ICONET CASE STUDY
Cartoon Planet as part of Salford Young People’s University
(micro-reflection through digital cartoons)
It was on that note that we hosted the first ICONET workshop during the SYPU 2008, here at the University of Salford.
The workshop meant to involve the young learners in an exciting journey through theirs and their peers skills and help them realize of their own strengths and abilities in a rather relaxed and exiting way. The motto of the SYPU is to introduce pupils to the academic live by exposing them to a wide range of approaches. The aim is to motivate these young people to consider higher education and/or further education as a possible future learning path. It is also the purpose to convey the message that learning can be creative and fun, and that recognizing their skills can also be beneficial in the long run.
So above all, the purpose was to give students a good time while engaging in serious reflection. To achieve that we create a set of micro-activities (to better capture their focus) which we invite them to take part in – engaging them in group and peer work, and always providing support and devoting attention to the pupils needs and requests.
The section below, briefly describes the workshop activity. (Full report coming soon)
Background
The Salford Young People's University (SYPU) is a Summer School Programme for 11-16 year olds. SYPU is a free one-week residential and provides a first-hand experience of life at the University, with an opportunity to meet current students and lecturers. SYPU is a community outreach initiative with is aimed at youngsters who would not tend to go to University.
Description of activity
2 hour face to face workshops were planned and carried our by the researchers/tutors. The workshops were two fold and were organized around activities that were supposed to be fun and stimulate active participation.
The first part of the workshop aimed at guided group reflection about pupils’ strengths and skills. Tutors also helped pupils to understand and use specific phrases which described their skills in a more CV orientated language.
The second part of the workshop was ICT based – students were taken to the computer lab where they were asked to (re)create themselves online, as avatars, and describe their skills while using voice and text.
The avatars were later published and presented to the rest of the class at the end of the workshop
Some Remarks
Above all, this pilot project has given us the knowledge about the young people’s reactions when exposed to such activities.
From the spoken feedback we received from the pupils themselves, and the mentors and coordinators who spent more time with the pupils, the Cartoon Planet sessions were successful and they seemed to have pleased the young participants. Comments such as “this is fun”; “now I can use this skills in my CV” are regarded as important feedback.
Pupils reported to have enjoyed the way the topic was presented to them and the way they were asked to explore their skills. The micro activities helped motivate the pupils’ involvement in the workshop. It also allowed learners to learn a bit more about themselves which they engaged in this micro-reflection exercise.
It is our impression that both parts of the workshop seemed to have played a vital role in the success of the session.
The personalized mentoring and constant support provided by tutor to the small group of young people, as well as the freedom they were granted to collaborate with each other while trying to explore their skills seem to have helped to spark up their motivation and active involvement in the workshop.
The fact pupils were allowed to use computers to freely create their own avatars appealed to their creativity and proved to be a positive exercise which helped reinforce what they had learned on the first part of the session.
The below cartoons were examples used by the workshop facilitators to help students realize how they could express and share their skills with others, according with the activities they had previously engaged in.
