ON THE HEELS of another ICT in Education Conference, I noticed the biggest cross-talk and sharing is happens when images or videos are shared. Knowing that behaviour, I'm going to try to upload a sketch a day onto my InsideView blog and cross-post the images into an album on Flickr.
The idea comes from Steve Mouldey in New Zealand. [1] He laid down a challenge "to share a sketch every day in May" and then use #edsketch15 when sharing on Twitter, Google+, Instagram or any other social media.
Steve cites Austin Kleon's "Show Your Work" [2] when encouraging "everyone to sketch something they have been reading, thinking about, trying out, observing, questioning, exploring, reflecting on, working on that day".
Are you up for the challenge?
As Steve says, sketches don’t take an hour to write. In my experience, you can use Skitch or Over to modify a photo you take and the words you use as overlays would count as sketches.
There is a lot of serendipity in sketching. You can often see through language and culture when studying a sketch, diving deep into ideas and thoughts beneath. As I discovered with my creative media students, those who worry about what their sketches look like often show a progression of skills through weeks of sketching. I will share dozens of my students' sketches during the month of May.
While inside MAVIS (a visual art collective in Dublin), I discovered the best way to start sketching was to sketch during workshops and lectures. I started connecting thought bubbles and speech bubbles. Instead of writing notes, I sketched words. The process opened a creative side of my thinking and helped me critique what I was hearing as I was sketching lecturers' talks.
If you're interested in seeing what unfolds during my month of sketching, please check the #edsketch15 hashtag on good social networks.
[Bernie Goldbach teaches creative multimedia in the Limerick School of Art & Design.]
Notes:
1. Steve Mouldey -- Sketch a Day in May" on his blog, April 30, 2015.
2. Austin Kleogh -- "Show Your Work--10 Ways to Share Your Creativity and Get Discovered (affiliate link), 2014.
3. Johanna Weintraub -- "What's in your pencil case?" on Medium, September 9, 2014.
