Teaching for me is about personal connection and facilitating a safe environment with your students and interacting with them on their level rather than simply infusing knowledge. The idea of teaching someone something to copy from influence is one thing, however to teach the learner to be comfortable to explore themselves artistically and at the same time have self discipline takes patience and understanding the individual. Personally I think a learner should be taught from the ground upwards and to slowly neglect bad habits from the past, this relating to technical stumbling blocks or the inability to think outside of the box artistically. I believe students with more insight into their own ability can then become truly versatile and more importantly 'satisfied' with their work and practice. I teach a range of techniques in my art lessons such as palette knife, paint brush techniques and technical sketching methods. I also instruct with a diverse variety of mediums such as pastel, charcoal, pencil, acrylic and oil paint as well as mixed media. With my background in hyper-realism portraiture, the subject matter I specialise in is realist portraiture, also with considerable experience in landscape and still life tutoring. I do encourage my students to venture into abstraction and mixed media aswell, which I feel can loosen up students to learn to relax and have fun also while making artwork. Whether studying for GCSEs, A Levels, University or just your own enjoyment, I teach at a level best suited for the learner and the goals in which they pursue. I would obviously encourage students studying for grades to follow certain assessment checkpoints which would be revolved around contextual and method referencing, self reflection, experimentation and consolidation. This will vary for different learners at different stages and obviously with different interests. I do stress though at the heart of my teaching is technical skills and learning to explore personal artistic growth. These are skills which are easily transferable to whatever stage you’re at with your art practice.