lashsakula's blog

My object based learning microteach involved the following objects from my home: a crochet chicken, a plaster cast of my thumb, a piece of obsidian, a square of orange neon perspex, a tiny model of mango sticky rice, a maze game from a christmas cracker.

Session plan: Museum of the future 

Warm up (5 min) 

1. Lay out a selection of objects on the table – none readily identifyable for a particular use. Invite peers to choose the one they feel drawn to. 

2. Ask participants to explore the object they have chosen using all their senses sight, sound, touch, smell, taste (if they are feeling brave) and movement without speaking for two minutes. 

3. Ask partipants to pair up and show their partner the things they have discovered about their object, non verbally for two minutes. 

Task 1 (5 mins) 

Tell peers that I have brought back these objects from the future and that it is, contrary to all expectations, a great place. Climate Change has been solved, war is over, we live in communities of care, the arts flourish, humanity is saved.  

Give each peer a couple of note cards. Ask them to imagine their object is in a museum of the future write and to write an explanatory label for it. Explain that the label could contain the following or anything else they think is relevant:

• Where does it come from? 
• What is it made of? 
• What is it used for? 
• Does it have any sacred or magic properties? 

Task 2 (5 min) 

Curate the museum of the future. Arrange the objects in the space with their labels and go on a visit. Read each other’s stories.  

Discussion (5 min) 

• How did it feel to imagine the future as positive? 
• Did engaging sensorily with the objects ahead of time help you to write your sci-fi labels? 
• Did you discover anything that surprised you?
• How much of a difference did this particular selection of objects make? 

Feedback and reflection:

• Participants found writing positively about the future challenging, as we are so much more used to dystopian imaginings than utopian ones. Using a text prompt such as Adrienne Marie Brown’s chapter on Science fiction could have helped peers engage with the premise that we can’t make a better world if we can’t imagine it:

Science fiction is simply a way to practice the future together. I suspect that is what many of you are up to, practicing futures together, practicing justice together, living into new stories. It is our right and responsibility to create a new world.

• Spending time physically exploring the objects “dethroned the cerebral over the bodily” as one participant put it, and allowed people to think about the future in an embodied pleasure seeking way rather than a rational fact based way. Perhaps giving students some time to write down some of the things they experienced while exploring the object immediately afterwards could have fed into their museum labels later on.
• Participants enjoyed asking the objects to speak back to us and giving them a voice, separate from ourselves. I would like to read more about puppeteering and giving objects life and a voice, so that I could bring some practice exercises into this section of the session.

Overall I was pleased with how the session had gone, I wish I had put more effort into documenting it and producing more beautiful resources to go with it, ie ready made museum labels would have made the final layout more aesthetically appealing and perhaps made the objective clearer to my participants.

References:

Brown, A. (2017). Emergent strategy. AK Press.

• Session/artefact to be observed/reviewed: Unit 9 Festival – Graphic Design Yr3 
• Size of student group:  20 
• Observer: Lily Ash Sakula 
• Observee: Ana Teles 

Part One: Context

• What is the context of this session/artefact within the curriculum? 

Unit 9 Festival – Graphic Design Yr3. I’m not one of their tutors, but I’ll be supporting students with their work and events. The studios will host workshops, an exhibition, and presentations simultaneously. 

• How long have you been working with this group and in what capacity? 

This is my first time working with the entire BA Graphic Design Year 3 cohort. I already know some students from their previous exhibitions and events at Peckham Levels. 

• What are the intended or expected learning outcomes? 

Students will be expected to present work and exchange ideas with peers; lead workshops to gain professional-relevant skills; practise articulating and communicating design concepts; learn to display work professionally in an exhibition setting. 

• What are the anticipated outputs (anything students will make/do)? 

There’s a workshop at 11:10 on Crafting Chinese New Year Traditions and another at 12:20 on Create n Share, with outputs produced during these sessions. Presentations will also be happening simultaneously. As the space is open to the public and all CCW students, other activities may take place as well. 

• Are there potential difficulties or specific areas of concern? 

There are no specific areas of concern, but I’m not sure how well students have prepared for these activities or how familiar they are with the space. My role will be to support them in making the most of this time and environment. 

• How will students be informed of the observation/review? 

I will let them know orally on the day. 

Part Two: My observations

• Ana takes time to make Peckham levels space warm and inviting to students, welcoming everyone who enters and keeping biscuits, tea and coffee topped up.  

• Ana offers a wide range of expert technical and practical support to students while I am there: including obtaining a step ladder, offering advice on how to hang a display, and talking a student through how to write a risk assessment. She has a lovely way of being supportive of student enterprise while not assuming knowledge. 

• Ana also acts as a connector, constantly offering students ways to extend their practice. For example, she tells students who are running a workshop to apply for a workshop festival that is being run at Peckham levels next month. Her wide knowledge of the people, space and schedule allows her to constantly be making connections between students, spaces and events. 

• In a meeting with a student, Ana is very encouraging – she compliments student on how her proposal for an exhibition is “well written and designed”. She offers multiple ways for the student to promote the show and including an offer to format the info for the Peckham levels website. 

• She has an encyclopaedic knowledge of the available equipment and offers student different options for sound and hanging technologies and tools. 

• Ana makes herself available to help in professional and boundaried ways to the students she works with, including giving her working hours and phone number so they always know how to reach her.   

• Session/artefact to be observed/reviewed: Group tutorial 
• Size of student group: six students 
• Observer: Ana Teles 
• Observee: Lily Ash Sakula 

Part One: Context

• What is the context of this session/artefact within the curriculum? 

Group tutorial 6 students, BA Illustration, Yr 1, Unit 2.  Students were asked to create a poster(s) that reflected their interpretation of a film. They were provided with four film options to choose from. 

• How long have you been working with this group and in what capacity? 

Lily first met the students on their first day last year and is now returning from parental leave. 

• What are the intended or expected learning outcomes? 

The intended learning outcomes for this tutorial are for students to refine and develop their work to meet the two-week deadline. To help students to critically reflect on the decisions they have made throughout the process, including their choice of subject matter and creative approaches. Students will be encouraged to think creatively to address challenges and overcome obstacles and be encouraged to give feedback to their peers. 

• What are the anticipated outputs (anything students will make/do)? 

The anticipated outputs for this project include students finalising and refining the posters they created and presented during this session.  

• Are there potential difficulties or specific areas of concern? 

The possibility of anxiety among students as they received their assessment feedback in December.  

• How will students be informed of the observation/review? 

The feedback of their work will be given orally.  

• What would you particularly like feedback on? 

My facilitation: Is everyone in the group able to particpate and does the conversation flow in dynamic and exciting ways

My Feedback: Is my feedback fair and accessible? Is it equitable? Are there ways I could make it more inclusive?

• How will feedback be exchanged? 

Written in the form

Part Two: Ana’s Reflections 

• Lily engaged with students on a personal level, establishing a welcoming and inclusive atmosphere as they joined the tutorial. By initiating casual conversations, Lily connected with students, making them feel more comfortable and setting a supportive tone for the session. 

• At the start of the tutorial, Lily facilitated introductions by asking everyone to tell their names. This worked as an icebreaker and helped create a sense of connection as not all students knew each other. It also encouraged an environment where students felt more comfortable participating. 

• When it came to presenting work, Lily invited a volunteer to begin, as a way to give a sense of agency and involvement. After each student presented their work, Lily prioritised peer-to-peer dialogue by asking the group for their thoughts before sharing their own feedback.  

• To guide students in reflecting on their work, Lily used open-ended questions and prompts, for example, asking them to consider the reasoning behind their choices or to explore alternative possibilities (“Have you thought of…”). This helped students articulate their decisions and develop their critical thinking skills. 

• Lily was attentive to students’ confidence. For example, when one student expressed doubt about their presentation skills (“I’m not explaining this very well”), Lily immediately reassured them with positive reinforcement (“You certainly are”) and encouraged them to continue.  

• Feedback from Lily was constructive and framed to encourage further exploration. For instance, when something could be improved, Lily phrased suggestions thoughtfully, using prompts like, “You might want to explore this in [a different way]” or “Have you thought of how to…?”  

• During the session, Lily provided feedback that invited students to examine their aesthetic choices, formal solutions, and interpretations of the film. Lily expressed enthusiasm for the students’ work and maintained a respectful and professional attitude towards both students and colleague. 

• Lily was also mindful of students’ technical capabilities and timelines. For students who presented less work, Lily acknowledged time constraints and still engaged with their ideas, and discussed their intended formats, colours, and visual language choices. This approach motivated students and helped them feel valued, regardless of the stage and level of their work. 

The tutorial seemed to have supported students in reflecting on their projects. They engaged critically with their peers’ work, giving feedback and drawing connections between their own posters and their peers’ choices. Students were encouraged to consider how their decisions regarding materials, format, composition, and colour contributed to the overall message and identity of their posters. The feedback they received from both Lily and their peers was constructive and encouraging, with Lily setting the example. 

Part Three: My Reflections 

It was really helpful to have Ana, notice and note down many specific things that I do naturally, without thinking. My teaching practice is very much developed on the back of my community facilitation practice, and I see many of the values I find important in those spaces: ie making everyone feel welcome and comfortable, bringing encouragement in the face of doubt and being attentive to the pressures on people’s lives and time – coming through in Ana’s feedback.

It is also really helpful to have my practice reflected back at me and broken down into constituent parts because it allows me reflect more consciously about which parts I doing consciously and which I am not. This is important as if I am not consciously aware of certain aspects of my teaching practice then these could slip if I have less energy or am having a difficult day. In order to teach equitably across all my students, it is really important to be aware of exactly what I am doing so that I can make sure I am bringing this level of energy and attention to all my students equally.

I found the conversation about social justice in our first PG Cert session useful in terms of sharing experiences and solidarity with other staff. Many of our discussions came up against the idea that it is impossible to create socially just teaching within a system that is so rigged against those who live at the sharp edge of the capitalism. For example, students who have to work at the same time as studying are materially disadvantage in terms of how much of our teaching they can access even before they walk through the door of the classroom. International students, have to learn in a language that isn’t theirs while dealing with the micro and macro aggressions of a racist society. In this context I was thinking about Arao and Clements idea of a brave space and whether it can create a more equitable base to teach from. This passage in the chapter felt perhaps like the most useful:

The collapse of “Safety” into “comfort” has been a hugely problematic swerve for those of us who want to embed social justice principles into our teaching. The idea of a brave space that can be defined by it’s participants, feels to me too inward looking to be particularly helpful, particularly in the current political context. In her new book Minority Rule: Adventures in the Culture war, Ash Sakar argues that the right wing has used social justice language, to victimise itself and justify a backlash against actual material benefits for oppressed groups. For example, trans people (such as myself) have materially gained very little from the increased representation of trans people in the media and the language of inclusion that has begun to spread in universities. However the backlash to that representation has had very material consequences: including legislation that specifically targets and discriminates against us. This is true across a wide range of minority groups. We need more than brave spaces to turn this around.

References:

Arao, B. and Clemens, K., (2013), From Safe Spaces to Brave Spaces: A new way to frame dialogue around diversity and social Justice

Sakar, Ash (2025). Minority Rule: Adventures in the Culture War. Bloomsbury Publishing. 

I’ve had a bit of a rocky start to this course. I went to the induction in the middle of my parental leave and felt completely lost. Couldn’t really follow what was happening or talk to fellow students. I felt a bit overwhelmed by the amount of work I was taking on and the pressure to do this course now even with a new baby because I might not have a job at UAL next year due to HPL cuts and so would no longer qualify. A tailspin. It made me think about how my students must experience arriving at the beginning of the course, sometimes from another country/education system and being given all of these somewhat incomprehensible course structures and assessment briefs. It is hard to maintain an excitement for learning and creating amidst the admin.

The first PG Cert session has got me thinking about my teaching practice as it currently stands and who and what has formed it. I learned many of the tools and practices I use now as a facilitator in community organising and creative projects. This has influenced the way I see my role as a teacher, less as someone imparting knowledge and more as someone holding space for conversation, encouraging making and maintaining (as far as possible) non hierarchical structure to learning.

My teaching practice has also been hugely influenced by the following texts:

Syllabus by Lynda Barry

An illustrated syllabus of Lynda Barry’s comic course that she teaches at the university of Madison. She takes you through every class from introduction to end of term assessments in a series of comics exercises. I love her use of humour as well and her demand for strict artistic discipline, and would love to bring these into my teaching practice.

Teaching to Transgress by bell hooks

I read this a few years ago before I was teaching at a university, and am excited to reread it with my current practice in mind. One of the things that resonated with me is her assertion that “Excitement is generated through collective effort. Seeing the classroom always as a communal place enhances the likelihood of collective effort in creating and sustaining a learning community” Sometimes I struggle as a teacher not to feel like I am responsible for bringing all the energy to my sessions, however if I could create a more communal space where everyone shared responsibility for learning rather than to me to deliver it, that would be a much richer experience for students and tutors alike.

Leave Me Alone – Power Control and resistance in a primary School by Joanna Stephanie Gore

Although the university is very different from primary school many of the same mechanisms of control and hierarchy exist in both and so do the resistance to these from students. Joanna Stephanie Gore asserts that “The education system is an institution of social control that reinforces the status quo.” Can we as educators, create spaces within the university that challenge this?

Teaching for people who prefer not to teach/Learning for people who prefer not to be taught

A collection of reflections from self employed artists. The introduction sets forth the rationale behind making it this manual:

“Being a zero hours contract teacher is extremely isolating. You just come in, deliver, go home. There’s no safety net, no continuity. You will have very intimate conversations with people you’ll never see again. We started compiling this manual because we became afraid that we were losing our ability to care.”

This is a fear I share, and one I want to fight by doing this course.

Poor Artists by The White Pube

An eviscerating exploration of the art school industry that made me shudder with recognition, but that ends with a utopian fantasy of what being an artist could (should?) be, and gave me hope in students and artists to imagine our way out of the current arts sector.

Bibliography

Barry, L., 2014. Syllabus. Drawn and Quarterly

hooks, b. (1994). Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom. Routledge

Gore, JS. 2004. Leave me alone: Power, control and resistance in a primary school. Libetarian Education

Bayerdorfer, M. and Schweiker, R., 2023,Teaching for people who prefer not to teach/ Learning for people who prefer not to be taught. AND.

Muhammad, Z., & de la Puente, G. (2024). Poor Artists. Penguin Books Ltd.

Hello, my name is Lily Ash Sakula (they/them). I teach on the BA and MA Illustration at Camberwell. Outside of UAL, I am an artist and animator, working collaboratively with a wide range of communities.

Outside of Camberwell I work on SPARK, a project in collaboration with Magic Me and artist Georgia Akbar exploring sensory invitations with people with late stage dementia in care homes.

I am in the very early stages of a commission from Animate to make an experimental animation about death.

I also have a three month old baby so am very sleep deprived, apologies for the out of focus expression and loss of words.

I am interested in doing the PG Cert because I would really like to grow and develop my teaching practice, which can sometimes feel a bit stale as many of my sessions have very similar formats dictated by the shape of the course, are there ways I could be breaking free of these? How can I introduce someo of more unexpected and playful practices I use in workshops when I am not teaching at a university?