ABSTRACT
First, we shall discuss the notion of a ‘professional’ and how to build upon your Initial Teacher Education (ITE) and develop your career as an Art & Design teacher; we must try to define what we mean by ‘professional’ in this context. It is a word which is often used to distinguish a critical and objective approach to practice from personal preferences, although it is sometimes contrasted with ‘amateur’ rather than with ‘personal’. In terms of the origins of the words themselves, amateur is best contrasted with connoisseur in that amateurs engage in certain activities for the love of it whereas connoisseurs engage in certain activities because they know a lot about them: with regard to art teachers, the vast majority both love the subject and know a lot about it. A more pragmatic approach to understanding the term professional is to examine its use in context. The present context is school culture, which tends to be conservative in nature and conforms in the main to middle-class values. These values may include such things as punctuality, cleanliness, tidiness, appropriateness of dress and so on. Art & Design teachers are sometimes (rightly or wrongly, probably wrongly) allowed some degree of latitude with regard to attitude-somewhat perversely, they are sometimes almost expected to not conform to the same rules as other teachers. However, it is worth remembering that Art & Design teachers are paid to teach art and to represent the school and the school’s values; they are, whether they like it or not, figures of authority, not authoritarian, but authoritative, having significant knowledge and understanding of their subject and having trained and qualified as teachers. Courses of initial teacher education (ITE), such as PGCE art courses, are fundamentally concerned with ‘professionalisation’—in the present case of turning art, craft and design students into Art & Design teachers. This means refocusing students’ orientation so that it becomes outward rather than inward, with other people’s artistic development rather than their own. It does not mean that the creativity is somehow knocked out of students, nor does it mean that your creative output is put on hold, rather the reverse. Apart from the very act of teaching being essentially a creative enterprise, an active learning environment can stimulate the art teacher into production. It is worth noting that the DfEE, in its introduction to Standards for the Award of Qualified Teacher Status states the following:
professionalism…implies more than meeting a series of discrete standards. It is necessary to consider the standards as a whole to appreciate the creativity, commitment, energy and enthusiasm which teaching demands, and the intellectual and managerial skills required of the effective professional.
