This article explores how using the creative arts in teaching in higher education can engage and empower individuals who learn in different ways, and who may have been excluded from traditional forms of learning which value cognitive and verbal means of learning and assessment. Drawing on an evaluation of a creative arts module in higher education, which used drama, movement, music, and visual art as teaching methods, the article first outlines a case for the kind of learning it is possible (...) to engender through the creative arts. The second part exemplifies the argument in illustrating how use of the creative arts in teaching influenced the students’ learning. The article concludes by arguing that, given the current emphasis on inclusive education, an opportunity exists to use the creative arts as a bridge to facilitate inclusion and open doors to those previously disenfranchised in the education system. (shrink)

Graduate supervision is a pedagogy that remakes students into the disciplined subjects of scholars and researchers. While the supervision relation is structured by the fixed and asymmetrical institutional positions of supervisor and student, pedagogic interactions between the two can also have a dynamic, playful and more mutual character. At these times, supervisor and student interact over the compelling topic of the thesis. In this article, which draws on the work of Gurevitch , such moments are characterized as improvisation. A supervision (...) dialogue between a humanities supervisor and student pair is used to illustrate and explore the productive, if risky, possibilities that attend improvisation in supervision. Despite its riskiness, however, this creative mode of supervision may itself be in danger as institutional environments increasingly value timely completions, safe projects, and directive modes of supervision. (shrink)

Integration of music in an academic university teaching setting is an example of how artistic practice and competences have potentials to resonate beyond the immediate discipline. The article explo...