Arts Challenge Unit 1 A & B
Unit 1 Parts A & B
Silver Unit 1 is all about your extending your personal arts practice and your knowledge of pathways into the arts. In Parts A and B, you plan and achieve an arts challenge. Here's what you need to do...
Part A: Plan your Arts Challenge
Part A is all about figuring out and developing your own arts skills. You could explore a skill you already have or learn something completely new. A good starting point is to note down the skills you already have, what you might want to develop and why you’ve chosen your challenge. You could write this down, create a diagram or poster or draw a picture to help you plan.
In Part A you should:
- Spend around one to two hours a week for three months developing your skill
- Record your own strengths and weaknesses in your chosen arts skill
- Discuss with your Arts Award adviser what would help you achieve your challenge. Do you need extra lessons or help from a teacher or friend? Do you need access to special equipment or materials? Where will you do your challenge?
- Make an action plan for your challenge. It should describe what the arts challenge is and help you set out a timetable, what you need and a plan to record and review your progress. This doesn’t have to be written, it could be a video diary or photo blog, whatever you fancy! It’s best to talk to your adviser about it.
Part B: Deliver and Review your Arts Challenge
There are two things to do for Part B:
Deliver your challenge - make sure to use your plan from Part A
Review how well it went and what you learned. You’ll need feedback from other people to use in your review.
Check out this video from Erica for an example of what they did for their Silver Arts Award, Unit 1: Part B.
Mini Checklist for Unit 1 Parts A and B
Make sure you include these in your portfolio:
- Your art form strengths and weaknesses
- Details of your arts challenge and why you chose it
- How you are going to achieve your challenge (including practical arrangements and how you will gather feedback)
- A record of you achieving your challenge
- A review of your arts challenge including feedback from others on your challenge
Download prompt sheets (in Word)
Download prompt sheets (in Google Docs)
Download a prompt sheet to help you plan your Arts Award
You can also download the 'What To Do' pages and a Portfolio Checklist from the Downloads page.
Arts Review Unit 1 C
Unit 1 Part C
This part is all about reviewing the arts as an audience member. You could review a live event such as a performance, backstage tour, exhibition, fashion show or an online art gallery or film.
You need to:
Experience an arts event as an audience member
Review it and share your review.
To find events happening in your area check out the Arts Award Supporters map or Voice’s Opportunities listing.
Tips for sharing your review: You could share it with your group, upload it to a blog, share it on a notice board or publish it right here on Voice. Get ideas by reading other young people's reviews and or Voice's guide to reviewing
Tips for writing your review: We’ve gathered some of the best advice from around the web to help you write the best reviews.
Check out this video from Erica for an example of what she did for her Silver Arts Award, Unit 1: Part C
Mini Checklist for Unit 1 Part C
Make sure you include these in your portfolio:
- Your reviews
- Evidence of sharing your review
- Tickets, programmes, flyers and any other information about events you experienced
Download Prompt Sheet (Google Doc)
Download a prompt sheet to help you plan your Arts Award
You can also download the 'What To Do' pages and a Portfolio Checklist from the Downloads page.
Arts Research Unit 1 D
Unit 1 Part D
This is your chance to find out how artists or arts organisations work - you can do this through meeting arts practitioners and through researching arts organisations.
Find out how they developed their career and what their working life is like.
Once you’ve done your research, have a think about the opportunities, careers or training you could take in your chosen art form to help build careers which interest you.
Get creative with the ways you research!
You could:
Visit a museum or arts organisation
Interview an artistic director
Watch an artist or arts organisation at work
Get involved in a workshop, then interview the arts leader afterwards
Want some ideas?
Take a look through the Want My Job and What Goes On At? series on Voice and read Luke's How to Write an Arts Interview. You'll soon get some ideas for the questions to ask when talking to a professional. Joanna Bailey's feature on How to Research an Artist is also really useful!
Then look through Voice's Careers section to find out more about how to get into the arts - or head over to the creative careers website Creative Choices
Mini Checklist for Unit 1 Part D
Make sure you include these in your portfolio:
- Evidence of participation in a workshop of arts events
- What you found out about artists/art professionals
- Research into potential career opportunities
- Reflection on what you found
Download Prompt Sheet (Google Doc)
Download a prompt sheet to help you plan your Arts Award
You can also download the 'What To Do' pages and a Portfolio Checklist from theDownloads page.
Arts Leadership Unit 2
Unit 2
Your Silver Arts Award Unit 2 is all about developing your arts leadership skills. You get to plan and deliver an arts project, supported by your adviser. You can work on your own or as a member of a leadership team.
Your arts leadership project can be a single event, like a gig, exhibition or performance, or a specific responsibility within a bigger project, such as marketing, or set designing as part of a team. Check out this video from Ludus Dance to see what others have done for their Silver leadership projects:
Top tips for being a successful arts leader for Silver Arts Award:
Identify the leadership skills you want to develop
Develop your project creatively
Consider the interests and abilities of your participants or audience
Define your own leadership role and other responsibilities within the project
Organise resources and/or people
Communicate effectively
Plan how you're going to get feedback
Here's what you need to do to achieve your Unit 2 Silver Arts Award.
Parts A & B: Plan an arts project
Create a project plan in a format that suits you. Your plan should include:
- A description of the project
- Your role in the project, including the leadership skills you want to develop
- Who you will work with and their roles
- The aims of the project
- The resources needed
- Information about any health and safety issues
- How the project will be promoted
Take a look at this video from The Green Room school on their Silver leadership project:
Parts C & D: Deliver
- Gather evidence of what you did to make your leadership project happen (eg photos, video, audio)
- Make notes about how you encouraged/supported/communicated with others
- Make notes about how you're developing your leadership skills
Part E: Review
- You need to write a report on how the project went and how successful you were as a leader
- Include your own views, feedback from others and what you learned
Want some how-to guides?
Mini Checklist for Unit 2
Make sure you include these in your portfolio:
- Your project plan including your role, the leadership skills you want to develop, resources you will need and health and safety considerations
- Evidence of how you promoted the project
- Evidence of how you communicated with others (eg mind maps, emails, letters, discussion in meetings)
- Evidence of your project taking place (eg photos, DVD, audio)
- A report on your leadership project including reflections on your leadership skills, reflections on how well the project went and feedback from others
Download prompt sheets (in Word)
Part A Part B Parts C & D Part E
Download prompt sheets (in Google Docs)
Part A Part B Parts C & D Part E
Download a prompt sheet to help you plan your Arts Award
You can also download the 'What To Do' pages and a Portfolio Checklist from the Downloads page.
