under the stage, while the scenic painter’s gallery is behind the stage, in use by painters Hosford and Laran.

Further New York Times articles indicate that James Schonberg was also a playwright.

His patent can be seen online as well: US 123735

As a side note, I have come across many references to technicians referred to bay their last name only (though very politely). This makes tracing these names more difficult, if not impossible, at least with the fairly searches that I am doing within this research. I assume that they have shorted the names to save space, or because they considered the first names unimportant and not that there was an assumption that they were so well known that first names were not needed. I say this because many names that I am more familiar with are fully spelled out.

Entertainment Design & Technology Blog

Jeromy Hopgood writes a blog called Entertainment Design & Technology. It is fairly new and has limited content, but the posts are interesting. I linked specifically to an entry about doing visual research.

Project Resource for Teaching Tools

I was browsing the internet looking for ideas for a project for my nephews to make over the summer when they visit. Complicated enough that a 13 year old would be interested, simple enough that I could help the younger kids in the neighborhood through it as well. I started off thinking about either a pine car derby or CO2 cars. Then I found Kelvin Educational. This sight has good prices on pieces if I do decide on cars,, but they have a lot of other cool things too, many geared towards classroom use. Bridges, cranes, catapults, hydraulics, robots, they have a bit of it all. Certainly a resource to use when thinking about how to teach concepts of engineering within the classroom.

Drywall Finishing Spec's

A couple of the places I have worked in the past refer to scope in terms of the level of production value a certain show is going to be produced at. For instance a season may have 1 or 2 A scope shows (high budget), a couple B scope shows and a C scope show that will round out the season. Sometimes shows are an A for costumes, and a C for scenery. But this system was used as a way of giving the production team an indication of what was expected and what budgets were available for productions.On one hand it certain aid production planning as you can plan out time and resources according to a scope a year or so out without knowing the specific show, and when it comes time to production, it is well known about what is available.

Scope is also frequently talked about within projects. Scope often creeps as a project evolves, and goals shift slightly, slowly, and turn into something that they weren't originally. It is necessary to define scope of any given project because without an agreement of scope, you can't determine success or completion. Then, on top of the easy scope definitions (size, paint treatments, general construction and material notes) it gets even trickier. For instance we use flats to build sets, yet seams can get pretty ugly. While there aren't industry standard for every finish, drywall does have a finishing schedule. While different than what we typically do, it is insightful for calling out the differences. now, the next challenge is for people to understand the cost difference between levels of finish...

Arcitecture and the Lost Art of Drawing

The New York Times ran an article called Architecture and the Lost Art of Drawing. out of that article I particularlly liked the following:

For decades I have argued that architectural drawing can be divided into three types, which I call the “referential sketch,” the “preparatory study” and the “definitive drawing.” The definitive drawing, the final and most developed of the three, is almost universally produced on the computer nowadays, and that is appropriate. But what about the other two? What is their value in the creative process? What can they teach us?

The referential sketch serves as a visual diary, a record of an architect’s discovery. It can be as simple as a shorthand notation of a design concept or can describe details of a larger composition. It might not even be a drawing that relates to a building or any time in history. It’s not likely to represent “reality,” but rather to capture an idea.

These sketches are thus inherently fragmentary and selective. When I draw something, I remember it. The drawing is a reminder of the idea that caused me to record it in the first place. That visceral connection, that thought process, cannot be replicated by a computer.

The second type of drawing, the preparatory study, is typically part of a progression of drawings that elaborate a design. Like the referential sketch, it may not reflect a linear process. (I find computer-aided design much more linear.) I personally like to draw on translucent yellow tracing paper, which allows me to layer one drawing on top of another, building on what I’ve drawn before and, again, creating a personal, emotional connection with the work.

I have never really thought about the three different types of drawing before - but it is true that when I first start to look at how something goes together, there is often a series of napkin sketches that puts some preliminary ideas onto paper. I also commonly see people sketch on one drawing about opposing views of construction - or elaborating on others sketches - and I think that these steps are important in the technical design process.

I think that with computers it is occassionally too easy to make something work on paper that really isn't practical to do in real life.

Finally, I thought this was interesting:

As I work with my computer-savvy students and staff today, I notice that something is lost when they draw only on the computer. It is analogous to hearing the words of a novel read aloud, when reading them on paper allows us to daydream a little, to make associations beyond the literal sentences on the page. Similarly, drawing by hand stimulates the imagination and allows us to speculate about ideas, a good sign that we’re truly alive.

It is true that upon reading, I occassionaly (or even often) pause and reflect - or skim a statment over again. Either to make the idea more firm in my mind or to think about the implications. While this is certainly true when reading educataional or informative information, it is also true in fiction. Sometimes its interesting to pause and think about what is next, or what might relate to the story outside of the book. And, while I like to listen to audio books - for convienence, it is harder to replicate that - you have to think more about actually stopping the process to reflect.

Theatre Terminology

New York Stagehand offers a post about stagehand terminology. It hasn't been updated for a while but has some interesting terms. Further, the initial post is fairly comprehensive - including terms that I haven't heard before.

Teamwork

When I first started in theatre in high school, playing theatre games was a common past time. Some of those games had a pretty clear intent, others were fun, but the intent was more ambiguous. Once in the technical side of theatre it seems like only actors get the fun of doing any theatre games or team building activities. I never quite agreed with that. While doing some research on team building activities I came across one called egg drop. In this activity a team has a couple hours to design and build a container that will allow them to drop an egg from 8' and not break. It made me think that a good technical team would surely have some great ideas on how to accomplish this.

Vygotsky & Theatre Training

I have been doing a little research lately on Vygotsky. Particularly with regards to scaffolding being used in mentoring relationships to help with increasing problem-solving skills for ill-defined problems. One of the articles I have been reading (Cognitive Apprenticeship in Educational Practice by Vanessa Paz Dennen) has been pretty interesting. I found the following particularly interesting:

Teaching and learning through cognitive apprenticeships requires making tacit processes visible to learners so they can observe and then practice them...
Modeling... the demonstration of the temporal process of thinking
Explanation: explaining why the activities take place as they do.
Coaching... the monitoring of students' activities and assisting and supporting where necessary.
Scaffolding... support of students so that they can cope with the task situation. The strategy also entails the gradual withdrawal of teaching from the process, when the students can manage on their own.
Reflection: the student assesses and analyses his performance
Articulation: the results of reflection put into verbal form
Explorations: the students are encouraged to form hypotheses, to test them, and to find new ideas and view points.

I find this relevant to the way that we educate young TD's and theatre technicians, because I think we skip a few important steps in the process.
First, I think that both modeling and explanation can be lacking. For instance, when I was in grad school, there were students that believed that 1x3 couldn't be used to build flats because the shop we worked in used 1x4. There were particular reasons that the shop chose to use 1x4 instead of 1x3, but most students didn't think about it and "learned" that all flats should be build with 1x4.

Secondly, I think we skim on true reflection and articulation of performance. There has to be an allowance for things not going perfectly - it is academia after all, but there seems to often be an attitude that failure isn't an option.

With the number of MFA students that continue on to teaching future theatre students out there - I often wish that there was a little bit more focus on how to teach instead of just content.