Reflections on my Micro- Teaching Session: A Brief History of Vinyl Graphic Design
For my micro-teaching session I delivered an interactive workshop on the subject of vinyl graphic design. Initially I struggled to narrow down the topic to just twenty minutes but decided to focus on two key areas- a very brief history of record sleeve design and a section on specific interactive covers (see session plan). I felt that the historical context was important and gave the subject matter some grounding. I also felt that the interactive design angle was one of the more ‘light hearted topics’ which I could tie into a playful session where the cohort could pick up physical vinyl and thus engage with the content through an object based learning lense (see figure 3). I also felt that it might appeal more to a group who were likely to be unfamiliar with the subject matter.
Whilst blues based music is a strong passion of mine I was aware that I needed to foreground the session with a personal story which would make me more relatable as a tutor. I chose a photograph of me as a young child outside my parents’ record shop. I felt that this combined the themes of music and design together through the eyes of a child who didn’t understand how they could be intrinsically linked. I felt that this tied in with the feedback session later where the cohort were only vaguely aware of certain bands and their respective sleeve designers.
I chose to highlight what I would consider to be more mainstream artists. I thought that talking about acts like Elvis Presley, The Beach Boys and The Beatles who are more readily identifiable figures in popular culture would perhaps feel less alienating to the group. I also chose artists and designers who had particular connections to UAL such as Jamie Reid.
I tried to structure the session so that there were periods where the cohort could pursue active engagement through browsing the vinyl sleeves/ studying them to find certain intricacies. I also endeavoured to ask questions that could engage critical thinking, for example around why Warhol’s 3D zip design for Sticky Fingers (see figure 2) might be problematic. I didn’t think that this was entirely successful. One of the challenges I quickly realised is that having only one copy of each record meant that there was only enough time for one person to study the sleeve before moving on to the next topic or slide. Given more time I would suggest that splitting the session into two parts and having the group work in pairs discussing particular designs might be a way to engage the cohort more fully. One of the other facilitators used a simple numbering system in their microteaching where images were paired up with corresponding numbers. I could have taken this approach to ask the group to classify the sleeve designs in date order. This could have been an interesting route to go down. It could have brought interesting discussions to the surface around nostalgia and pop culture. For instance, whilst Peter Blake is strongly associated with designing the Sergeant Pepper sleeve he is still producing album art in the 21st century age of streaming. With more time it would have been an interesting session to bring the designs full circle to the present day.
The feedback I received from the group was positive with most people enjoying physical vinyl and noting that the textures and smells was a nice contrast to the digital imagery. I was pleased that this came across the in the session and I felt it succeeded in the aim of engaging auditory, tactile and visual learners alike.
It was also mentioned that I assumed knowledge from the group. Although I pitched it at a cohort who I felt would possess some prior knowledge (for example of the Bauhaus Movement ) it was fair point which I would reassess when presenting to a traditional student body with diverse backgrounds and knowledge bases. Some of the cohort also felt that there wasn’t enough time spent looking at the sleeves. I felt that perhaps I rushed through some of the slides and spoke a little too quickly. In hindsight I think that a fewer number of slides and more group discussions might have teased out more observations from the cohort.
Figure1: Microteaching: Delivering a session on the history of vinyl graphic design
Figure 2: Andy Warhol’s Sleeve Design for The Rolling Stones’ album ‘Sticky Fingers’ – original pressing with 3D moveable zip (1971)
Figure 3: Pop up Sleeve design for Jethro Tulls’ album ‘Stand Up’ – original pressing (1969)
Figure 4: Cohort engaging with record sleeve designs
Figure 5: Promotional material for LCC’s Cross Cultural discussion group- World Conversations
Figure 6: World Conversations Workshop being delivered in the LCC Library Learning Lounge
Figure 7: World Conversations Handout: Prompt Questions on Subcultures
Figure 8: World Conversations Handout: Prompt Questions on Freedom of Speech