Students Create Sculptures to Explore Creativity in Teaching

First year students on the Education in Context foundation programme at St Mary’s University, Twickenham recently decorated the Strawberry Hill campus with sculptures as part of their Inclusion and Diversity module. The two-year programme is designed for those who already work within a school setting, and many students are already working as teaching assistants with pupils in mainstream schools but with additional needs, as well as special schools. As part of the Inclusion and Diversity module, students were asked to create sculptures from recycled materials as a way of exploring how they can enable children to be creative, whilst taking into consideration the consideration and opportunities for cohesion. One of the groups made a ‘worry tree’, with each leaf representing and expressing a child’s worry. Once all the leaves are placed on the tree together, the idea is that the individual worry became a whole, so each child would take on board the anxieties of others and respect them as a whole class community. Following a trip to a butterfly house, another group made butterflies from multi-sensory materials, so students that were visually impaired would be able to experience it. Meanwhile, a huge replica of children’s book character Incey Wincey spider took to the side of the building, tying in with work the students had been doing on nursery rhymes with Key Stage One children. Finally, the fourth group made a post box for children who wanted to share their thoughts and ideas. St Mary’s Primary Education Lecturer Jo Woodbridge said, “Our students are all current teaching assistants and as such, bring with them a huge wealth of experience. They have an insight and passion for what they do that is a hugely valuable resource to each other, and to me! “The sculptures were all fantastic and showed quite clearly that creativity and making is a valuable part of any lecture.”