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Design & Technology

I've got to admit - I never 'got' DT.  I left primary school the year the National Curriculum was introduced and can honestly say that I don't remember doing anything remotely similar to Design and Technology in Primary School.  And due to severe epilepsy as a child, the teachers were generally too apprehensive to allow me to take part when I got to secondary.  However, today I took part in my first proper DT lesson - and thoroughly enjoyed it!  I can now see the value and the purpose to DT, and the definite difference to art.  I had previously, admittedly mistakenly, linked it to in the form of craft; apparently a common misconception (Dixon, 2014)

The above image is one of the slides from the Foundation Subjects Design and Technology seminar, with my annotated notes.  This image displays the planning  process when preparing a DT lesson.  (Sarah Wright, 2016)

 


 

 

The year one DT lesson consisted of going over experiences and expectations of DT as a subject, then getting stuck in to making a bridge - and boy did we make bridges!  Bear in mind that we only had one hour to make our bridges. 

 

And even better, the lads managed to make their bridge into a draw bridge!

 

The skills developed through designing and then creating the bridge are numerous, ranging from collaboration and communication to critical thinking and resilience.

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After the seminar I did my own reading to enhance subject knowledge.  The Department for Education (2013) describes DT as "pupils design and make products that solve real and relevant problems within a variety of contexts".  However, according to Dixon (2014) DT should go beyond this and relate to citizenship and history by relating design to previous designers and innovators for inspiration.  A lot o educators are intimidated by the lack of subject knowledge, myself included.  And also the health and safety aspects of the subject.  It would appear that the health and safety aspects of DT are not as scary as it might first appear, it is just a case of having stations for the potentially harmful activities (i.e. using a real saw, or using a glue gun) and teaching the children good practice.  

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This is definitely a subject area that I need to develop and as I do so this page will be updated.

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One last thing - the fabulous male trainees in my group made a draw bridge, picture above with video below:

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Bibliography

DEPARTMENT FOR EDUCATION, 2015. National curriculum in England: Primary curriculum. Available from: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/national-curriculum-in-england-primary-curriculum [Accessed 8 May 2016].

DIXON, W., 2015. Design and Technology. In: M. WEBSTER and S. MISRA, eds. Teaching the primary foundation subjects. United Kingdom: Open University Press. pp. 38–56.

WRIGHT, S., 2015. Design and Technology Seminar Year 1 [online]. Ormskirk: Edge Hill University. [Accessed 11 May 2016].

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