The Spaces in Between is a weekly newsletter on culture, language, and technology written by Stephan Caspar. If you’re new here, then welcome, feel free to subscribe.
I have no idea where the week has gone, in the blink of an eye, it is Friday. A wacky week of weather, sunshine and shorts Tuesday evening, freezing temperatures and snow through Wednesday and Thursday morning. Today is a little sunnier, temperatures are climbing and the weekend looks promising.
I murmured a small sigh of relief this week as the verdict came through in the George Floyd case. I hope that it is the start of something, justice has been served, but there is a long, long way to go.
We are only a few weeks away from the end of the semester and it is crunch time for the students. I’m desperately trying to clear the decks so that I’ll have time to give feedback and anticipated praise to our students who have been working their butts off. I feel for them, they seem stressed and keep reminding them to schedule their time, book some exercise, and plan their meals.
Thank you for your correspondence this week, I love it when people riff off something that I’ve written, tell me their stories, or mention a particular memory that has come back to them. There is a community that exists around this newsletter, in pictures, posts, and mentions; you are all more similar than you know, if I got you in a room together (imagine a virtual one for now) then the conversation would flow and I would hear the sound of clinking glasses and polite introductions.
Stephan
Teaching & Learning
In anticipation of a new course by one of my favorite people, artist Felix Scheinberger (I’m honestly not paid to promote anything). I thought I would remind my classes that they can in fact draw. There is Art with a capital A the type you see in galleries, and then there is art that we can all do, which is drawing, sketching, painting, sculpting, and making that we can all do and not worry about whether it needs to be seen or sold. This is the art that is good for the soul, flexing drawing muscles that might have become a little flabby in the years since we were all child artists.
We began with mark making, simple shapes and lines, and then closed our eyes, felt our faces, and explored portraits through something called blind contour drawing. This is a simple technique to create outlines of faces. It is fun to look down at the squiggle of lines and decern features, yes - that’s definitely an eye, an ear, mouth albeit on the wrong side, on top of each other. It’s all good. Students seemed to enjoy the exercise, “it doesn’t have to be photography, the lines make up things, it doen’t have to be precise” - was one reflection.
Precision (if any is needed at all) will come later, but again there is power in the rough sketch, incomplete draft, shapeless lump of clay - this is where everything starts. Skipping steps as learners are often tempted to do, in the hope that something complete will materialize without needing to play, explore, rework, or refine, dents confidence and often leads to a binary - “I’m good at this/not good at this” view. I asked how many have tried blind contour drawing before? In the sixty-odd that I surveyed, not one of them.
Life Lessons
Christian Payne @documentally encouraged me to record some audio, and I feel grateful for him doing so. He’s a brilliant storyteller and I would encourage you to read his newsletter and listen to him talking with his readers. I’m going to dust off my zoom H4n and find a shady spot. I’ll pop a link on these pages.
We exchanged messages in the week, following this interview with Mark Zuckerberg for platformer. Facebook has clear sights on the podcasting space, perhaps a little behind the curve than Spotify or Apple, but armed with audio tools that we might see popping up on its platforms, including Instagram. Many people who love audio very much, record regularly but don’t call themselves podcasters or produce podcasts. Christian sometimes calls these audio blogs and I enjoy the sounds her captures and chats that take place in an impromptu and unrehearsed way but are authentic and always fascinating.
I mean, it’s good that this space is being recognized more and more, but I don’t think I’ll ever resurface my FB account. It’s lovely not having one, I don’t feel I’m missing out on anything. In fact, I really can not wait to retire all my social media accounts. You will know that I am truly at peace when I have gone dark.
oh, haven’t forgotten to let you know about the audio I recorded last week for The Teaching & Scholarship Podcast, I think it will come out in the first week in May. This month’s episode with Dr. Naomi Winstone, Director of the Surrey Institute of Education is a delight.
Lost and Found
As we get to the dog ends of remote learning (perhaps) we’re finding out about more games you can play with zoom. It says for kids but I don’t see why you couldn’t try these with older learners. We played Pictionary on Tuesday, using the whiteboard function in zoom with this useful word generator. We started with easy words.
There were two articles with similar themes that stood out on the ALT blog - I can relate to both - I don’t want to go back to normal and Pandemic Pedagogy: in praise of collaboration and compassion are reminders that we have to capture and preserve those moments when we were able to reflect on what was happening, how our teaching changed and what we were thinking. I want to go back to normal either, sure, I can’t wait to get back into shared spaces, but there have been moments, however fleeting when I have enjoyed the solitude of home working and the connections that have been made online.
Thank you
I’m adopting a new defensive formation in our U10 soccer this Sunday against the same team that rather trounced us 7-1. I think we were a little out-numbered in the midfield, so I’m going to pack it and feel confident moving them from three to two at the back, I trust my defenders and hope that with a few more in the middle we will be able to link up and get the ball to my trusty striker who last week had it all to do by himself. If any of this sounds like I know what I’m doing, then you know even less about footy/soccer than I do.
The other final thing to mention is that our lovely neighbor asked if any of the food trucks would like to park up in our street. Thinking that she might only get a couple of replies and for even fewer to agree to visit, she was surprised when almost all of them said yes. So last night we enjoyed delicious, firey bowls of goodness from Revival Chilli, in the first No Cooking Tonight, which will take place every month until September (and perhaps even beyond).
I hope that you’re well and having a good week, that you take some time for yourself. It is going to be a tiring few weeks as we reach the end of the semester, and hope you have a treat planned for you and your loved ones. Hang in there.
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You might notice a few typos occasionally, and although I can’t do much about them once the email is sent, I do try to mop them up and update the web version with corrections.