This project enabled me to explore a subject very close to my heart - creativity in education. Established by the Centre of Higher Education in Theatre Studies, Athens and funded by Socrates it ran during 1998-2000.
My initial function was to dig out examples of good practise in the application of creative learning methods in UK primary schools and develop ways of presenting that practise to other teachers Europe-wide. This launched me into a variety of areas:
Multimedia
Although I had some experience of the development of multimedia projects (with the RSC and Applied Cytometry Systems) this was the first time I found myself starting absolutely from scratch. The final product was to be assembled by Binary Logic, another Greek partner, but my task was to make sure that the ellements submitted from the UK were in a form suitable for slotting into both the CD and Web based presentations that were planned. During this phase I developed materials starting with raw video and audio footage using video editing software, RealProducer, Authorware 4, ToolBook 2, JavaScript and so on.
On-Line Conferencing
One major function that I took on was the development of the on-line conferencing ellements of the project. This involved the setting up, initially, of asychronous conferencing events for the partners, but later I went on to develop a sophiscated set of live meetings using the excellent facilities at www.tappedin.org. I set up a Clear office at Tappedin which included document sharing, web projection and access to video. You can visit the Clear office by linking to Tappedin, sign on as a guest and visit office E1106 (11th floor, east wing - take the elevator from the lobby; seriously).
Project Management
Still not entirly sure what this is, but certainly I found myself in a position of trying to bring together contrebutions from a wide variety of sources in the right place at the right time. Maybe that was more to do with diplomacy, which brings me to...
Working on an International Team
This was a big new experience for me - flying outover Europe at someone else's expense (Euro-sceptics note I always flew economy and stayed in 2/3 star hotels). Building working relationships between different cultures and languages was seriously challenging and certainly had its moments, but in the end lasting relationships were established and I have nothing but hugs for Nicholas, Mika, Paula, Gerald, Kostas and Celia.
Developing Classroom Materials
While this is something I've been doing for years, Clear presented some special challenges. Writing for teachers on a Europe-wide basis, while trying to put across the UK perspective on creativity in education (whatever that is) while keeping within certain standard formats certainly stretched me. Did it though :)
Links
There's some stuff that I developed during the project that hasn't, so far, made it onto the final product - so the following are just some bits and pieces that may beof some small interest, though mostly to those were directly involved and love to see themselves in print :)
Sheffield 99 This document outlines some UK case studies I investegated early on, not all of which were developed in the final product.
The Seagull Teaching Tolerance through Drama, based on The Seagull - an Italian children's book. This shows an attempt to develop a full blown multimedia presentation of case study based in an Italian school. Note that the discussion link no longer works.
Evaluation 2 - Birkhill Infants. Gives web based access to some of the interviews I did with the children from Birkhill about their production of Oliver!
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