slides to accompany a paper about the action research project in detail on getwet.org.uk

1. The Get Wet project
Pat Thomson with the GW team

2. The problem
High cultural capital,
alienating pedagogies,
disconnect from children’s
life worlds
V
Engaging pedagogies,
based in children’s life
worlds, but low cultural
capital

3. Water
• Appears and disappears
in the formal curriculum -
primarily in science and
geography.
• Usually taught in primary
schools as ‘the water
cycle’- again and again.
• Current English primary
teachers not necessarily
well schooled in science
or geography

4. Enter Papplewick

5. GW team
Four schools:
Four classes and
teachers
Five local artists
Four School of
Education staff
Not enough
money
Two years

6. University perspective
We had already
identified that lack of
attention to pedagogic
content/disciplinary
knowledge had held back
many projects in other
‘creative’ innovations e.g.
Creative Partnerships.
We wanted to change
that. Hence the inclusion
of specialist teacher
educators.

7. Beginning
Installation as
reconnaissance (Townsend
and Thomson, 2014) and
provocation
(signaturepedagogies.org.uk)
with adults and
children……..
Our questions and then
children’s questions
(accessing their vernacular
knowledges).

8. In the first cycle we found that
• Teachers were really good at
identifying a big
interdisciplinary question e.g.
what makes water special?
• They were also really good at
working out a sequence of
activities – they were used to
lesson by lesson planning
• They were familiar with
working with artists and keen
to have a go – they were risk
takers in supportive schools
• They were mostly OK at
tracking back through class
artefacts to see what learning
had occurred – this is relatively
unusual and GW teachers had
learned this in other PD
projects

9. However…
• They needed to work a bit more on
including children’s life world
knowledges – the artists were great
at helping them do this
• They were really not used to
identifying mes- level concepts that
provided the ‘meat’ for their big
question, so what sat behind the
sequence of activities?
• We surmised that the lack of meso
level concept awareness actually
limited the teachers’ capacity to
plan and also to assess
• This was a challenge for the
university staff- and then the
artists

10. In the next cycle
New planning Big
Question
Meso
concept
Meso
concept
activity activity activity activity
Meso
concept

11. Example: Water is essential for life
• Questioning: Activities were devised from the start-up activity with
questions;
• Observation activities
• Group activity: Testing hypothesis on water properties children’s (e.g.
‘droplets on pennies’, ‘sticking streams of water’ – a big bottle of water;
three holes near the bottom and when the jets of water come out if you
get them to come together they will stick together. … Milk and oil. );
• Writing down experiences
• Research and lecture on coal
• Debate on big theme
• Creative engagement with materials: created water molecules, created
umbrella messages
• Creative engagement with language: created poetry
• Theatrical experience: Met “James Watt” at the Papplewick station -
history of the pumping station

12. Disciplinary coverage
• Chemistry
• Maths (counting, size)
• English (literacy)
• Science
• Geography
• Art and design
Skills: Communication:
Negotiation, persuasion,
debating, argumentation,
empathy

13. NEW: Meso level concepts in lesson
plans
• Unique water physical properties
• (water molecules sticking together: water liquid nature, water chemical structure,
water attractiveness) Water turns to steam
• Water cycle (they all knew this one!)
• Water chemistry vocabulary
• Water availability/accessibility
• Size in numbers (numeracy)
• Comparison (literacy)
• Water power (steam engine, coal; Radcliffe power station; Papplewick pumping
station visits)
• Water as a medium for transferring energy
• Water geological ... filtering
• Public health - consequence of dirty water (diarhorrea)
• The importance of inventiveness and inventions in life (appreciation of innovative
and visionary ideas (like the invention for purifying water) and how they can
change life and society)
• The development of labour market/preparation for and uncertainty in
employment (there were less professional opportunities in the past (jobs change
and grow, disappear and appear)

14. So what?
• Significant improvement in
literacy
• Almost universal understanding
of cientific concepts – retention
after 12 months – taught well
before formal curriculum
• New ‘stuff’ – history, geology,
geography
• Attitudes about water and water
use/abuse greatly enhanced
• Connections with local ‘place and
people’
• NO DUMBED DOWN DISCIPLINES
HERE, NO LOW CULTURAL
CAPITAL

15. www.getwet.org.uk