Untitled Travels, A Set On Flickr.

Victoria Park - to accompany my previous text!

Sydenham Wood - had a lovely walk in the wood with the London Wildlife Trust - I'm a big fan of The Great North Wood so it was fantastic to not only hear and learn about the natural environment - but also to think about the no longer present victorian houses and gardens - see above the folly and the Lebanon cedar that appeared as a shrub in a picture from 150 years ago -  & the train track that once went through to the now bat inhabited tunnel - & the interconnected-ness of it all... enjoyed the rain though of course I treated myself to some cake and tea upon return.

More About The Great North Wood

From around 2016 I think!

I have an ongoing interest in the The Great North Wood. When working on projects about The Crystal Palace I became entranced by the idea of the wood that previously covered much of the local area - It would have spanned from Camberwell to Croydon!

I recently developed two music and storytelling projects for adults with learning disabilities about the Great North Wood. The first was a weekly class for adults with learning disabilities based at West Norwood Leisure Centre about The Great North Wood, developed with a collective entitled Sound Tracks. This comprises of Keith Park, Emmie Ward and me.

The second project was in association with The London Wildlife Trust and funded by the Crystal Palace Park Fund. Coralie Oddy, Emmie Ward and I developed and delivered 10 sessions for adults with learning disabilities in Crystal Palace Park about it's history - centring on its history as part of The Great North Wood. Find out more about Sound Tracks here.

In May 2013, I jointly created a tree walk in Crystal Palace Park with a museum colleague. The walk included nature activities and storytelling about the Great North Wood for local children.

In June 2015, I jointly curated an event about The Great North Wood in Brockwell Park as part of the MADD 2015 programme. The event included folk music, blue printing and storytelling.

Bit of learning.... we’re going on a bear hunt... found the ‘worksheets’ online.... kids colour their own map for the bear hunt then make little figures to move around the map as in the story :) https://www.instagram.com/p/CXbOuAKs6bx/?utm_medium=tumblr

Approaches to Research

So, I have finally been dipping into the book entitled 'Doing Your Research Project'. The one that is hailed as the 'traditional' approach. We have talked about some different approaches to research in our classes, but still I feel a bit stuck between styles. I like the ideas of 'Action Research', yet I am not really trying to challenge anything or change anything about the job I am doing, because it is not my job, it is an independent project. Yet, I think I have been calling what I am doing action research just for the fact that I am aiming to make a 'product' (in other-words a trail) myself as part of my learning about what makes an effective community trail.

I am also quite intrigued by the 'narrative inquiry' approach. I like the ideas of it, but my question is whether I can be a good storyteller or not! I am looking for stories for my project - stories about the park - and looking into other people's trails that they have created, which are stories - and psychogeography itself seems to have its roots in stories - which I must check out - and I am indeed blogging the process so there is some hope that the narrative approach could be incorporated in my study and writing.

Apologies for the very obvious nature of this entry. I am probably not sounding like an MA student!!

In other news, as they say, I've started listening to the radio for the duration of this assignment (ok, as of yesterday) in order to concentrate on the medium of the spoken word - to consider its potential and gain inspiration.

Questions I have been thinking all along, but came to me quite strongly on the underground yesterday are - and these are exactly how I typed them and so don't always make perfect sense, but it is a snippet of my thoughts in action - mostly on te theme of what questions I might ask makers of trails: 'Good practice and effective community trail? Effective for who? The listener or the maker and the community? Or all? What benefits have ppl found? I am looking into alternatives too because can gain inspiration from them... What types are there?! Was there a reason for making a community trail as opposed to another form of interpretation/ engagement? For you what are the positives of making a community trail?'

My next task is to send out the questionnaires and also the text I have been working on to try and recruit participants. I've ordered my digital recorder at last! The Tascam dr-40! Fingers crossed it arrives ok, it works and that I can work out how to use it properly as well as of course get the good stories to record!

Okay, for now it is onwards with reading some articles we were given in class a couple of weeks back about research styles and then for some more reading of my intro to psychogeography book and hopefully a listen of some of the audio trails that people sent me and that I won't be able to go and try them out on the spot as such. I am still hoping for an improvement in weather again to go and try out the trails in location!!!

Finally at MoMA after two years of hearing & reading about it & Loic Tallon's work on my MA Museums & Galleries in ed course & conferences :)

Post- lecture thoughts

So a few thoughts that I had during my course session today: Should I in theory involve participants in my trail, in the trying out other audio trails? I don't think that it is feasible with my time scale, but a good thought in terms of creating a community project. Involve the community with decisions about how they want to create theirs. I feel mine is going to be driven by me in the main.

Something that was said today by our visiting lecturer kind of linked with my thoughts. She said that in terms of her education setting that it is about connecting the past to the present and it is not jut about knowledge transfer. I like that thought.

I was also wondering about referencing the visitor research that Kew Gardens did for their app - that was published in their paper entitled 'Delightfully Lost' - there may be some elements that are relevant to creating my trail - when thinking about what people like to do in an outdoor natural space - and the thought of wanting to be delightfully lost seems to fit with some of my reading on psychogeography.... still only in the initial stages and my introduction to it book!

I'm doing #100happydays - I think I'm ok at noticing things and will try and make it more museum/career orientated, but with space for other happy things :) Doesn't mean my life will be all blue skies- but today is! I did feel a bit resentful/confused of/by the sudden sun these past mornings because I felt so tired but the sun has won me over today :)

When I moved back from Austria to the U.K. Summer 2022 with two cats by train and the help of my sister :)

Check out my sister blog about Norwood Fun Palace which I curated in October 2014