‘Revolutionary’, ‘unique’, ‘ground breaking’, ‘motivating’ are just a few of the plaudits accruing to Edexcel’s new DiDA qualification. Sounding more like a trio of tragic Egyptian heroines than a suite of ICT qualifications (DiDA, AiDA and CiDa), the Diploma in Digital Applications is being launched this autumn to general acclaim from commentators and from the schools that have piloted it. Designed to engage students in “real-life” tasks that focus on the practical application of digital skills in preparation for Further and Higher Education or employment, its four modules can be taken at two levels on a pick and mix basis, provided the basic Award in Digital Applications – Using ICT (which can be taken as early as Year 9) – is included. One of the fundamentally innovative and radical aspects of DiDA is the interactive, paperless format of the evidence students submit in the form of an eportfolio. So where does art and design fit in? Surely this is an ICT qualification and best left to the technology department? Not so. To my mind it constitutes a forceful argument for overcoming barriers to cross-curricular collaboration at this level, since two of the four modules, Multimedia and Graphics, are directly relevant to further study or careers in the creative industries, and, equally significantly, to the creative work in new digital media that many art departments are already delivering. Communicating a message memorably through words and pictures; manipulating images imaginatively and developing original solutions; knowing how colour works, affects mood and has a symbolism of its own; understanding composition, how to construct the visual hierarchy of a picture or a page; and being able to read the semiotics of an image, the language of its signs; these are areas of expertise to be found in the art room, not the ICT lab. Thinking outside the box? Art teachers were never in it! What kind of technical skills are required? Unit 3 Graphics specifies that students need to learn how to use vector and bitmap-based software, understand the main graphic types and file formats, be able to prepare images for either print or screen, apply these skills to developing graphic solutions to realistic Summative Project Briefs (SPBs), and exhibit their work in an eportfolio, using web authoring tools, which is a basic requirement of all the modules. Unit 2 Multimedia applies skills in animation, web graphics, imaging, digital video, sound and interactivity to creating a multimedia product such as a website, presentation or game. Project planning and management, standard methods of working with digital formats, correct referencing of sources, having some knowledge of copyright are competences common to all modules and would be familiar to students through their experience of AiDA, the initial Award in Digital Applications, equivalent to one GCSE. The Certificate in Digital Applications, CiDA, comprising Using ICT plus one other module of choice, equates to two GCSEs; while the full Diploma is worth four. If this seems to make impossible demands on your art department’s ICT resources, reassuringly only two software packages are essential for the Graphics unit: a bitmap-based program like Adobe Photoshop Elements, Jasc Paint Shop Pro or Serif PhotoPlus; and vector-based software such as Macromedia Flash, Serif DrawPlus or CorelDraw. The eportfolio could be created using whatever web authoring program is already installed on the school network, for example Dreamweaver, Front Page, Flash or WebPlus. If your department introduces vector drawing, animation and image manipulation at key stage 3, you already have the prerequisite skills and kit to seriously consider offering one of these qualifications, perhaps even in Year 12. Support materials for DiDA, many of which are free and interactive, are already available or in preparation for the autumn. The most ambitious of these is the DiDA Delivered Project, a cost free digital resource created by the North West Learning Grid. Their Teachers’ Skills Gym is already online, offering training in all the Macromedia Studio suite of programs; the Pupils’ Skills Gym launches in September. The project has already been shortlisted for a Becta ‘ICT in Practice’ award. Your school can register with them at http://dida.nwlg.org and you can access the resources at www.dida-delivered.org Many commercial resources are also available for purchase with eLCs, including materials written by Edexcel’s Chief Moderator, Elaine Topping, and Qualifications Leader, Ann Weidmann, published by Pearson Longman. If for many schools the cost of commercial solutions is prohibitive, software company Serif have free resources in preparation for autumn that will enable teachers to deliver the curriculum for the Graphics module through their suite of programs, and they plan a similar free package of materials for the Multimedia unit. Summative Project Briefs for levels 1 and 2 Multimedia and for level 2 Graphics will be available on the dedicated Edexcel website at the end of September; the first brief for level 1 Graphics will be on the website by the end of the year: http://dida.edexcel.org.uk/home Paradoxically, although the latest Department of Culture, Media and Sport statistics confirm the increasing significance of the creative industries to the economy, with employment totalling 1.9 million jobs in June 2002, and with the Design sector showing a 6% increase above the average in employment for those industries, too few students choose to study for public examinations in art and design. As John Steers, General Secretary NSEAD, concluded in his paper to the NSEAD Annual Conference at Tate Modern in May 20051, “over two-thirds of students make the judgement at the end of Key Stage 3 that it (i.e. school art) is not very relevant to their future prospects”, arguing that, “it is the content that must change and become more pertinent to students’ and society’s needs in the twenty-first century”. DiDA could be one mechanism for such change, broadening future horizons and prompting a shift in curriculum focus from art to design. Rosmond Kinsey Milner References 1 Steers, J (2005), ‘School Art: Time for Change?’, A.N.D Issue 16, Summer 2005, p4.
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