Technical drawing in progress in Mrs Hislop's Higher Graphics class

Some of the girls in Mrs Hislop's Higher Graphics class

Higher Graphics interpenetration orthographic

We currently run Graphic Communication at Standard, Higher and Advanced Higher grades, and traditional technical drawing is still a major part of these courses.

With the new ‘Curriculum for Excellence’ subjects beginning to be rolled out over the next few years, will SQA use the reorganisation to reduce or completely remove technical drawing from the courses on offer?  Just how useful is the skill out in industry?  There’s no doubt that doing technical drawing helps pupils learn to read orthographic layouts, and I expect that reading drawings is a useful skill out in industry.  However, interpreting drawings could be learned without actually drawing with a pencil and instruments.  Additionally, industries are moving towards a workflow that goes direct to 3D CAD design, cutting out the need for ortho drawings / printed drawings.

A reduction in the time spent on technical drawing would allow time for pupils to learn such skills as:

Animation; 3D graphics for video games and product simulations; web design; 3D CAD for CAM; video recording, editing and compositing; more in-depth DTP and illustration skills.

We’re dabbling in most of the above skills, but as things stand there are limited opportunities to tie some of them in to SQA graphics courses, to allow pupils to gain credit for their work.  In some cases we’re interpreting the current arrangements documents in unusual ways to do so.

Jim