How art is re-energising students post-lockdown
I’ve been at my school for 16 years now, and I can’t remember a year that has been such a pleasure to teach as this previous one. It is a true joy being back in the classroom after successive lockdowns, the energy levels are high and, fortunately, in my setting the need for behaviour management is low to non-existent.
I found it was such a warm and familiar feeling to be back in the school building, full of smells and noise. Schools were designed to be full of people, not to be empty shells.
I often find myself walking around in my class now, amazed at how completely engaged my students are, enjoying being creative and being in that zone. It’s like a magical pixie dust has been sprinkled on them. But why am I surprised? After all, it makes sense that after having 18 months of disrupted learning, these students are now in an environment where they can switch off the outside world and just tune into their personal zone and explore their creativeness. You can call it mindfulness or healing but for me what is happening right here, right now is what I would call strengthening or reconnecting with oneself.
We’re very lucky at my school because we’ve got a rich arts curriculum. At key stage 3, for example, our children have three lessons every fortnight, which means three full hours of art. This has been the case the whole time I have worked here, and I can’t see it changing in the future; we know it’s something that the majority of students enjoy and get a lot from.
Covid and the power of arts education
And that’s been most apparent in their response to returning. The students have been really excited to come back to the art spaces, re-engaging and using materials and media that they didn’t have at home (even felt tips and plain paper are a luxury for many of our children). Some students were really engaged with the arts in lockdown and some found it quite a challenge.
Nonetheless, we know that our students are creative - or want to be creative - so we wanted to make sure that they had the opportunity to show us what they had been doing at home independently and to encourage this, as well as trying to get back to delivering the curriculum.
So we’re taking a creative and collaborative approach, where we are inviting them to re-engage and to showcase what they are capable of. Of course, for some, this may take a little while longer to achieve but once they are warmed up and their skills have strengthened, the confidence soon takes over.
And for them to come in and be able to engage very quickly in a creative piece of artwork that is theirs, which doesn’t have many constraints on it, has been really rewarding for them. This is the beauty of the arts subjects: we have the opportunity to be part of a creative journey undertaken by our students, whether that’s a long or short trip.
We’ve also found the mindfulness benefits of art to be a real blessing during this period. The way that the students can just get lost in artwork is incredible, and they tell me the hour just seems to fly by.
Our lessons are about 95 per cent back to normal now and I love it. I’m much more energised and am thoroughly enjoying the planning process and creating lessons that are fun and enjoyable. As a result, I am even hearing “Thank you, Miss!” when they leave my lesson, which feels amazing.
Wearing masks is optional in my school now and it’s clear that the students are benefitting from not being restricted like they were previously. That definitely had an effect on them, as if there was a barrier there for them, a shield that kept them distant. And the fact that I can now come a little closer to them, which was something that I wasn’t able to do before, is great. I was previously having to teach behind a desk barrier, as it were, using various bits of technology, like the visualiser. But now I’m able to get closer and have those one-to-one individual conversations that are really important and meaningful for students.
In some schools, the art department is just one or two people, so it can be quite lonely, and it’s often away from the rest of the school, like Sleeping Beauty at the end of the corridor. My concern has always been that these colleagues can feel isolated and not valued or prioritised. And that’s why it’s so important for us to connect with other art teachers and other practitioners, within our own boroughs and outside. I have made great contacts and have learned so much from teachers all over the country and it is so lovely to see another art classroom in action.
This continued during the lockdowns and beyond: I love the online spaces where people from all over the country will show you what they’re doing. I have picked up so much from that, in terms of how other teachers plan a lesson, how they develop ideas, how their students respond. The beauty of being a teacher, and of being a practitioner, is that you don’t stop learning - you carry on. You’re always finding new ways of making your lessons really fabulous. Those networks have been more powerful than ever over the past 18 months and I know they will be here to stay now. I would definitely recommend that any teacher at any career stage should join a teacher network of their subject and be prepared to be inspired and to inspire others.
After all, we are teachers. We were never meant to work behind 14-inch computer screens in our living rooms. We thrive in school environments, packed with young people and the hustle and bustle and energy. We are social beings. We need to be with real people, learning and teaching with them and knowing that whilst we are doing this, we are changing and improving lives and futures.
Andria Zafirakou is an arts and textiles teacher at Alperton Community School in London and the winner of the 2018 Global Teacher Prize
