Non-fussy and frictionless: Loom as a useful teaching tool
I was delighted to be mentioned by Loom on their recent blog post not least because much of what I am about is communicating ideas efficiently using digital tools. Being recognised in this way might mean that finally my media career can take off and I can buy those gold taps that I always longed for.
Anywho… the previous blog post outlined a few initial thoughts on this useful tool which I pretty much still stand by. The big change since then is that I am using it a lot more for short topic intros and work feedback with my groups.
For posterity I thought it was worth sharing the clip that they mentioned - a quick overview of the Buddha’s life complete with a fictional hedgehog apprentice:²
As you can see it isn’t a super-polished presentation¹ - which is the point of these things - this is about fallible teachers communicating directly, quickly and sometimes roughly with their classes. The great benefit with this tool is that I can make a fast shareable upload that retains the human touch. One of the things I am often expressing on this blog is the importance of facilitating thought processes - in other words employing tools that enable idea development rather than slowing it down or getting in the way. For me, Loom has been a frictionless method to get some teaching thoughts down efficiently without being too fussy.
Non-precious is the new precious.
¹ although the material I created did take a while to put together!
² if you are offended then you haven’t taught teenagers
³ I don’t care for gold taps
Supporting Vulnerable People
Dave Burke is a friend from a galaxy far, far away. As a communicator, he speaks with conviction and insight into mental health issues. I was thrilled to see he is reaching out and providing useful tips for supporting vulnerable people in our communities - especially with Covid19 looming so awfully. Hopping into one of his zoom webinars recently, I created some shareable sketchnotes:
If you want to explore these issues further Dave has a helpful website. If my scribing is something you think would benefit someone you know then get in touch or explore other examples here.
Managing an Organisation Through a Crisis
Alex Morrison wrote a superb article about managing an organisation through a crisis (eg C19). He presented this as a free webinar via Wired Sussex yesterday and I made this A3 infographic from my notes.
If that is too tricky to zoom in on I made a slideshow version below.
If you see this and think that my scribing service might be useful then please get in touch to chat about working together.
Sketchnoting for More Than Robots
Cliff Manning runs More Than Robots. Focussing on the shifting intersection between ‘tech/youth/support’ the group consists of a stimulating newsletter and quarterly meet-ups. As I am mainly working from home as a high-school teacher in lock-down I was able to attend the most recent event via zoom. Cliff’s encouragement to contribute something initially left me a bit cold… but as we discussed mutual areas of interest I realised that creating a set of sketch notes would probably be the best thing I could offer to promote the excellent work represented by the attendees.
Here are the eight snapshots I created for most of the presentations:
Some process footnotes:
as this was my first remote scribing experience I gathered as much source material as possible for later review. This included a variety of things - initial talk slides, audio, weblinks and screen captures for later reference/review, notes in my sketchbook.
I agreed with Cliff beforehand that it was counter-productive to create facsimile drawn notes for everything being said - there were already slides that could easily achieve this - better to grab a few resonant moments and illustrate those in a useful, shareable way. Below - is a scan of my initial notes: the boxes in red denote areas that looked worth developing into something more.
From here I used Clip Studio Paint on the iPad to compose something that I felt worked better.
And then I dropped this into Procreate which feels like a better final inking solution for this kind of thing. It’s funny that the way CSP works seems facilitate thinking in a way that Procreate enables toddler bitmap art. If the project had required something more involved I would have gone further using Affinity Designer for polished hand-drawn vectors.
Thankyou to Cliff for letting me in to this group - it gave me a strong impression of how many serious-minded groups are trying to serve those who so often get left behind in society. If you are interested in using me as an illustrator/facilitator then please get in touch and we can discuss your needs.