Meeting Phenomenon-Based Learning

Insights from Art Education

Gaia Mazzola

MA Thesis 30 hp

Department of Visual Arts and Sloyd Education

Master’s programme in Visual Culture and Learning –

specialization Nordic Visual Studies and Art Education

VT 2020

Supervisors: Anette Göthlund, Jaana Brinck

Examiner: Fredrik Lindstrand

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Abstract

The most recent Finnish national curriculum for basic education was implemented starting

from 2016. The curriculum calls for the development of learners’ transversal competences,

which are built on the broader discourse on 21st century skills and challenges. Phenomenon-

based learning, as a multidisciplinary approach, was formulated to address the new Finnish

curriculum, in order to help regular subject teaching to tackle the transversal competences.

As an artist, art educator and researcher, my interest was directed towards the

understanding of phenomenon-based learning from an art-educational perspective.

Therefore, this study brings insights from art education to phenomenon-based learning, in

order to open a discussion on the following questions: where do art education and

phenomenon-based learning meet? And following, how could teachers and learners benefit

from this encounter?

A post-structuralist view on art education forms the researcher’s perspective within the

study. Methodologically, a post-structural positioning was also taken, relying on the

a/r/tographical approach. A/r/tography is a performative arts-based research methodology

that recognizes the complexity of situations and articulates in-between them.

An arts-based workshop worked as a platform for exploration. Framed within a

phenomenon-based project, the workshop was conducted in collaboration with a class of 6th

graders and their teacher, in the City of Espoo, Finland. The a/r/tographical toolkit, built on

visual and performative ethnography, worked alongside workshopping as methods of data

collection and being with the material. The collected data include: visual and written field

notes, video recordings, audio recordings, a written questionnaire and a semi-structured

interview. Performing the material through theory revealed that art education and

phenomenon-based learning meet in the concepts of multidisciplinarity and engagement,

through different entanglements.

The study suggests that the encounter between art education and phenomenon-based

learning could benefit teachers and learners in different ways. In addition, the situation

experienced in this study holds some interesting challenges that leave space for further

developments.

Keywords: art education, phenomenon-based learning, multidisciplinarity, engagement,

a/r/tography

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Table of content

1. INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................... 4

1.1. INQUIRING THE PRACTICE ............................................................................................... 5

1.2. AIM AND RESEARCH QUESTION ...................................................................................... 6

2. CONTEXTUALIZATION ................................................................................................ 8

2.1. THE PARTNER-SCHOOL .................................................................................................. 8

2.2. WHY 6TH GRADERS? ....................................................................................................... 9

3. METHOD ..................................................................................................................... 11

3.1. ON PERFORMATIVITY AND ETHNOGRAPHY ..................................................................... 12

3.2. WORKSHOPPING ......................................................................................................... 13

3.2.1. CONTENT OF THE WORKSHOP ................................................................................... 14

3.3. DATA SET ................................................................................................................... 16

3.4. MULTIDISCIPLINARITY AND ENGAGEMENT ...................................................................... 16

3.5. ETHICAL CONSIDERATIONS ........................................................................................... 17

4. THEORY: MEETING PHENOMENON-BASED LEARNING ........................................ 19

4.1. THE CONTEXT, THE LEARNER, THE TEACHER ................................................................. 20

4.2. PERSPECTIVE(S) FROM ART EDUCATION ....................................................................... 21

4.2.1. THE RHIZOME ........................................................................................................... 21

4.2.2. MULTIDISCIPLINARITY ............................................................................................... 23

4.2.3. ENGAGEMENT .......................................................................................................... 24

4.3. A NOTE ON METHODOLOGY: IN-BETWEEN WITH A/R/TOGRAPHY ....................................... 26

4.4. CONTRIBUTIONS TO RESEARCH ON PHBL ..................................................................... 27

5. NAVIGATION AND INTERPRETATION OF THE EVENTS THROUGH THEORY ...... 29

5.1. EMOTIONS – CREATIVE THINKING - AGENCY ................................................................... 29

5.2. ROLES – PERFORMATIVITY - COLLABORATION ................................................................ 36

5.3. HOW THE WORKSHOP EXPERIENCE WAS PERCEIVED ...................................................... 42

6. DISCUSSING THE OUTCOMES ................................................................................. 46

7. FINAL THOUGHTS ..................................................................................................... 49

8. REFERENCES ............................................................................................................ 51

9. APPENDIX .................................................................................................................. 54

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Abbreviations

PhBL = Phenomenon-based Learning

NCBE = National Core Curriculum for Basic Education

NCECEC = National Core Curriculum for Early Childhood Education and Care

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1. Introduction

“If we want the child to become a creative person with a developed fantasy, not a

suffocated one (like in many adults), we need to make sure that the child memorizes

the biggest possible amount of information according to their capabilities, in order for

the them to be able to create more relations between these data and therefore be

able to solve problems when they occur. (…) In the first years of one’s life, one’s

individuality is shaped and will stay the same for the rest of it. It is educators’

responsibility whether this person will be a creative person.” (own translation-original

in Italian)1

Bruno Munari (1977)

Bruno Munari (1907-1998) was an Italian artist and designer. During the last twenty years of

his practice, he focused in promoting art education and artistic thinking to children, in order

to stimulate their creativity. He did so by initiating a series of laboratories called “Giocare con

l’Arte” (Eng: playing with Art) that were open for children of any age. The workshops were

considered a platform for investigation and knowledge encounters between children, their

parents and the educator. The children had an active role as explorers and the parents,

alongside the educator, assisted them in their exploration (Restelli & Sperati, 2009).

Together, they let the children be free to do and make mistakes. Nothing was ‘not good

enough’ or ‘wrong’. Munari advocated for experiencing and learning to be with uncertainty,

by pushing towards a creative use of errors. Errors bring knowledge and help us identify

what better direction could be taken.2

Born and raised in Italy, I moved to Finland in 2014 at the age of 21. I was about to graduate

from my bachelor studies in Painting and I freshly started working on my art educational

project, called cresceréarte.

‘cresceréarte’ in Italian is equal to ‘crescere é arte’, which means ‘growing is art’. It started

1 ”Se vogliamo che il bambino diventi una persona creativa, dotata di fantasia sviluppata e non soffocata (come

in molti adulti), noi dobbiamo quindi fare in modo che il bambino memorizzi più dati possibili, nei limiti delle sue possibilità, per permettergli di fare più relazioni possibili, per permettergli di risolvere i propri problemi ogni volta che si presentano. (…) Nei primi anni della sua vita, l’individuo si forma e resterà tale per tutta la sua vita. Dipende dagli educatori se questa persona sarà poi una persona creativa.” (Munari, 1977) 2 Munari’s workshopping legacy is still carried on by Bruno Munari Association (ABM). ABM organizes

workshops for children and trainings for adults willing to become registered BM educators ("I Laboratori Bruno Munari®", n.d.). The trainings and workshops are based on Metodo Bruno Munari® didactical methodology, which shares some values with the more popular Reggio Emilia Method - but maintains its own identity.

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as an artistic response to a problem I had been working with during the previous years. The

more I got into my art studies, the more I perceived physical and mental disconnection

between the art world and people’s everyday life. I felt my communication through paint,

canvases and drawings was not efficient anymore. How can real communication happen, if

most of the people I want to talk with cannot understand my language? How can I involve

them directly in the making of this communication, in order to create a dialogue? I slowly

moved from a more traditional ways of doing visual art towards a more interactive way of

acting, working with the audience and engaging them in interactive installations and sewing

sessions. However, the educational turn within my artistic practice came once I encountered

Munari in my studies. His concept of art education was a great inspiration, that helped me to

shape my ideas.

Mainly focusing on children, cresceréarte brings arts-based workshops to different

educational environments, both informal and formal.

These workshops ultimately aim to shorten the distances between people and art, by making

the art-language more understandable. Though, the workshops do not focus on art per se.

Rather, they are designed to use art tools and artistic process to understand reality and

question it. By questioning and reflecting upon ourselves and our context, creativity and

critical thinking are stimulated.

My experience living in Finland further shaped my project and my thinking, through authors I

encountered during my master studies, through challenges I faced during my work practice

and by encountering inspiring people I met along the way. This thesis presents to the reader

a checkpoint into my experience as an always developing artist, thinker, researcher,

educator, person.

1.1. Inquiring the practice

With cresceréarte, in 2019, I started working as an art educator for the City of Espoo,

Finland, in the Culture Call project (Fin: Kulttuurikurkkaus). This educational project

organized art and culture workshops in kindergartens in Espoo municipality. The aim of

bringing professionals from the field of art and culture into kindergartens’ daily life was to

create a systematic collaboration between early childhood education and the cultural field,

which promoted the right of every child to experience art in its various forms (“Culture Call”,

2019).

Culture Call provided opportunity for each kindergarten to collaborate with an art and culture

actor once a semester. The collaboration could last from one to several days, according to

the content. However, it was not possible to create a strong and continuative relationship

between the external educator and the kindergarteners. The same problem occurred during

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previous collaborations with other partners, such as primary schools in Finland and Italy.

These experiences were extremely valuable, but never allowed me to create a stronger bond

with the learners.

These encounters generate complex and valuable learning experiences for all parties: the

teachers, the external educator and the learners. In order for this experience to leave a

legacy, proposing content that meaningfully fits teachers’ programs and catches learners’

interests is crucial, but quite challenging.

My response to this challenge, both in early childhood education and primary school

settings, was to take children’s perspective as a starting point for creating the content of

every workshop. This response emerged from the idea that if the topic is relevant for the

learner, they will be more engaged in the learning (Saavedra et al., 2012).

However, the fact that my time in these kindergartens and schools was limited did not allow

me to get in direct contact with the children. Therefore, the topics were based on teachers’

observations of children’s interests and their own pedagogical goals.

While experiencing this situation, I started searching for clues on how to involve children

directly. I turned to the new Finnish national core curriculum for early childhood education

and care (NCECEC), which talked about ensuring the children with opportunities to

participate and influence in matters that concern them (Finnish National Board of Education,

2017). What sparked my interest though, was when I encountered the multidisciplinary

approach of phenomenon-based learning (PhBL) (Lonka et al.,2018) and its view on

learners, multidisciplinarity and engagement, which brought me to dig deeper into the new

Finnish national core curriculum for basic education (NCBE) (Finnish National Board of

Education, 2016).

1.2. Aim and Research question

According to NCBE, the learner is expected - on different levels - to be involved in the

making of their own learning and taking responsibility for it (Finnish National Board of

Education, 2016). This concept works in support of the idea that learners should develop

their sense of agency and their creativity, in order to become citizens that will be able to

master the 21st century skills (Saavedra et al., 2012; Lonka et al., 2018). The 21st century

skills are identified by Binkley et al. (2012) as: creativity and innovation, critical thinking and

decision making, learning to learn (metacognition), communication, collaboration,

information literacy, ICT literacy, local and global citizenship, life and career, cultural

awareness and social and personal responsibility. Mastering these skills will allow the

learners to navigate the complexity of the world we live in (Lonka et al., 2018).

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PhBL is a multidisciplinary approach on learning that emerged in Finland as an articulation

on the new curriculum reforms on multidisciplinary learning modules (Finnish National Board

of Education, 2016). Phenomenon-based teaching focuses on the study of a phenomena by

helping the learners to build bridges between subjects and gives them freedom of

exploration (Lonka et al., 2018). According to this approach, the learners are seen as active

agents and their interests shall be taken into account in order to make the learning

meaningful (Lonka et al., 2018).

In the light of this framework, I started noticing parallels between PhBL and my existing

knowledge on post-structural art education, which sees art education as a platform for

emancipation, agency and exploration, where the learner is an active agent and the

educator acts as a scaffold for the learners (Richardson, 2017; St. Pierre, 2004; Munari,

1977). The aim of this study is, therefore, to find the connections where art education and

PhBL meet. The exploration will, hopefully, open further discussions on the subject. To guide

the inquiry, the research questions are formulated as such:

Where do art education and phenomenon-based learning meet?

And following, how could teachers and learners benefit from this encounter?

To investigate these questions, this study articulates on a workshop-experience held in a

public elementary school in Finland, in collaboration with a class of 6th graders and their

teacher.

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2. Contextualization

Since the 1960s, Finland has always been working on promoting equality and providing free

education for its citizens. School days are currently relatively short and the amount of

workload at home is not as heavy as in other countries (Lonka et al., 2018). High-school and

universities are also tuition-free institutions. As far as my personal experience goes, being a

foreigner who has been living and studying in Finland and Sweden, I can state that the

difference between these two Nordic countries and my country of origin, Italy, is remarkable.

However, the overall European context they share hosts many similarities.

The study took place in collaboration with a class of 6th graders and their teacher in Espoo,

Finland. It was performed throughout three days and consisted of orientation, workshop and

feedback session.

With the intent of finding one partner school for the study to take place, I sent my proposal to

sixteen different schools in the Espoo area. The City of Espoo, located in southern Finland,

was selected because of the high number of Finnish-English speaking schools in the area,

mainly due to the presence of a high percentage of Swedish-speaking people and other

international inhabitants.3 Despite Finnish is a language I can speak, I framed my choice

towards English-Finnish speaking schools in order to be sure I would have been able to

express myself fully, if necessary. The selected school was the first to answer.

2.1. The partner-school

The partner-school is a state-funded institution which belongs to public education. Each

learner has equal opportunities within the school environment, including special needs

learners to whom special classes are organized and support is granted. The school includes

learners from different social backgrounds and cultures (based on my own observation), and

it emphasizes language learning. Some classes are working both in Finnish and English.

However, the partnering class used Finnish as a main language and the workshop was held

in Finnish.

In Finland, each school’s curriculum is developed according to the municipality’s curriculum,

which in turn goes by the guidelines of the NCBE (Finnish National Board of Education,

2016, section 1). On these basis, every class teacher is autonomous in making decisions

regarding the teaching content and their pedagogical approach.

NCBE calls for integrative instruction, facilitated by multidisciplinary learning modules.

Theme days, events, campaigns, study visits and school camps are ways for the learners to

3 Fin: suomenruotsalaiset. Finland has a big Swedish-speaking minority, which results in Swedish being

recognized as the second official national language.

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create connections and relationships with society and its agents (Finnish National Board of

Education, 2016, section 4.4). The partner-teacher stated that their class did not have the

chance to extensively participate to such projects, apart from the yearly multidisciplinary-

week organized and carried out by the school. The learners were, therefore, extremely

curious to meet an art professional “from the outside” and did not know what to expect from

this experience (January 21st, 2020).

I did not have the opportunity to familiarize with the study environment beforehand, thus the

first encounter with the classroom and the learners happened during the first official meeting.

My first encounter with the partner-teacher, however, occurred a month and a half prior in a

casual setting.

2.2. Why 6th graders?

Contextually to this study, no relevant moves were yet made in Finnish primary education in

order to support children’s right to an accessible, free of charge and continuative art

education. Whereas thanks to projects like Culture Call and Art Testers (Fin:

Taidetestaajat), efforts to bring art and culture to public early childhood- and lower-

secondary education could be seen.4

In 2019, during a cresceréarte workshop held for 8th graders in a Finnish public school, I

had the pleasure to converse with their art educator about art education’s struggles in basic

education. During our discussion, a few problems in the system emerged. Firstly, fighting for

recognition of the subject both with parents and colleagues. Secondly, most of the art

educators working with 7th to 9th graders are struggling to keep learners interested because

of the lack of a proper background on the subject (art educator, personal conversation,

March 28, 2019). Art Testers’ website (www.taidetestaajat.fi) displays playful charts on data

collected during the experience. The charts show that the learners found the experience

interesting (20%), successful (14%) or diverse (13%) and that 34% of the learners that

encountered art through this campaign would “perhaps” do it again (“Taidetestaajat”, 2017).

What can be deduced from these numbers is that the art field stimulates curiosity in this

group of learners. However, only two visits during a school year are not sufficient to even

grasp the phenomena of Art. Continuity is lacking.

In the educational field Finland employs only professionals holding a master’s degree as a

minimum level of education. However, the structure of teaching changes based on the level

of education the teacher is working in. Whereas in lower-secondary education learners have

4 Art Testers (Fin: taidetestaajat) was an ambitious campaign occurred in 2017-2020, that brought all the 8th

graders in Finland to two organized visits in different artistic and cultural settings: one in their region and one in Helsinki (“Taidetestaajat,” 2017).

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access to subject teachers, in primary education teaching is carried out by the class teacher

(Fin: luokanopettaja), who is engaged in the teaching of most of the subjects. A class

teacher can surely work interdisciplinary, but often they do not have the resources to shape

arts-based content to be connected to the other study realms (art educator, personal

communication, March 28, 2019; teacher, personal communication, March 16, 2020).

This background becomes problematic for 6th graders, who are about to approach lower-

secondary school where they will be faced with more complex arts-based content that they

might feel unsure to work with. The decision of working alongside this group during this

study aims to address this context within Finnish (art)education.

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3. Method

The study was conducted as a case study. The study was methodologically framed within

a/r/tography (Springgay, Irwin, Leggo & Gouzouasis, 2008) and included workshopping as

an arts-based method.

Patricia Leavy (2018) presents an overview on the field of arts-based research, the umbrella

under which the methods selected for this study are located. Arts-based research hosts a variety

of different research genres, from literary to performative and educational. A/r/tography is

identified by Leavy (2018) as a performative genre. As a method, workshopping also calls for

performativity. However, its flexible nature allows it to be extremely adaptable to fit most of the

genres in the realm of arts-based research.

A/r/tography is a research methodology that focuses on the in-between of art practice,

research practice and educational practice (a /r /t ) (Irwin & Springgay, 2008). The ‘ography’

in ‘a/r/tography’ refers to its connections to ethnography due to the used methods, even

though a/r/tography still remains arts-based and shares many aspects with arts-based

educational research - also located under the same umbrella.5 There is no sharp way to

describe this methodology, however Irwin and Springgay (2008) highlight that it is practice-

based and it reflects on relationality and complexity.

As a post-structuralist methodology, a/r/tography puts the dichotomy of identity into

discussion and brings the idea that there is no identity as such, but rather the whole lies in

multiplicity (Irwin & Springgay, 2008; Deleuze & Guattari, 1987). In a/r/tography, the

researcher is often addressed as a/r/tographer because of their engagement in artistic,

research and teaching practice and the contiguity of the artist, researcher and teacher

identity. Being aware of the contiguity of this identity and aligning with it, with the choice of

using in the text the terms singularly or in pairs, I aim to highlight where I feel the artist, the

researcher or the teacher should be more visible. In order to do so, I chose to use the

following terms: (me)artist, (me)art educator, (me)researcher.

A/r/tography as a method builds on elements from visual and performative ethnography. Its

connections to post-structuralism will be discussed more thoroughly in chapter four. The

following section focuses on the ethnographic and performative aspects of a/r/tography, in

order to frame my positioning and actions within the study.

5 Arts-based educational research (ABER) is a research methodology that highlights art as a knowledge-

building tool through which problems within the educational discourse are addressed (Haywood Rolling, 2018).

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3.1. On performativity and ethnography

Performativity is a key element in a/r/tography. Leggo (2008) suggests that professional life

and personal life exist contiguously, therefore the a/r/tographic inquiry is performed

autobiographically. “We need to write personally because we live personally” (p.5).

A/r/tography is defined as a living inquiry (Irwin & Springgay, 2008; Springgay, Irwin & Kind,

2005). The concept of ‘living’ stems from the idea of performativity as a way of being and

working with knowledge (Irwin & Springgay, 2008). Performativity can be carried out by

different means: written, artistic, educational or all of the above.

Performativity is discussed in a post-structural and feminist perspective by Barad (2003) as a

contestation of the representative power on language. She states: “representationalism is

the belief in the ontological distinction between representations and that which they purport

to represent” (2003, p. 804). Representationalism is challenged by the post-structural

discourse with the performative understanding, which “shifts the focus from linguistic

representations to discursive practices” (Barad, 2003, p. 807). Barad (2003) explains that a

discursive practice produces the knowledge rather than describes it, and produces it within

the intra-action of the discourse’s different agents. In the a/r/tographical approach the

a/r/tographer similarly aims towards creating the context that will be then studied, instead of

focusing on finding knowledge that is ‘already there’ and getting to the results (Irwin &

Springgay, 2008).

The context of this study was also created by the (me)researcher, with the purpose to better

understand the dynamics and theoretical implications within its discourse. The study

performs in a specific case, however this choice does not exclude the existence and value of

every other case. In the light of a/r/tography, the case is a positioning (Barad, 2003) of the

a/r/tographer within the (art)educational rhizome. The positioning within a discourse is

defined by Barad (2003) as an agential cut.

As a performative, practice-based research methodology, a/r/tography relies on and values

the experience each party had during the research process as part of the discourse. As

stated by Madison: “experience becomes the very seed of performance” (2011, p. 168). The

a/r/tographic inquiry puts the a/r/tographer in a both ethnographic and auto-ethnographic

position. The a/r/tographer necessarily works within the context of the study, which includes

them as an active part of it (Irwin & Springgay, 2008; Springgay, Irwin & Kind, 2005). The

observation is therefore focused on the totality of the participants - in this study’s case: the

teacher, the (me)art educator, the learners.

Subjectivity is strongly connected to performativity, as subjectivity encases a person’s life

experiences, socio-political-economical background and power-positioning (Madison, 2011).

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A/r/tographical practice highlights participants’ subjectivity and wants to merge them in the

situation. ‘Merging’ in this framework works to value subjectivities as individuals, but

recognizing the common points between them within the shared context and the complexity

of the encounters (Madison, 2011; Irwin et al., 2008).

3.2. Workshopping

I have been using workshopping as a method even before I started my art educational

adventure with cresceréarte. Since it always proved to be an exceptional way to be with the

participants and merge artistic, educational and research practice, I believed it functioned as

an ideal co-host to the a/r/tographical approach.

Workshopping can be used in different contexts and provides the participants with a safe

environment for exploration and to foster creativity. This environment leaves the participants

free to investigate their ideas through different techniques. The educator is a professional in

the field and works as a scaffold for the participants. By doing so, they stimulate participants’

own reasoning and agency (Munari, 1977; Restelli & Sperati, 2008).

In the eye of PhBL, the study opted for a workshop that could bring learners’ interests to

discussion and use them to explore a phenomena multidisciplinarily. The workshop was built

on different arts-based techniques in order to facilitate the tasks, with the help of others

adapted from design practice. Thought-visualizing techniques - typically used in the field of

design - were used to stimulate thinking processes, visual presentations were shown in

order to inspire ideas and arts-based tools were explored with the support of the (me)art

educator/(me)artist.

Workshop planning started with a first informal meeting with the teacher in January 2020,

and continued through e-mail exchange until the content was ready.

During the meeting, different topics were touched upon, such as art education in primary

education, multidisciplinarity, learners’ engagement and which phenomena to address during

the workshop. The phenomena to be tackled in the workshop came as a proposal from the

teacher, which was: energy. The teacher selected the topic based on their program, since

the semester would have been “all about energy” (teacher, personal communication,

January 21, 2020).

The workshop was divided in three days within a two-weeks time span and it took place

between the end of February and the beginning of March 2020. The first day included

orientation and the first part of the workshop, while the second day was entirely dedicated to

the second part of the workshop. The third day hosted a feedback session with the

participants. In the following section, an overview on the events is presented.

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3.2.1. Content of the workshop

The first day of the workshop started with

orientation, aimed to introduce myself and the

study to the participants and to get to know

them. Orientation included a small exercise

used to briefly get to know participants’ names.

The first part of the workshop followed right

after and consisted in bringing participants’

interests to surface. Every participant was

asked to write down (or draw) individually their

interests on sticky notes, which then were

collected all together on the door’s surface.

Collecting their interests on one surface

created the opportunity of getting an overview

on the variety of topics.

The participants were then asked to group

these interests into topics. They collectively

moved the sticky notes to the whiteboard (on

turnation) and finally individuated eight

different interest-topics.

Every participant was then asked to select

amongst the interest they wrote and leave on

the whiteboard only one, by taking the others

away. The amount of sticky notes diminished

and we were able to sort the eight interest-

topics and ended this section with four main

interest-groups: art, science, food and sport.

Each participant belonged to one interest-

group and they would have worked alongside

the other group-members in the following

meeting.

Picture 1

Picture 2

Picture 3

Picture 1, 2, 3. Workshop activities during the first day. Bringing learner’s interest to

discussion.

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The day ended with an introduction to the topic

energy. As a conclusion, they were given a small

research task as a homework for the next

meeting. The task required the participants to

work individually and research their interest-topic

(e.g. food) combined to the word energy – the

chosen phenomena to tackle.

The second day of the workshop, a week after,

was mainly focused on making participants work

on their interest-topics related to the phenomena-

energy. Firstly, we discussed on the results of

their researches related to energy and explored

the classroom trying to find energy sources based

on our observations. Some participants had not

done their homework, therefore they did the

research during this first part of the day assisted

by the teacher.

Following, participants were asked to tackle the

phenomena-energy through the results from their

researches, networking with their group-members

towards an artistic interpretation of it. They were

shown a visual presentation on possible ways to

approach artistically these results – e.g. visually

or performatively. The day ended with each

interest-group presenting their final work and

commenting.

The last day was reserved to fill questionnaires

about the experience. Each interest-group was

given eleven questions, which required either a

colour-coded answer (red, yellow or green) or an

open-ended answer (see appendix B).

Picture 4, 5, 6. Workshop activities during the second day: discussing about learners’ research observations, exploring the classroom environment and experimenting with the art tools.

Picture 7. Feedback session with questionnaires.

Picture 4

Picture 5

Picture 6

Picture 7

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3.3. Data set

The partner-class counted a total of 29 learners and one teacher. Learners’ age ranged from

11 to 12 years old (6th grade). As specified by the Finnish National Board on Research

Integrity (2019), the parents received beforehand a letter of consent to be signed, in which

the aim of the study, data collection and handling were presented (see appendix A). This led

to three learners not being granted the permission to participate by their parents. Data is,

therefore, based on 26 learners. It is important to point out that, due to flu season, not every

learner was present and the number diminished meeting after meeting. During the feedback

session some students were missing and unfortunately their point of view could not be

collected (see Table 1. In appendix).

The collected data are divided into audio material, visual field notes, video material, written

field notes and written feedback (see Table 1. in appendix). Most of the data were produced

with the research participants and collected with the help of the research assistant,6 who

was responsible for visual documentation. Photographs were taken as visual field notes to

document the process, videos and audios were recorded in order to capture details like

conversations, comments, facial and bodily expressions. During the second part of the

workshop audio recordings were taken from two of the interest-groups (food1-group and

science-group). 7 Video recordings instead focused primarily on the art group and the sport

group. The purpose of this was to cover, with different methods, all the groups that did not

include learners without a research participation permit. A feedback session was organized

to collect participants’ opinions with questionnaires. Teacher’s opinion was instead collected

before and after the workshop in the form of interviews.

Observation on site focused on dynamics between participants, teacher and (me)art

educator within the context: overall feeling, moods, engagement and disengagement,

facilitation, and so on. The observations were collected as field notes after every meeting.

3.4. Multidisciplinarity and engagement

Inspired by a/r/tography, my way of being with the produced material aimed to bring

rhizomatic relations to surface (Irwin et al., 2018). The rhizome is a post-structural concept

elaborated by Deleuze and Guattari (1987) to portray the complexity of reality (see chapter

four). As described by Irwin et al. (2018), a/r/tography can be considered a methodology that

“(…) provokes the creation of situations through inquiry, that responds to the evocative

nature of situation found within data, and that provides a reflective and reflexive stance to

situational inquiries”.

6 A research assistant was needed because in that very period I injured my arm and could not use it.

7 During the second part of the workshop, the learners were grouped in five interest-groups according to their

interest-topic. See chapter five.

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In this framework, I performed a cut within the phenomena-PhBL and brought along insights

from art education. These insights worked as my positioning within PhBL. Once the

workshop experience was over, I started to investigate the material in order to find the

strands that could (re)connect the workshop-experience to the phenomena-PhBL. These

strands are defined by Barad (2003) as entanglements, which figuratively emphasize the

ideas of complexity and interconnection within the Deleuzeguattarian rhizome.

Through coding, different entanglements emerged: agency, educator’s role, curiosity,

uncertainty, engagement, disengagement, discussion, multidisciplinarity, collaboration,

scaffold.

Afterward, connections between these concepts started to become evident. Therefore, I

decided to create two main umbrella-topics: engagement and multidisciplinarity.

Engagement and multidisciplinarity, as the gathering of the found entanglements, are used

throughout the study for framing theory and performing the material.

3.5. Ethical considerations

As I noticed during my practice over the years, working with young ones can be ethically

tricky. This study specifically deals with 6th graders in a public institution; as suggested by

Rose (2016), we are talking about a very vulnerable group of research participants. Not only

they are underaged, they might also be not fully aware of what a ‘research’ is and what

being a ‘research participant’ means. The parents were invited to talk to their children and

check on their will to participate or not, in order to respect their perspective. The letter of

consent (see appendix A) was written so that the parents and the children could understand

participation was not compulsory (Finnish National Board on Research Integrity TENK,

2019), and that children would have still had the chance to enjoy their time with their

classmates.

In order to ensure that the learners understood what was happening, in addition to the letter

of consent, the workshop included an introductory orientation part in which I presented

myself as a researcher and I explained what the interest of the study was. In order to make

the situation less intimidating, the researcher assistant and I opted for a compact camera for

video material and visual field notes collection - instead of a more professional camera, and

used mobile phones instead of audio recorders to collect the audio material.

As an educator, the strongest ethical stance I could not compromise on was that learners

that did not receive the permission from their parents could still participate in the activities.

This is why, upon agreement with the teacher and negotiation with the research assistant,

every part of the workshop and data collection was designed in order to engage them in the

activities while being careful not to get any visual or non-visual data. Even the feedback

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session was organized so that they could express their opinion regardless. Of course, their

contribution stays anonymous and was not included in data analysis.

The visual field notes taken during the workshop and used in this study were anonymized by

using skin/dark tones to blur participants’ faces. Rose (2016) explains that the discussion on

ethical anonymization has two main stands: pictures portraying participants should be

anonymized in order to protect their identities and privacy, however others support the idea

that anonymization can be dehumanising and disrespectful.

I am aware of the perception a reader could have while looking at the way the photos were

anonymized - to some they might appear rather disquieting. The choice of blurring faces

instead of superimposing emojis or other images, along with the choice of keeping the

photos as they were rather than translating them into digital drawings, was taken in an effort

to not distract from the surrounding visuals, and maintain as neutral an effect as possible.

Making the reader feel like ‘being with the (me)researcher’ was the aim. To impose my

interpretation of participants’ faces on their visual representations did not feel the most

ethical choice, since I did not ask them to pick for themselves. Asking participants to pick

their own ‘anonymization-filter’, however, could be a resolution for a future study.

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4. Theory: meeting phenomenon-based learning

Try to imagine. You are ready to build your new dream house, but you are no expert. You

would firstly need to contact an architect and a quantity surveyor. Secondly, the three of you

should work alongside a construction engineer, so that ideas would be brought to surface

and evaluations on the terrain, soil, measurements and materials would be made properly.

Then, you would need to add to the team a plumber, which will take care of the piping

system and water supplies. Let’s not forget the electrician, the smith and others.

Every single expert brings to the table a different point of view on the same matter: building a

house.

Lonka and Westling (2018) similarly utilize the example of ‘building a school’ to showcase a

situation that requires the combination of different expertises. Architects, pedagogues,

psychologists, engineers and others are working in synergy in order to tackle the ‘building a

school’ phenomena (Lonka & Westling, 2018, p.175).

The name chosen for this approach ‘phenomenon-based learning’ emphasizes the idea that,

in order to develop problem-solving skills, creativity and critical thinking, the learner should

be involved in exploring a phenomena in a multidisciplinary way. The phenomena should be

connected to real-life situations (e.g. in our starting case ‘building a house’) and the learners

should be allowed to work together by bringing their personal experience and knowledge to

the table. Community-based projects are highly encouraged, so that learners can learn to

work alongside a broader range of people, apply the skills acquired in the formal learning

environment to real life situations and ultimately learn to analyze and question what happens

within the community - their context (Lonka et al., 2018).

The discussion on PhBL requires, as a starting point, the framing of the concept of learning,

based on PhBL’s theoretical background. As stated by Lonka et al. (2018), PhBL’s concept

of learning is rooted in L. S. Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory. It needs to be noticed that,

however, PhBL’s concept of learning appears to be conceptualized in a less static and linear

way compared to Vygotksy’s theorization.

PhBL’s view is aligned to NCBE, which sees the learning as a dynamic process that “takes

place in interaction with other pupils, the teachers and other adults, and various communities

and learning environments” (Finnish National Board of Education, 2016, section 2.3, p. 27).

In order to better explore PhBL, therefore, this chapter firstly presents the concept of

learning according to PhBL’s sociocultural background. Secondly, it proceeds to understand

PhBL from a post-structural art educational perspective. Important concepts expressed by

Lonka et al. (2018), with a particular note on the concepts of engagement and

multidisciplinarity, are viewed by bringing insights from art and art education. The concepts

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emerged from the meeting between art education and PhBL are then used to navigate the

empirical material in chapter five.

4.1. The context, the learner, the teacher

According to the sociocultural theory, the upbringing of a child within a society is what forms

their way of learning, thinking, interacting and being. The tools that society uses to facilitate

and influence this process are cultural objects, social institutions and language. All of these

agents, through interaction, help human beings in their developmental processes and to

grow their cognitive potential (Schunk, 2012). Similarly, Lonka et al. (2018) state that “human

cognition is always embedded in a historical continuum of social community, culture, and its

tools” (p.39).

As specified by Schunk (2012), Vygotsky believed language was the most crucial among

these tools. Language plays a core role in our development, by helping us to form mental

functions: first we learn to use language to transmit our thinking externally, then we learn to

use it to self-regulate our actions and thoughts (Schunk, 2012). The language, as ‘inner

voice’, serves a self-regulatory function which allows the child to transform and internalize

the social environment (Schunk, 2012). This process of transformation and internalization is

what makes learning and development possible. Therefore, Vygotsky saw the learning

process as mediated by language and inseparable from the context in which it takes place -

both informal and formal.

The zone of proximal development is a concept that Vygotsky presented to clarify the limits

of this transformation and internalization process (Schunk, 2012). To explain this concept,

Lonka et al. (2018) associate it to the situation where a child is learning to ride a bicycle.

This situation challenges the learner with a task that cannot be performed without the help of

a more competent peer or adult. The interaction with the adult/peer, once internalized by the

learner, leads to a cognitive change and, therefore, to their development (Schunk, 2012).

Based on this concept, the role of the teacher is defined as a scaffold for the learner

(Schunk, 2012; Daniels, 2003).

Daniels (2003) review on authors engaged in social-constructivist learning theory highlights

the problems connected to the current use of the concept of ‘scaffolding’. The sociocultural

theory sees scaffolding as a collaboration between knowledges, where both teacher and

learner bring their own contribution (Schunk, 2012). However, Daniels (2003) argues that the

wide use of the term ‘scaffolding’ can undermine the depth of its meaning. ‘Too much’

scaffolding could potentially make the role of the learner uninfluential. Similarly, the concept

of ‘peer support’ should be carefully handled, because peer tutoring becomes efficient only

under specific circumstances and the pedagogical role of the educator could fade.

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Moreover, the reframing of the teacher’s and learner’s role might create a sense of precarity,

both in teacher’s and learner’s experience. Symeonidis & Schwarz (2016) also move a

critique to this idea in the context of PhBL, by warning on the risk of giving learners too much

responsibility. The conception of the self-regulated learner, if brought too far, might lead to

learners receiving and taking the blame for their educational failures. The teacher should be

able to evaluate the real potential of their learners and act accordingly, which could become

tricky in a situation where learners have the role of creators and the teacher is ‘only’ a

scaffold (Symeonidis & Schwarz, 2016). Lonka and Westling (2018) also recognize the

challenges brought by the reframing of learners’ and teachers' role within PhBL. First and

foremost the challenge towards inherited preconceptions, which are the legacy of a

structured way of thinking. Moreover, the challenge for learners and teachers to cope with a

new set of situations, such as ambiguity, friction, discomfort and uncertainty.

4.2. Perspective(s) from art education

Vygotsky’s thoughts on society and learning leave many open channels towards other

theories. Deleuze and Guattari’s concept of rhizome (1987), a core point in post-

structuralism, can help to delve into the concept of multidisciplinarity, and therefore build a

bridge with PhBL. Moreover, an additional ‘post-structural art educational filter’ can bring

new insights on PhBL’s conceptualization of engagement.

In order to start the conversation, it is important to first understand what Gilles Deleuze and

Félix Guattari (1987) rhizomatic philosophy is and its relation to art and art education.

4.2.1. The rhizome

Deleuze and Guattari see art as the “Life in the living or the Living in the lived”

(Sauvagnargues, 2013, p. 172 as cited in Jagodzinski, 2016). A Life is something that exists

transcendentally, “it is a plane of existence, of genesis, the clamour of becoming”

(Jagodzinski, 2016, p.3). Art is therefore considered to be within the becoming of everything,

but still hidden under the stereotypes it is subjected to. The stereotypes regarding art see it

as limited to certain disciplines and see artistic practice as limited to certain topics, towards

which it usually behaves critically. Art has also common utilitarian aspects, such as

therapeutic, that “put art and design in the service economy of ‘doing’ that is quite distinct

from what art can ‘do’” (Jagodzinski, 2016, p.4). The possibilities of Art transcend these

boxing. As a Life, it exists rhizomatically within reality and the artist’s role is to be within it

and make it emerge in its natural truth – make it visible. As A Life, Art and art education shall

be committed towards the recognition of the One in multiplicity and the multiplicity in the One

(Jagodzinski, 2016); in this frame, the art educator joins the artist in this endeavor and both

share the responsibility of what turns visible and how.

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The rhizomatic philosophy is the philosophy of the “in the middle, between things, interbeing,

intermezzo” (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987, p.25) - the philosophy of multiplicity. In nature, a

rhizomatic example would be fungi. Fungi expands in every direction in a non hierarchical

and multi-layered way, and every encounter expands the fungi even more. The intersecting

points allow nutrients and other information to navigate through the body of the fungi. There

is no ‘entry’ or ‘exit’. Rather, the fungi exists as a whole, as One, and becomes with the

context it is situated in.

Deleuze and Guattari (1987) identify six key concepts, which can be helpful to summarize

the idea of the rhizome: connection and heterogeneity, multiplicity, the principle of

asignifying rupture, the principle of cartography and decalcomania (pp. 7-13). According to

these principle, every point of the rhizome is potentially connected to any other point. The

number of connections increases with the expansion of the rhizome, which automatically

changes its nature according to the connections that were made. The rhizome has,

therefore, multiple definitions, which are ever-changing and co-present. The rhizome is One

in multiplicity and vice versa.

The rhizome can be ruptured/interrupted in a certain point. Like a scar becomes part of the

body on which it formed, a rupture into the rhizome becomes a temporary cut which then

becomes part of the rhizome’s multiplicity. “All of tree logic is a logic of tracing and

reproduction” (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987, p.12). The root-tree logic sees things linearly, as

traces that follow a scheme that can be then reproduced. The rhizome, instead, sees things

as a map. The map visualizes the openness of the rhizome, which highlights the connections

between fields and the different dimensions it includes. A map has multiple entries and no

formal exits. However, the rhizome does not exclude the concept of tracing. Once a cut is

made, tracing can be used to trace back to the rhizome/context by finding its streams.

PhBL focuses on the idea of phenomena. As suggested by Silander (2015), the phenomena

can be an authentic object of observation or a framework/motivation for things that need to

be learned. The concept of ‘phenomena’ within PhBL can be seen as a shifting entity, rather

than a stiff identity. It can be framed differently in order to serve the pedagogical purposes of

the case. “Boundaries do not sit still”, states Barad (2003, p. 817).

However, a phenomena cannot be entirely grasped. Symeonidis & Schwarz (2016) explain

the concept by giving the example of ‘weather’ as a phenomena. The perception of the

phenomena ‘weather’ is constructed on the manifestation of the intra-action between

different tangible (e.g. rain) and non-tangible (e.g. global warming) elements (Barad, 2003).

Though it remains a perception - a manifestation. A phenomena cannot be grasped in its

totality due to its complexity.

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Based on these premises, the phenomena discussed in PhBL can be paralleled to the

Deleuzeguattarian rhizome. Therefore, the way to tackle a rhizome in an educational

environment is to make cuts within it, which provide positionings to trace the streams back to

the phenomena-map.

4.2.2. Multidisciplinarity

What is the difference between multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary? Multidisciplinary

means people from different disciplines working together, each drawing upon their

disciplinary knowledge. Interdisciplinary means integrating knowledge and methods from

different disciplines, using a real synthesis of approaches (Jensenius, 2020). Both the terms

point towards the merging of knowledges, however a multidisciplinary process emphasizes

networking.

A PhBL project uses multidisciplinarity in order for the learners and the teachers to network

towards the study of a phenomena. PhBL projects can help the learners to build a more

rhizomatic view on things, exploring the bridges and layers of disciplines - described by

Lonka et al. (2019) as a holistic view. 8 As argued by Symeonidis and Schwarz (2016), an

interdisciplinary or multidisciplinary approach can help grasping the complexity of a

phenomena. However we should be aware we cannot fully embrace it, just like we cannot

see the end of a rhizome. Every connection made by the learners, every subject taken into

account, will bring to other territories, which will bring to even further territories and so on.

PhBL’s take on multidisciplinarity fits the objectives expressed by NCBE, which require the

integration of multidisciplinary learning modules: every school, based on its own curriculum,

shall provide at least one multidisciplinary learning module per school year. The module

shall be long enough to allow the learners time for exploring the theme, and as many

subjects as possible shall be involved in exploring the topic (Finnish National Board of

Education, 2016, section 4.4).

According to Lonka et al. (2018), the multidisciplinary and networked exploration of a

phenomena develops the creative thinking in the learners. Creative thinking is what artists

like Bruno Munari have been trying to enhance in themselves and others - through art

8 PhBL’s approach to multidisciplinarity can be easily associated to STEAM education. STEAM stands for

Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics. STEAM as a way of thinking education, opposes to STEM education, which doesn’t include arts amongst the most relevant subjects. Both STEM and STEAM education call for collaboration between disciplines. Whereas STEM education recognizes creativity development as a way towards innovation – not necessarily art-based, STEAM education highlights the importance of art education to train creativity and facilitate the innovation process (Liao, 2016). Lonka et al. (2018) make the comparison themselves and argue that STEAM education is limiting, because its concept of ‘bridging’ is less organic and subject are kept as separated identities rather than part of a whole – like PhBL does.

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education. Munari (1977) conceptualizes creativity as a combination of fantasy, imagination

and invention. A skill in-between entangled to the others that enables us to understand every

aspect of a problem - from the functional to the psychological one. On this basis, a bridge

can be built between the creative thinking and the rhizome, as creative thinking stimulates

the connection-making process necessary to grasp the rhizome - ergo, creative thinking

facilitates the rhizomatic thinking.

Recent researches in neurosciences at Helsinki University (Rodoniov, 2019; Huotilainen,

2019) have been exploring creativity and support the claim that creativity is a trainable skill.

Saavedra, Opfer, Perkins, Singmaster, & Stewart (2012) follow by explaining that creativity is

a characteristic that can be improved and requires structure. The advantage of artists and

other art practitioners, whether they received a formal or informal education in the field, is

that an artistic training in based on a different way of learning (Rodoniov, 2019).

Artistic learning processes make use of the creative thinking, which we previously

associated to the rhizomatic thinking. Munari (1977; 1981) believed training the creative

thinking was a process of exploration based on a trial-and-error model, scaffolded by the

parents and the educator – which resembles the process of transformation and

internalization recognized by the sociocultural theory (Schunk, 2012). The more information

a child is exposed to, the more ground for exploration there is (Munari, 1977).

Lonka et al. (2018) adhere to the idea of training the creative thinking. PhBL response was

to follow an inquiry-based pedagogical approach which exhorts the learners to ask questions

and seek for answers. Similarly, Munari (1981) highlighted the importance of questioning

during the process of exploration, in order for the trial-and-error model to become effective.

4.2.3. Engagement

NCBE articulates a series of transversal skills which need to be worked on in education.

These skills, called competences, are divided as so: 1) thinking and learning to learn 2)

cultural competence, interaction and self-expression 3) taking care of oneself and managing

daily life 4) multiliteracy 5) ICT competence 6) working life competence and

entrepreneurship 7) participation, involvement and building a sustainable future (Finnish

National Board of Education, 2016, section 3.3.).9 Together, they aim for lifelong learning.

Based on a post-structural view, the lifelong learning, or ‘real learning’, happens when the

learners’ needs are taken into account and they are supported in the process of making-

connections towards a rhizomatic view on reality (Atkinson, 2017). Munari (1977, 1981)

explains how connections are created by experiencing and testing. He also argues that the

9 These transversal skills are related to the list of 21

st century skills presented by Binkley et al. (2012).

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educator’s role as scaffold is to expose the learners to the tools and the ‘raw material’: the

information. St. Pierre (2004) similarly argues that the role of the educator is to engage the

learning of the learners by bringing their knowledge to the table, rather than passively infuse

it. The learner is physically and mentally engaged to combine information and explore what

emerges.

The environment in which this exploration takes place is essential for the learning process. It

needs to create a safe space in which the learners feel it is ok to fail. In Munari’s educational

practice, the safe space was provided by the art workshop environment. Richardson (2017)

also considers art (and art-making situations) a safe platform for observing reality and being

with uncertainty. Lonka et al. (2018) moreover highlight that a learning environment should

be designed according to the users, in order not to outsmart them but rather make them feel

comfortable and supported.

Based on the sociocultural framework, phenomenon-based teaching recognizes the learner

as an active knowledge builder, and knowledge as the product of the encounter between

knowledges and contexts. Vygotsky identified that learning, as the product of this interaction,

requires the learner to be actively engaged in order for it to happen (Schunk, 2012).

However, a well scaffolded and safe learning environment does not necessarily lead to an

actually engaged learner.

“The problem at school is that students need to learn lots of things that they know nothing

about and that do not appear interesting at first sight” (Lonka et al., 2018, p.45). Interest is

considered more than an emotion. It is a status which is strictly connected to emotions. The

cognitive role of emotions within learning, according to Lonka et al. (2018), is to orient our

attention and strengthen our memory. When a learner feels curious, inspired, surprised or

challenged, they will feel their interest growing towards the topic.

While the interest grows, the motivation grows too. Lonka et al. (2018) explain that

motivation could be either intrinsic or extrinsic. Extrinsic motivation is commonly goal

oriented, meaning the learner feels motivated to perform the task because they want to

achieve a result (e.g. succeeding in an exam). However, if the learner can establish a

deeper connection with the task, the extrinsic motivation can turn into an intrinsic one.

Intrinsic motivation comes from within, and the learner feels directly connected to the task

and doesn’t feel obliged or in need to please others. Intrinsic motivation is affected by what

Lonka et al. (2018) call the four C’s : a meaningful context, sense of competence, sense of

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control and curiosity.10 Contextualising a task helps the learner understand the

meaningfulness of it. The sense of competence is increased by pondering the level of the

task according to the level of the learner and providing adequate support. The sense of

control is achieved by making the learner feel they are capable and responsible of their own

learning, schedule-wise and interest-wise. Curiosity is what keeps the gears oiled and the

machine of engagement moving.

4.3. A note on methodology: in-between with a/r/tography

According to the previously presented framework, the artist and art educator share the

endeavor of recognizing the One in the multiplicity (Jagodzinski, 2016). An extra layer is

added to the discourse by a/r/tography, where the artist and art educator coexist (Springgay,

Irwin, Leggo & Gouzouasis, 2008). As a post-structuralist methodology, a/r/tography puts the

dichotomy of identity into discussion and similarly supports the idea that there is no identity

as such, but rather the whole lies in multiplicity (Irwin & Springgay, 2008). This coexistence

can be testified by the figure of the a/r/tographer, who believes practice and life are One and

develop between different realms. This concept, of course, applies not only to the

a/r/tographer, but also to the people interacting with them. The a/r/tographer becomes

according to these interactions, and the influence is mutual (Irwin & Springgay, 2008).

The rhizome articulates in what Deleuze and Guattari (1987) defined as foldings. Like an

origami, the more foldings there are, the more complex the body of the origami becomes.

Yet, despite its complexity, it is still One: an origami. As Jagodzinski (2016) highlights, the

term ‘folding’ is often encountered in post-structuralist theory reframed as ‘entanglement’

(Barad, 2003). Moreover, thanks to Barad (2003.), the Deleuzeguattarian concept of ‘cut’

becomes agential. The a/r/tographer is an agent that purposely and consciously cuts the

rhizome, in order to position themselves within a phenomena and work with the flow of the

unfolding situations. The phenomena is treated as a discourse that articulates through intra-

actions. As Barad (2003) proposes “discursive practices, are fully implicate in the dynamics

of intra-activity through which phenomena come to matter” (p.822).

The ‘a/r/tographical journey’ is a path many researchers undertake. A/r/tography as a

methodology allows the researcher (the a/r/tographer) to be with the intra-action and reflect

on the entanglements that emerge, being aware that these entanglements are only a fraction

of the phenomena they are positioned in.

10

In the context of intrinsic motivation, what Lonka et al. (2018) call the four C’s are not actually related to the homonymous four C’s from 21

st century skills. 21

st century skills’ four C’s include: creativity, critical thinking,

collaboration and communication, and they are part of a larger discourse (Binkley et al., 2012). Lonka et al. (2018), however, with PhBL aim to address all of the 21

st century skills in their complexity, and so does NCBE.

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4.4. Contributions to research on PhBL

Thus far, researchers have been exploring the implementation of PhBL within different

realms. PhBL studies have been carried out internationally in diverse setting, in order to

investigate the implications of this approach in teaching and learning, and its possible

developments.

Wakil et al. (2019) experimented the effects of this approach on primary school learners in

Sulaimani city, Iraq. ICT was the subject towards which bridges were built, with the aim to

help the learners improve their ICT skills by applying them to other realms. The study

compares groups of learners that were taught ICT in a PhBL setting to groups of learners

that were tackling the same subjects but in a classical teaching method. The results show

that PhBL can better improve learners’ ICT skills and make them last longer, compared to

the situation where ICT was kept as a separated subject.

Yuliati and Parno (2018) explored problem-solving skills within a PhBL setting with high

school learners in Indonesia. The study investigates the impact of a PhBL approach to the

teaching of physics, which is mainly dominated by mathematical problem-solving. The study

highlights how mathematical procedures are still extremely embedded in the problem-solving

processes within the learning of physics, despite the integration of a phenomenon-based

project. The researchers eventually suggest a PhBL approach could be impactful in the case

teachers would consider physics as a phenomena to be taught holistically, rather than from a

mathematical perspective only - in order for learners’ problem-solving skills to be enhanced.

Paula Karlsson (2017) conducted a study where PhBL and the Finnish National Core

Curriculum are analyzed by bringing teachers’ perspective to discussion. The author

identifies different problem-areas, which emerged from the interviews they held with six

teachers from upper-comprehensive education in Finland. The problems concern co-

designing processes and multidisciplinarity, and are the following: getting PhBL started

within the already existing setting, finding a sustainable theme to be tackled, concerns about

the heavy workload (for both teachers and learners) and feeling of a forced changed on the

role of the teacher (Karlsson, 2017, p.105). According to these challenges, Karlsson (2017)

pinpoints different areas opened for development, such as: researching for a better co-

design atmosphere, a better engagement of the students and a more impacting transversal

learning (p.106).

Mira Kallio-Tavin (2016) ponders on the main concepts of PhBL and the challenges that this

multidisciplinary, collaborative, learner-led and contextual approach to teaching and learning

brings to art education. How to draw bridges between art education and other subjects?

Kallio-Tavin (2016) puts the emphasis on how contemporary art and art education should

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walk hand in hand, in order to project art education into the probable, collaborative

educational future depicted by PhBL. That meaning, art education should similarly address

important societal topics and become a platform for learners to explore and question them.

This study contributes to the research on PhBL by bringing insights from art education, and

discussing challenges and positive aspects of this encounter. I found no research strictly

connected to the perspective presented by this study. The presented previous research is

what I found the most relevant, being my search narrowed by the language barrier. I am

aware of the existence of equally pertinent research in other languages, such as Finnish and

Swedish. Finland being the ‘motherland’ of PhBL, and Sweden with the ongoing discourse

on the Reggio Emilia pedagogical approach.

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5. Navigation and interpretation of the events through theory

A/r/tographically, a positioning within the phenomena-PhBL has been made by initiating this

study (Irwin et al., 2018). This chapter proceeds to navigate the events of the workshop and

trace back to the discourse on PhBL previously presented in chapter four. In order to do so,

the streams of engagement and multidisciplinarity will be followed.

The navigation is performed by creating interruptions in the storytelling, which aim to bring

the reader back and forth between the events and the discourse. Each interruption is either

connected to engagement or multidisciplinarity, however it presents different concepts within

the umbrella-topics. Some of the concept are: emotions, roles, agency, curiosity, creative

thinking, rhizome and rhizomatic thinking, discomfort. The chapter lastly brings to the table

teacher’s and learners’ experience, which will be influential for the discussion.

5.1. Emotions – creative thinking - agency

It was February 25th 2020. The assistant and I arrived at the partner-school in the morning.

We walked upstairs and we were received by two learners and the teacher.

The first meeting was scheduled from 10 till 11:30 a.m. and included orientation and first part

of the workshop. Before starting, the teacher, the assistant and I agreed on how to group up

the participants and how the assistant should move within the space, in order to stick to

parents’ wishes on permission. Once all set, the learners came back from their break and

the teacher discretely grouped the ones with no permission so that we could start.

Orientation took part in the first half an hour and was meant to break the ice and get to know

each other. I started by presenting myself as a person, artist and art educator. I was told the

participants were curious about my nationality, therefore I got them giggling by saying some

sentences in Italian.

I consequently introduced myself as a researcher and as a student. The goal was to make

the participants aware of what will be done and why. Moreover, I unraveled the program for

the day and anticipated the content of the next meetings.

After this, I wanted to get to know participants’ names and characteristics in order to set the

mood and connect with them. I presented a small exercise to get to know each other that I

have been myself experimenting in the past: going in a ‘s’ shape, each participant should

state their own name, the neighbouring participant’s name and one adjective to describe

them.

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ENGAGEMENT

Picture 8. Getting to know each other during the orientation part.

Establishing valuable emotional connection with the learners is extremely important. As

explained by Lonka et al. (2018), emotions play a relevant role in motivation and learning,

because positive emotions stimulate engagement. Lonka et al. (2018) divide them in: topic

emotions, social emotions, achievement emotions and epistemic emotions.

During the orientation part, due to the novelty of the situation for all the participants, the main

feelings emerged from observation were uncertainty and slight uneasiness, followed later on

by curiosity. The (me)art educator tried to make everyone at ease and created a more

relaxed atmosphere by laughing, making jokes and asking casual questions to the learners

and the teacher. Parallel to jokes and laughter, the way the (me)art educator physically

moved in the classroom also influenced the way the mood changed for all the participants.

Whereas stationing corresponded to a feeling of uneasiness, dynamism – walking through

the desks and getting closer to the learners – corresponded to a release of the sense on

uneasiness and arose curiosity.

Lonka et al. (2018) divide emotions in different themes: topic emotions, social emotions,

achievement emotions and epistemic emotions. The way the (me)art educator chose to

relate to the learners was meant to trigger positive social emotions - which are situational

and relational. If the environment fosters positive social emotions, they can transform into

achievement emotions, topic emotions or epistemic emotions – which, according to Lonka et

al. (2018) play a major role in engagement and learning. Moreover, positive social emotions

help to create bonds between people.

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Back to school

Once the ice was broken, it was time to move on to the first part of our workshop.

The first part of the workshop aimed to bring participants’ interests to surface. In order to do

so, participants were given a bunch of sticky notes and were asked to write down as many

interests as they had - things they felt passionate about. Each participant wrote individually.

There was no limit on how many interests one could write, however it was required that each

sticky note had only one interest on it. A huge variety of interests emerged: sushi, pizza,

football, basketball, make-up, Netflix, drawing, painting, camping, learning about outer

space, playing Minecraft and so on.

Following, participants were asked to attach their sticky notes to the door, in order to collect

all the interests together and move forward to the second stage of the exercise: grouping

and selection.

Grouping the interests was no easy task, some difficulties were encountered in handling this

amount of material. However, the goal of creating a platform for discussion was achieved:

participants were vividly negotiating between each other on how to group the interests.

Umbrella-topics organically emerged on the whiteboard during the process. The whole

situation was supported by me, by directly participating in the sorting and incentivising

discussion.

MULTIDISCIPLINARITY

Picture 9. Negotiating and discussing about grouping during the sticky notes exercise

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Picture 10. Negotiating and discussing the position of the sticky notes on the whiteboard.

In his educational practice, Munari (1977) exposed the learners to tools from different

disciplines and invited them to use these tools to reflect on the content of the inquiry.

Munari’s multidisciplinary approach related to the idea that an inquiry should be carried out

by including different points of view, in order to stimulate creativity.

The sticky notes exercise used in this section of the workshop was similarly adapted from

design practice. Visualizing thoughts on sticky notes suddenly turns them from abstract to

tangible – and movable. This technique therefore enhances the mobility of thoughts through

visuals.

By ‘mobile’ thought I aim to describe a thought that can ideally jump from point A to point B.

In this case’s workshop, from the door’s surface to the whiteboard. Inside our brain, from a

concept to another. A mobile thought works for/with the creative thinking – or rhizomatic

thinking (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987). As argued by Munari (1977), the creative thinking is

stimulated when the learner is helped to move from an experience to another, from a thought

to another. In this workshop, moving the sticky notes from one surface to the other during

the process of sorting and grouping gave the learners the possibility to train their creative

thinking, by creating connections between their own and others’ interests.

In addition, as suggested by PhBL (Lonka et al., 2018), during this part of the workshop the

learners elaborated their thinking and performed the sorting in a collaborative way, while

the (me)artist/(me)art educator worked as scaffold by helping with the task and sharing

personal ideas and insights.

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Back to school

The result of the sorting process was a good amount of umbrella-topics: food, sport, art,

movie, nature, animals, science and games. 11 Next, we proceeded to select which interests

to keep and which to give up. Participants were asked to select only one of their interests by

leaving it on the whiteboard. Every other interest they wrote, should have been taken away

from the surface. This request functioned as a way of narrowing down the material and

getting to know what was really important for them.

After each participant selected their interest of choice, some of the umbrella-topics no longer

included sticky notes – and were therefore discarded. The umbrella-topics we were left with,

were: art, science, food, sport, movie and games. Together with the participants we decided

to combine some of them thematically, in order to have a narrower number of umbrella-

topics to work with. Eventually, the finalized umbrella-topics were: art (art+movie), science,

food and sport (sport+games).

ENGAGEMENT

Picture 11. Selecting the sticky notes that should stay on the whiteboard.

The process of selection enhances learners’ capability of making decisions, and makes them

understand that these decisions influence and are influenced by the context. Decision-

making – individual and collaborative - positions the learners as active agents within the

context. This positioning creates meaningfulness, which leads to engagement (Lonka et al.,

2018).

11

Finnish names of the umbrella-topics: ruoka (food), urheilu (sport), taide (art), elokuva (movie), luonto (nature), eläimet (animals), tiede (science), pelit (games).

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PhBL (Lonka et al., 2018) pinpoints that peer confrontation is extremely important. The

partner-teacher highlights that learners in 6th grade are slowly becoming independent but

they are by no means ready, therefore friends (peers) become their new and most important

social point of reference (personal communication, January 21, 2020). The process of

selection is therefore influenced by the peers. Moreover, this process hosts emotions of

discomfort and friction, due to negotiation. Friction and discomfort are not usually classified

as positive emotions, however they still play a role in engagement (Lonka et al., 2018).

Therefore, the (me)educator aimed to create a safe-space, in order for the learners to be

able to cope with this emotions and keep the learning process going (Munari, 1977; Restelli

& Sperati, 2008).

Back to school

Now that interests were brought to surface and umbrella-topics emerged, participants were

given a short presentation regarding the second part of the workshop, followed by a small

task to be completed at home.

The presentation focused on energy - the phenomena the teacher and I agreed upon

beforehand. The idea of the presentation was to give a glimpse to the participants on what

the phenomena-energy is - or could be, by including different perspectives. In the end of the

presentation participants were asked to remember their own interest and the umbrella-topic

where it belonged. They were given a homework where the umbrella-topic defined their field

of investigation on the phenomena-energy. They were asked to individually search and write

down their observations on the phenomena-energy associated with their own umbrella-topic.

These observations would have been gathered during the following meeting in order to

proceed with the workshop.

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MULTIDISCIPLINARITY and ENGAGEMENT

Picture 12. Learners were asked to make a small research at home about their interest combined with the

topic energy.

According to the feedback questionnaire (see appendix B), most of the learners knew little to

nothing about energy before the task was given. Therefore, the task aimed to make the

learners become acquainted with the phenomena, and consequently highlight the rhizomatic

connections towards it. This task, in the light of a/r/tography (Irwin & Springgay, 2008), can

be interpreted as the learners were invited to experience what the (me)researcher was

doing: to perform cuts and trace back to the phenomena. The cut-point, identified in this

case as the umbrella-topic, positioned each learner slightly differently within the phenomena

and worked as a framework for investigation.

The concept of performing cuts puts the learners in the position of being active agents

(Barad, 2003) within the study of the phenomena. In the context of the task, the role of the

(me)art educator/(me)artist was to make the rhizome visible (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987) by

initiating the process of discovery.

Back to school

After the task was given, the morning eventually came to an end. This first part of the

workshop was quite filled with content and the participants looked tired and ready to go for

lunch - and so were we! We greeted each other and the assistant and I left the class

accompanied by the teacher. It was time to prepare for day two.

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5.2. Roles – performativity - collaboration

After a week, on March 3rd, my assistant and I adventured again into the school premises.

The meeting took place from 9 to 11.30 a.m. In the beginning the assistant and I shortly

briefed up with the teacher about the day’s program. Next, the day started from where we

left off the time before, by discussing about the phenomena-energy and collecting

participants’ observations from the task they were asked to complete at home.

However, a third of the participants did not actually do the task. The teacher felt compelled to

exhort the participants on their duties as research participants and learners. Moreover, the

teacher asked me for permission to temporarily divide the class in two groups. The ones who

did not do their task would have followed the teacher into another room, in order to catch up

on what they should have done at home. The rest of the class would have stayed with me

and proceeded with the regular program. In the end, they would have reunited before the

starting of recess at 9:45 a.m.

Considering I had foreseen a situation like this, I gave my consent. We decided to rearrange

the participants like so: since only one participant from the food-group was present, the

participants who did not do the task would have joined them. Since the total amount of

members in the new food-group became too high, we decided to split them in two: food1-

group and food2-group.

We both agreed on the fact that this change would have become beneficial for the study, as

an interesting confrontation could have emerged from this situation.

ENGAGEMENT

“The day didn’t go as planned because about one third of the learners didn’t do their

homework (9 in total). The teacher took responsibility for it and decided to make them

“do extra work” to responsibilize them (on 6th grade, they said, we work on the idea of

taking responsibility of one’s actions. Was it work skills?). (…) the teacher stepped

right in and made decision themselves.” (field notes, March 3, 2020)

Phenomenon-based projects rely on the engagement of the learners (being active agents)

and the presence of the teacher as a scaffold (Lonka et al., 2018). The events occurred

during the first part of the day highlight some challenges that could emerge in a PhBL

setting. As pointed out by Daniels (2003) and Symeonidis & Schwarz (2016), the concepts of

self-regulated learner and scaffolding could be problematic, since it could make the learners

feel they have too much responsibility (without properly mastering the self-regulation

abilities) and could undermine the pedagogical role of the teacher/educator. As observed in

the workshop events, some learners did not carry out their home task. The partner-teacher,

which by that point shared the space with the (me)art educator, took over and brought the

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learners’ focus to the curricular objectives - enhancing the thinking and learning to learn,

self-care and managing everyday life, working life and entrepreneurship skills (Finnish

National Board of Education, 2016).

“I feel that it is part of my work as an educator to keep the rules equal. If we do

homework, we do it. And it applies to everyone. I don’t feel that when we have

projects ‘it’s kind of an exceptional thing that I don’t have to do my homework

because here is someone else’ ” (teacher, personal communication, March 16,

2020).

Back to school

Once the food-groups left, the rest of us proceeded with the program. We firstly collected

participants’ observations on the whiteboard, under the title “energy is…” (Fin: energia on…).

Secondly, we checked the vocabulary definition of ‘energy’ and discussed about it, drawing

parallels with their observations.

In order to investigate even more and contextualize the phenomena, I redirected

participants’ attention towards the classroom environment with a small exercise. They were

given sticky notes and were asked to attach them to wherever they thought ‘energy’ was

present. I participated as well, and during the exercise the learners were interacting with

both me and my assistant. By the end of the process us and the whole classroom were

covered in colourful sticky notes.

MULTIDISCIPLINARITY

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Picture 13, 14. Participants searching for energy sources in the classroom environment.

PhBL advocates for applying the skills and knowledge developed in the formal learning

context to a real, every-day-life context (Lonka et al., 2018). During this exercise the learners

explored their surroundings by applying the knowledge they elaborated during research and

discussion. This process of contextualization shifted their perception of the formal learning

environment, by making it part of the phenomena they were investigating. Learners used

sticky notes to make visible the rhizomatic connections they discovered. It is also important

to highlight, that learners did this by physically navigating the space. Exploring the

environment by navigating it, allows the learners to experience the space - and therefore

perform it. As Madison (2011) and Irwin et al. (2008) explain, experience is the key to

performance and facilitates the learning. Drawing a parallel with PhBL, the holisticity that

Lonka & Westling (2018) cite does not only include the multidisciplinary view on the

phenomena, but also experiencing the community and performing within it.

Back to school

Participants went then off to recess. Once they were back, we divided them into the pre-

established interest-groups: art-group (4 participants), science-group (2 participants), sport-

group ( 6 participants), food1-group (4 participants) and food2-group (4 participants).

The workshop challenged the participants with the creation of a mood board. Each mood

board would have become the expression of each interest-group’s communal observations –

therefore, expression of their point of view on the phenomena-energy. Participants were

invited to share their observations with their group members, in order to include everyone’s

contribution and negotiate on how to express it.

To start, I gave a presentation about mood boards, in order to firstly introduce this design

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tool and secondly suggest the possible artistic-twists it could take. Their final work could

have been a more traditional visual assemblage (e.g. collage) an installation or a

performance. The idea was to offer them different possibilities for exploration from an artistic

point of view - and see what happens.

MULTIDISCIPLINARITY

As argued by Richardson (2017), art practice produces a unique type of thinking. This

thinking allows the artist to be within the rhizome and perceive its strands (Deleuze &

Guattari, 1987). Richardson (2017) sees the artistic thinking as a method of inquiry beneficial

for learning processes. Due to its nature, the artistic thinking can be conceptually juxtaposed

with both the concepts of creative thinking (Munari, 1977) and rhizomatic thinking (Deleuze

& Guattari, 1987). As described, the learners were challenged with the creation of a mood

board as a tool for visualization. Mood boards are tools belonging to design practice, largely

utilized for thought-visualization. The (me)artist, however, adapted this design tool to the

arts-based workshop, by taking the concept and twisting it to engage the learners in an

artistic response. This appropriation was based on the idea that, as exemplified by Munari’s

work, design processes and tools foster creative thinking, such as art practice and tools

(Munari, 1977, 1981).

The (me)art educator contributes to the facilitation of this way of thinking, by suggesting the

learners some investigation tools from their artistic practice. The idea is, therefore, not to

passively pass on knowledge. Instead, to shoot out “concepts like arrows that are picked up

by chance and used in strange new ways” (St. Pierre, 2004, p.293). The same idea is

shared by Lonka et al. (2018) in their theorization of the role of the teacher. The beauty of

putting your personal knowledge to the table in a PhBL context lies in uncertainty. How

would learners react? Would they make my experience theirs? If so, how?

Back to school

Right after the task was presented, participants started to discuss and plan what kind of final

work to create. They had different materials available to use, such as painting, coloured

pencils, ink, papers, tape, glue. They were free to choose their own materials too, or the

ones already present in the classroom.

The process lasted for about 50 minutes. Artistic processes varied according to varying of

the chosen tool. The science-group decided to combine writing and drawing, and so did the

food2-group. The art-group planned for a three-dimensional collage, while the food1-group

went for a completely three-dimensional paper object. The sport-group opted for a

performative representation of their observations and went to rehearse in the corridor.

Food1-group and food2-group conducted their small research during that day – since they

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haven’t done it at home, therefore their background was less strong than others’. However,

both groups decided to use their phones or ask the teacher to help them search for more

information, in order to deepen the research they did earlier and better support their content.

The teacher and I were present all the time to give support if needed. My intervention

included suggestions on how to integrate different materials or concepts, by helping the

participants to find alternative solutions. Overall, the participants acted quite independently

and negotiated their ways through the project(s).

MULTIDISCIPLINARITY and ENGAGEMENT

Picture 15. Food1-group working on their three-dimensional, paper-based object.

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Picture 16. Teacher helping the food1-group finding extra information for their project.

NCBE’s objectives call for the development of learners’ socio-cultural competences,

interaction and self-expression skills (Finnish National Board of Education, 2016). Within a

phenomenon-based project, group work and negotiation pose different challenges. As

explained by Lonka et al. (2018), this setting stimulates learners’ agency and develops their

competences in relation to other peers. Not only do they need to stand for their own ideas,

but also to understand how to make their ideas work alongside others and find a common

ground. “Arting as event becomes a site and a moment when change happens, a

modulation takes place from one way of being to another” (Jagodzinski, 2016, p.6). The art-

based workshop, as an arting event, creates the platform for creative exploration of the self

and the context (Richardson, 2017) and gives the learners the possibility to express

themselves and be with others’ self-expressions – the possibility to perform.

Lonka and Westling (2018) emphasize the idea that learners should be exposed to

professionals from different fields, in order to collaborate with them and integrate new real-

life perspectives to the study of a phenomena. In the context of the study, by encountering

the (me)artist/(me)art educator, the learners had the chance to exchange insights with a

professional in the art and culture field - which, based on my experience, often occupies a

mis-perceived role in society. This exchange exposed the learners to a new perspective on

how to tackle a phenomena. According to the final questionnaire (see appendix B), learners

in fact perceived the (me)artist/(me)art educator’s way of doing things like something new in

their school experience.

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Back to school

In the end of the morning every group had the chance to present their work to others.

Every interest-group approached presentation differently. Some participants were more

confident, others felt shyer. However, everyone brought their contribution and we shortly

commented on each final work.

After the presentations, the workshop was officially over.

I thanked everyone for their participation and asked whether there were questions,

comments or critics. No critics were moved, and the most common comment was that

participants felt the experience was interesting and curious.

It eventually was time for me and the assistant to leave. We greeted the participants and the

teacher, then left the school.

5.3. How the workshop experience was perceived

This section aims to suggest how this workshop experience was perceived by the learners

and the teacher, according to teacher’s oral feedback and learners’ written feedback-

questionnaires.

Learners’ feedback was collected two days after the end of the workshop, on March 5th.

Every learner was involved, even the ones who did not received the research permission

from their parents (see chapter three). The answers were mostly colour coded (green meant

‘agree’ / ‘yes’, red meant ‘disagree’ / ‘no’ and yellow meant ‘neither agree or disagree’ /

‘maybe’), however three questions out of ten encouraged the learners to leave comments

(see appendix B). Learners were divided in groups, which corresponded to the previously

used interest-groups. Each interest-group had the same questions, apart from the food1-

group and food2-group questionnaires that differed by one question (see question nr.6,

appendix B). This difference was made to better understand how the situation changed

according to whether the participants could choose their topic of interest or not.

Teacher’s feedback was collected by using a semi-structured interview. The communication

took place on March 16th electronically and lasted around thirty minutes.

During the call the teacher and I touched upon different topics regarding their experience

within the workshop. The questions worked as a guideline for discussion.

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The learners

Picture 17. Using coloured stickers to complete the questionnaires during the feedback session.

In the matter of multidisciplinarity, learners felt they experienced a new way of approaching

art education compared to the one they are used to in their daily-life at school. Some

believed this new way of doing was fun and interesting, and consider the normal visual art

classes boring. Some thought art education was only about drawing and painting something.

The overall feeling about art education prior to this experience, though, was positive. The

perception of art education changed a bit for most of the learners, after our experience

together. A relevant comment made by one of the interest-groups states that “art can really

be taught in many different, more interesting ways than in our school” (see question nr.10,

appendix B). This comment suggests how some learners actually perceived the possibilities

of art education within a multidisciplinary context. One learner even stated that they

understood what energy was.

Learners, however, expressed quite different - but evenly distributed - opinions regarding the

efficiency of this experience. 1/3 of the learners believed this experience helped them

understand the phenomena-energy, 1/3 felt it perhaps did help, and the last 1/3 felt it

actually did not.

Regarding engagement, the majority of the learners stated they never got asked about their

interests in order to create content for school. The learners who explored the phenomena-

energy through their interest believed this made the process feel way more interesting, while

the ones who did not pick their interest-group (the learners who did not do the homework)

perceived the experience differently. Some felt it was not good because they could not

decide, some felt the experience was still interesting despite not having been able to tackle it

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from their interest of choice. However, once asked whether they would like school to create

more content based on their interests, the opinions divided quite evenly between yes and

perhaps.

The teacher

The teacher and I discussed learners’ engagement within the workshop. I was interested in

understanding their point of view as their class teacher – and therefore, as a person that

knows them better than I do. The teacher said they felt learners were well engaged and

worked pretty nicely together, even though they were not putting all their energies in what we

were doing - which became visible once a third of the learners did not do their homework.

(me)researcher: “Do you believe the guest art educator was a problem in this

context? Perhaps the children perceived it as less of an authority compared to the

class teacher? ”

Teacher: “ What I think it is important is that children know that this is something that

continues and it is not just a ‘pop-up’ thing, you know. It applies also to when the

teacher falls ill and gets substituted, children might not take things so seriously

because their teacher is not there (…) It is important that you have good structure for

collaboration and that children also know that is part of the curricula, what we are

doing.”

(teacher, personal communication, March 16, 2020)

The discussion then moved to questions about multidisciplinarity. My goal was to understand

the teacher’s positioning regarding art education and multidisciplinary learning modules,

which are an integral part of NCBE (Finnish National Board of Education, 2016, section 4.4)

and find their expression in phenomenon-based projects.

The teacher is highly supportive to the idea of collaborating with art educators (and other art

professionals) in daily-school-life. In their opinion, it would be very beneficial to both

learners, teachers and curriculum making. Teachers - they state - need to carry out

multidisciplinary modules as requested by the curriculum. Of course art education is

included, but unfortunately not every teacher is familiar with arts-based methods and

therefore it might be overshadowed by other subjects. Having a professional from the field

could help to integrate the subject better.

(me)researcher: “After this collaboration, where we brought learners’ interests to

discussion, do you think you could use these interests to create a multidisciplinary

learning module?”

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Teacher: “ Yes. Well, this kind of interest-creation processes are something that are

also part of our teacher education, we do similar things as you did in the class. I think

I would be able to do something similar, but not the same (…) You know, we are

quite in a hurry in our everyday work. It would be ideal to always start with learners’

interests but we do not always have time for that, because the requirement is too

large…think about what you did with us…it took almost three hours. In order to

satisfy curriculum requirements it would have took two lessons more, you know (…) I

really liked your way of working but in everyday life is too time consuming.”

(teacher, personal communication, March 16, 2020)

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6. Discussing the outcomes

Where do art education and phenomenon-based learning meet?

And following, how could teachers and learners benefit from this encounter?

In this study, art education is considered both a field of practice and a subject on its own.

PhBL is an approach that elaborates on Finnish NCBE requirements for multidisciplinary

learning modules. Under a Deleuzeguattarian light, they are both part of the educational

rhizome. Driven by the research questions, the workshop-experience presented in this thesis

was meant as a test-platform for exploring the possibilities of the encounter between art

education and PhBL, by identifying and investigating where the two meet within the

educational rhizome. The workshop’s own identity turned out as being in between a

phenomenon-based project that relied on arts-based methods, and an arts-based workshop

that aimed for a phenomenon-based perspective.

Afterwards, the navigation of the workshop-experience through theory allowed many

entanglements between art education and PhBL to emerge. However, two concepts seemed

to hold all the others: multidisciplinarity and engagement. In retrospective, multidisciplinarity

and engagement were already evident from the very beginning of the study, when the

workshop was still in a planning-phase. This is so, due to two main reasons. First, my

a/r/tographical positioning within the study, which tightens my insights on art education to my

research practice. Second, the nature of PhBL, being multidisciplinarity and engagement

both its core concepts and critical points.

As identified by the teachers interviewed in Karlsson’s study (2017), practical PhBL

challenges are related to how to find a theme (phenomena) that can be properly tackled

multidisciplinarily, how to put learners in the right mindset to get PhBL started and how to

make the experience meaningful and engaging despite the lack of time and support. Time

management and feasibility were similarly pointed out by the partner-teacher as challenging

aspects in this study.

While sharing some aspects, the main difference between this study and Karlsson’s is

situational. Whereas in Karlsson’s study the teachers were the ones who conducted the

phenomenon-based projects, in this study the phenomenon-based project was carried out by

a person external to learners’ daily-context. This situation brought both positive results and

further challenges.

According to the partner-teacher, the presence of an external professional stimulates

learners’ curiosity and engagement (personal communication, January 21, 2020). As

observed in the orientation part of the workshop, learners were curious about me and my

origins. Curiosity is essential when talking about engagement, because of its role in

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stimulating learners’ inner motivation (Lonka et al., 2018). However, during the second day

of the workshop-experience, one third of the learners did not do the homework they were

given. What can be interpreted from this situation is, that the presence of an external (me)art

educator might be perceived by the learners as more recreational than educational, and

therefore be counterproductive in matters of properly engaging the learners. In this context,

the partner-teacher highlights how important it is for learners to be aware that this kind of

‘pop-up’ projects are part of the curriculum, and therefore of their duty as learners (personal

communication, March 16, 2020). In retrospective, I question whether the workshop’s

orientation part could have been more thorough in explaining the aim of the experience and

the role of the learners. Lonka et al. (2018) argue that external motivation also plays a role in

engagement. Communicating clearly the objectives should* trigger in the learners the feel of

agency and willingness to achieve, which stimulate inner motivation (Lonka et al., 2018).

However, the partner-teacher stated that “this is something that happens all the time” – it is a

real school-life situation that an educator needs to learn to deal with (personal

communication, March 16, 2020).

Despite this challenge, the outcomes of this study suggest that the collaboration between a

class-teacher and an art educator could have long-term benefits for both learners and

curriculum-making. Learners’ and teacher’s feedback made visible how positively the arts-

based methods and contents were perceived. Their preconceptions and expectations

regarding this arts-based workshop varied, and their opinions once the experience was over

changed in some cases (see appendix B). The teacher was ready to expect “almost

everything” (personal communication, March 16, 2020), whereas most of the learners were

expecting a more traditional way of approaching art education.

The way learners perceived art education prior to this study is based on their personal every-

day school experience. Set upon Espoo City’s requirements ("Oppiaineet ja tuntijako", n.d.),

the partner-class’ programme includes one hour per week of visual art held by the partner-

teacher, and two hours of crafts held by a specialized teacher. The partner-teacher stated

the visual art classes they held are more traditional, due to the fact that they are not so

familiar with the art methods and their potentiality (personal communication, January 21,

2020). The objectives of visual art teaching that the partner-teacher follows, are the ones

expressed by NCBE (Finnish National Board of Education, 2016, section 14.4.11). Visual

production, perception and thinking are some of the core objectives for 6th graders, which

connect to the idea of being within visual culture – and, therefore, understanding

contemporary society. On top of the subject-specific objectives, there are the broader

objectives regarding engagement, creative thinking, agency and more.

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The partner-teacher believes, that systematic collaborations with art educators would

positively support the class-teachers in the implementation of the objectives presented by

NCBE and enrich learners’ learning, by bringing a more insightful perspective on art

education - while relieving class-teachers’ already overwhelming workload (personal

communication, March 16, 2020).

As pondered by Kallio-Tavin, how could art education be bridged in a PhBL context?

Karlsson (2017) points out that the implementation of phenomenon-based projects makes

teachers’ workload grow even bigger – while work schedules stay the same. Based on the

study’s workshop-experience, the partner-teacher feels that having a professional within art

and art education could benefit the way phenomenon-based projects are carried out, and

how art education is bridged with the other subjects.

It is important to notice that Lonka and Westling (2018) talk about holistic approach on

learning. The Deleuzeguattarian concept of rhizome (Deleuze & Guattari, 1987) becomes

useful to understand how the art educator could bridge art education with other subjects, in

the lens of holism. Therefore, I believe a rephrasing of Kallio-Tavin’s previously cited

question is needed, in order to frame the discussion even better. How could art education be

a bridge in a PhBL context?

Barad (2003) explains, how post-structuralism challenges the paradigm of

representationalism – governed by language, as expressed in Vygotsky’s sociocultural

theory (Schunk, 2012) – by adding performativity. Through this study, some situations

emerged where learners clearly appeared more engaged. This was most seen during three

sections of the workshop: when the learners were grouping their interests by topic, while

they were applying their newly-created notions to the classroom environment, and when they

were working on their final projects. All these situations shared the common point of learners

being physically active and dealing with their interests through new methods.

Performativity is, according to Barad (2003) and Madison (2011), a channel of experience

and consequently learning. As observed from learners’ feedback, the majority was happy to

have had the chance to explore the phenomena by doing – even among the one who did not

work with their interest-topic (see appendix B). Performativity is related to embodiment and

doing, however it is an aspect of holism that I feel is not given enough attention in PhBL. Art

and art education can help to implement the holism in phenomenon-based projects, with the

challenge of not to be considered a mere utility (Jagodzinski, 2016) but rather a language of

body, visual and words.

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7. Final thoughts

Picture 18. The food1-group presenting their final artwork.

Every subject, in contemporary teaching practices, holds its challenges for both learners and

teachers. When the PhBL lens is applied, challenges within a subject increase by having to

deal with other realms’ challenges. In order to tackle this situation, we need to learn to think

differently. As stated by Deleuze and Guattari (1987), “thought is not arborescent, and the

brain is not a rooted or ramified matter” (p.15). Shifting our brain to a rhizomatic way of

thinking, allows us to perceive the complexity and multiplicity of reality. The rhizome has no

‘entry’ or ‘exit’, neither should there be in the way we conceive and build knowledge.

Everything is contextual and knowledge lives in the streams of learning, in the in-between

(Irwin & Springgay, 2008).

Some learners stated that this arts-based workshop-experience actually helped them

understand the complexity of the phenomena-energy. However, the majority of them said

they either did not understand or only grasped it (see appendix B). This might be due to the

short amount of time spent together on the phenomena – considering how well perceived the

arts-based methods were. In comparison, the phenomenon-based projects described by

Yuliati and Parno (2018) and Wakil et al. (2019) are mostly of longer duration.

Time also affected the possibility to dig deeper in the concept of enhancing

creative/rhizomatic thinking. In a multidisciplinary context, art education - through its ways of

activating thoughts and reflections (Richardson, 2017) - could stimulate the creative thinking

and help the learners to become critical, emancipated beings. Many reflections on the

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subject emerged while navigating the material through theory, which highlights the

importance of this entanglement. However, I feel the study does not provide enough

outcomes to properly address it.

The experience discussed in this thesis might be relevant for other researchers, who are

interested into getting to know PhBL from Finland and want to see some of its practical, real

life implications. This study does not want to present answers. Every entanglement

previously discussed is extremely connected to the context of the study and expands in

many directions outside of it. My hope is that one of these entanglements could be picked up

in the future from other researchers, in order to expand this study. Specifically, there is a

couple of entanglements that I believe could potentially make a good subject for further

studies.

Bringing learners’ interest into discussion through art education, as done in this study, could

be used from teachers to create multidisciplinary learning modules, that will help learners to

develop their creativity and critical thinking. Ideally, if a module or a project is built upon

learners’ interests, it engages them personally in the discussion (Lonka et al., 2018). This

study highlights, however, how time consuming the studied-process was. Therefore, a

further development for this experience, would be an exploration on how to make this

process less time-consuming and reproducible. Based on NCBE (Finnish National Board of

Education, 2016), multidisciplinary learning modules are held mainly on a school-level, not

singularly by each class. This is so, in order to create the best platform possible for

collaboration, meeting and multidisciplinarity. It would be interesting to expand this study by

bringing it on a school-level and see, which new entanglements and challenges would

emerge.

Lastly, as identified within my previous work experiences and confirmed by this study,

contiguity is an influential concept that I believe should be developed. Art education’s

performative way of conceiving learning has great potential in matter of engagement and

multidisciplinarity, however I believe this potential is fully expressed within a prolonged

collaboration with the study context.

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8. References

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Barad, K. (2003). Posthumanist performativity: Toward an understanding of how matter comes to matter. Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society, 28(3), 801-831.

Binkley, M., Erstad, O., Herman, J., Raizen, S., Ripley, M., Miller-Ricci, M., Rumble, M. (2012). Defining Twenty-First Century Skills, In: Griffin, P., McGaw, P., Care, E. (eds.), Assessment and Teaching of 21st Century Skills (pp. 17–66). New York: Springer, ISBN 978-94-007-2323-8 e-ISBN 978-94-007-2324-5, DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-2324-5,

Christine Liao (2016) From Interdisciplinary to Transdisciplinary: An Arts-Integrated Approach to STEAM Education, Art Education, 69:6, 44-49, DOI: 10.1080/00043125.2016.1224873

Culture Call. (2019). Retrieved December 4, 2019, from https://www.espoo.fi/en-US/Culture_and_sport/Culture/For_teachers_and_educators/Culture_Call

Daniels, H. (2003). Vygotsky and Pedagogy. New York: RoutledgeFalmer.

Deleuze, G. & Guattari, F. (1987). A Thousand Plateaus. (11th ed.). Trans. Brian Massumi. Vol. 2 of Capitalism and Schizophrenia. 2 vols. 1972-1980. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press

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Haywood Rolling, J. (2018). Arts-based Research in Education. In Leavy, P. (2018). Handbook of arts-based research (pp. 493-510). New York: The Guilford Press.

Huotilainen, M. (2019, November). Building Human Strengths - Neuroscientific Insights into Cognition and Skill Development. Presentation, Creating the Future III conference. Helsinki.

“I Laboratori Bruno Munari®”. Retrieved 4 November 2019, from http://www.brunomunari.it/index2.htm

Irwin, R., & Springgay, S. (2008). A/r/tography as a practice-based research. In S. Springgay, R. Irwin, C. Leggo & P. Gouzouasis, Being with A/r/tography (pp. xix-xxxiii). Rotterdam: Sense Publishers.

Irwin, R., Beer, R., Springgay, S., Grauer, K., Xiong, G., & Bickel, B. (2008). The rhizomatic relations of a/r/tography. In S. Springgay, R. Irwin, C. Leggo & P. Gouzouasis, Being with A/r/tography (pp. 205-218). Rotterdam: Sense Publishers.

jagodzinski, J. (Ed.). (2016). What is art education? : After Deleuze and Guattari. Retrieved from https://ebookcentral.proquest.com

Jensenius, A. (2020). Disciplinarities: intra, cross, multi, inter, trans. Retrieved 26 April 2020, from https://www.arj.no/2012/03/12/disciplinarities-2/

Kallio-Tavin, M. (2016). Perceptions of the changes in the Finnish art education curriculum. Oktatás–Kutatás–Innováció, 7, 37.

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Karlsson, P., Kallio-Tavin, M., korkeakoulu, T. j. s., School of Arts, D. a. A., Jalas, M., University, A. & Aalto-yliopisto. (2017). Teachers' perspective on the national core curriculum of basic education 2016 - Finding leverage in supporting upper-comprehensive school teachers with phenomenon-based learning and co-design.

Leavy, P. (2018). Handbook of arts-based research. New York: The Guilford Press.

Leggo, C. (2008) Autobiography: Researching Our Lives and Living Our Research. In Springgay, S., Irwin, R., Leggo, C., & Gouzouasis, P. (2008). Being with A/r/tography (pp. 3-23). Rotterdam: Sense Publishers.

Lonka, K., Makkonen, J., Berg, M., Talvio, M., Maksniemi, E., Kruskopf, M., ... Westling, S. K. (2018). Phenomenal Learning from Finland. Helsinki: Edita.

Lonka, K., Westling, S. K. (2018) Phenomenon-based learning. In Lonka, K., Makkonen, J., Berg, M., Talvio, M., Maksniemi, E., Kruskopf, M., ... Westling, S. K. (2018). Phenomenal Learning from Finland.(p. 173-193). Helsinki: Edita.

Madison, D. S. (2011). Critical Ethnography: Methods, Ethics, and Performance. (2nd ed.) Thousand Oaks, California: SAGE Publications.

Munari, B. (1977). Fantasia (30th ed.). Gius. Bari: Laterza & Figli.

Munari, B. (1981). Da cosa nasce cosa (29th ed.). Bari: Laterza & Figli.

Oppiaineet ja tuntijako. Retrieved March 5, 2020, from https://www.espoo.fi/fi-fi/kasvatus_ja_opetus/perusopetus/opiskelu_peruskoulussa/opetussuunnitelma/Oppiaineet_ja_tuntijako

Restelli, B., & Sperati, S. (2008). A che gioco giochiamo? (2nd ed.). Verona: Corraini Edizioni.

Richardson, J. (2017). What art thinks. In j. jagodzinski (Ed), What is art education? After Deleuze and Guattari (pp. 111-126). New York: Palgrave.

Rodoniov, A. (2019, February). Creativity in Neurosciences. Presentation, Science Basement. Tiedekulma, Helsinki.

Rose, G. (2016). Visual methodologies: an introduction to researching with visual materials. (4th ed.). London: SAGE.

Saavedra, A. R., Opfer, V. D., Perkins, D., Singmaster, H., & Stewart, V. (2012). Teaching and Learning 21st Century Skills. Teaching and Learning, 37.

Schunk, D. H. (2012). Learning theories: an educational perspective. (6th ed.). Boston: Allyn & Bacon.

Silander, P. (2015). Digital pedagogy. In Mattila, P. & Silander, P. (2015). How to create the school of the future. Revolutionary thinking and design from Finland (pp. 9-25). Oulu: Multprint.

Springgay, S., Irwin, R. & Kind, S. (2005). A/r/tography as Living Inquiry Through Art and Text. Qualitative Inquiry. 11. 897-912. 10.1177/1077800405280696.

St. Pierre, E. A. (2004) Deleuzian concepts for education: The subject undone. Educational Philosophy and Theory, 36(3), 283-296.

Symeonidis, V. & Schwarz, J. F. (2016). Phenomenon-Based Teaching and Learning through the Pedagogical Lenses of Phenomenology: The Recent Curriculum reform in Finland. Forum Oswiatowe, 28(2), 31-47. Retrieved from http://forumoswiatowe.pl/index.php/czasopismo/article/view/458.

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Taidetestaajat. (2017). Retrieved December 9, 2019, from https://www.taidetestaajat.fi

Wakil, K., Rahman, R., Hasan, D., Mahmood, P., & Jalal, T. (2019). Phenomenon-based learning for teaching ICT subject through other subjects in primary schools. Journal of Computer and Education Research, 7 (13), 205-212. DOI: 10.18009/jcer.553507

Yuliati, L. & Parno, P. (2018). Exploration of Physics Problem-Solving Skills within Phenomenon-Based Learning in Senior High School Students. Proceedings of the International Conference on Education, 4(1), 97-103. https://doi.org/10.17501/icedu.2018.4111

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9. Appendix

Table 1. Data and participants

Timeframe

Activity Participants (number, age, gender)

Data

21.01.2020 Free discussion with partner-teacher

- Recorded audio material

Tot: 51’ 33’’

25.02.2020

1,5h

First meeting with participants

n=24

11-12 years old

Boys=11

Girls=13

Recorded video material Tot: 38’ 31’’

Visual field notes

Tot: 277 photographs

Field notes

03.03.2020

2,5h

Second meeting with participants

n=20

11-12 years old

Boys=10

Girls=10

Recorded video material

Tot: 49’ 21’’

Recorded audio material

Tot: 84’ 26’’

Visual field notes

Tot: 104 photographs

Field notes

05.03.2020

0,75h

Feedback session with participants

n=17

11-12 years old

Boys=7

Girls=10

Recorded video material

Tot: 21’ 05’’

Written feedbacks

16.03.2020 Feedback session with partner-teacher

- Recorded audio material

Tot: 23’ 35’’

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Appendix A

Letter of Consent

Letter of consent is written in Finnish. It contains, in order: self presentation, presentation of study aim, study time frame, data collection and data handling plan (anonymity), permit request.

Helsinki, 11.12.2019 Huoltajan Suostumus Tiedot-kirje tutkijalta

Lukekaa tarkasti ennen Huoltajan suostumus-lomake täyttämistä.

Hyvät Vanhemmat,

Nimeni on Gaia Mazzola. Olen taiteilija ja taidekasvattaja.

Olen Nordic Visual Studies and Art Education (NoVA) maisteriopiskelija. Opiskelen Konstfack yliopistossa Tukholmassa, mutta asun ja työskentelen Suomessa ja olen vaihto-opiskelija Aalto-yliopistossa.

Olen kirjoittamassa opinnäytettäni. Pro-gradu tutkimus tule olemaan yhteistyö _______koulun kanssa. Tutkimus koskee 6.luokkalaisia (tässä tapauksessa teidän lapset) ja heidän opettaja (________).

Tutkimuksessa haluan tutkia taidepajaympäristöä ala-asteen luokassa. Haluan ymmärtää ja tarkkailla mitä tapahtuu kun lapset, opettaja ja taidekasvattaja suunnittelevat yhdessä taidepaja-sisältöä ja jos tästä yhteistyö-prosessista voi syntyä mielenkiintoinen ja hyödyllinen opetusmenetelmä, joka arvostaa lasten omia ideoita ja tarjoa kaikille lapsille oikeutta laadukkaan ja ilmaiseen taidekasvatukseen. Tutkimus kestää 2 viikkoa. Kahdessa viikossa tavataan 3 kertaa: ensimmäisellä kerralla suunnitellaan sisältöä, toisella kerralla pidetään taidepaja, kolmas kerta on palauteistunto.

Tutkimuksen aikana aion ottaa kuvia tekemisestä ja videoita prosessista. En aio käyttää lasten nimeja opinnäyten kirjoittamisessa ja datan analyysissa. Tallennan videoita ja kuvia suojattuun ulko-asemaan, jota pidetään suojatussa varastossa omassa kodissani Helsingissä. Kuvia ja videoita poistetaan asemasta mahdollisimman pian gradu-suunnitelman mukaan.

Taidepajaa pidetään suomen kielellä. Opettaja on mukana koko ajan. Taidepaja toteutuu sisätiloissa.

Jos ette anna lupaa lapsillenne osallistumaan tutkimukseen, hän voi siitä huolimatta osallistua suunnittelemiseen ja taidepajaan kavereiden kanssa tekemällä samaa asioita, mutta hänestä ei saada dataa (kuvia, videoita, ideoita, mielipiteitä).

Ystävällisiä Terveisiä,

Gaia Mazzola

gaia.mazzola@student.konstfack.se

+358- - - - - - - - -

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Appendix B

Feedback questionnaire

The questions listed below form the questionnaire that the participants (learners) were given during the feedback session meeting. Questions were both in English and Finnish. Answers are colour coded just like during the filling of the questionnaire. Comments are reported in Finnish and translated in English.

1 How much did you know about the topic ”energy” before these workshops? KUINKA PALJON TIESIT ”ENERGIA” AIHEESTA ENNEN TYÖPAJOJA? ● ●●●●● ●●●●● ●●●●● ●

2 Did you ever get asked about your interests in order to create content for school? ONKO KOSKAAN SINULTA KYSYNYT OMISTA KIINNOSTUKSISTA, KOULUN SISÄLLÖN LUOMISTA VARTEN? ●● ●● ●●●●● ●●●●● ●●●

3 What did you think about “art education” before we met? You have free word in here! SINULLA ON VAPAA SANA! MITÄ MIELTÄ OLIT/MITÄ LUULIT ”TAIDEKASVATUKSESTA” ENNEN KUN TAPAASIMME? ●●●●● ● ●●● ● “Ei oikein tiennyt, millaista se oli” I did not really know, how it was “Ei ollut mielipidettä” (x 3) No opinion ”Luulin, että piirrämme ja maalaamme jotain” I thought, that we draw and paint something ”EI minulla ollut mitään luuloja” I did not have any thought ”Ei oikeastaan mitään” Nothing, really ”Normaalit kuvaamataidon tunnit ovat tylsiä, mutta nämä työtavat/pajat olivat kiinnostavia ja hauskoja (kaikkien mielestä)” The normal visual art lessons are boring, but these way of working/workshops were interesting and fun (in everybody’s opinion)

4 Was Gaia’s way of doing things something new for you in your school experience? OLIKO SINULLE GAIAN MENETELMÄ/TAPA TEHDÄ ASIOITA JOTAKIN UUTTA OMASSA KOULUKOKEMUKSESSA? ●●●●● ●●●●● ●● ●●●●●

5 (Science, Art, Sport groups) Did you feel safe exploring the topic through your interests? Why? You have free word in here! SINULLA ON VAPAA SANA! TUNTUIKO TURVALLISTA TUTKIA AIHETTA OMAN KIINNOSTUKSEN KAUTTA? MIKSI? ●●●●● ● “Well, why wouldn’t it be safe?”

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“Tämä tapa tutkia teki aiheesta monipuolisemman ja paljon mielenkiintoisemman (kaikkien mielestä)” This way of researching made the topic more diverse and way more interesting (in everybody’s opinion)

6 (Food1, Food2 groups) How did you feel exploring the topic not through your interests? Why? You have free word in here! SINULLA ON VAPAA SANA! MILTÄ TUNTUI TUTKIA AIHETTA ILMAN OMAA KIINNOSTUSTA KÄYTTÄMISTÄ? MIKSI? ● ● ●● ”Kivaa” Nice ”Ihan hyvältä koska opin paljon uutta energiasta!” Quite good because I learned a lot about energy! ”Se tuntui väärältä koska ei saanut päättää” It felt bad because I could not decide ”(?) ei ollut kivaa” It was not nice “Oli ihan kivaa ja hyvä aihe vaikka ei ollut oma kiinnostus” It was quite nice and a good topic even though it was not my interest ”Työskentely oli ihan kivaa ja hauskaa, vaikka en ollutkaan kiinnostunut aiheesta” The process was nice and fun, even though I was not interested in the topic ”Oli ihan kivaa tehdä työtä vaikkei aihe kiinnostunut minua” It was nice to work even though the topic did not interest me

7 Are you satisfied with the final result? OLETKO TYYTYVÄINEN OMAAN LOPPUTEOKSEEN? ●●●●● ●●●● ●●●●● ●●●

8 Did the workshop help you understand how complex the topic “energy” in reality? AUTTOIKO TÄMÄ TYÖPAJA SINUA YMMÄRTÄMÄÄN, KUINKA MONIMUOTKAISTA “ENERGIA” AIHE ON TODELLISUUDESSA? ●●●●● ●●●● ●●●●

9 Do you believe there should be more art educational classes in primary school? LUULETKO, ETTÄ ALAKOULUSSA PITÄISI OLLA ENEMMÄN TAIDEKASVATUS-TUNTIA? ●●●●● ●●●●● ●●● ●●● ●

10 Do you think school should create more content based on your interests? LUULETKO, ETTÄ KOULU VOISI PERUSTAA ENEMMÄN OPPITUNTIA OPPILAIDEN KIINNOSTUKSIIN? ●●●●● ●●● ●●●●● ● ●●●

11 How did your idea of “art education” change after this experience? You have free word in here! SINULLA ON VAPAA SANA! MITEN SINUN IDEA “TAIDEKASVATUKSESTA” ON MUUTTUNUT TÄMÄN KOKEMUKSEN JÄLKEEN?

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● ●●●●● ●●● ● ”On se vähän muuttunut. En ennen tiennyt, että se olisi tälläistä” It has changed a little. Before I did not know that it would be like this. ”Sitten että tämä on muuttunut paljon” So that it changed a lot ”En tiedä” I do not know ”Olen ymmärtänyt mitä energia on” I understood what energy is ”No” ”Ei oikein mitenkään” (x2) Not really ”Taidetta voi opettaa todella monella erilaisella mielenkiintoisemmalla tavalla kuin meidän koulussa” Art can really be taught in many different, more interesting ways than in our school