Last and final blog

This semester I have learned a lot especially in this class through experience in the field as well as watching others perform lessons. I really enjoyed the lesson activities in class. I think that everyone had many opportunities to learn from others. It also brought to light many things to think about like classroom organization, guidelines, standards, how to cause student interest, how to talk to a class  using invitational language, how to organize your own self, how to prepare for lessons, and what materials work best for a lesson. I definitely also learned how to introduce a lesson and get students involved and participate. I feel that opening up with artist images, asking the students what they see, observe, what emotions they get, and how they feel about an image is an awesome way to really get students involved and develop their understanding of visual images and culture. I also think that physical warm up activities are a great way to get the energy flowing in a classroom and that it is also a great way to invite students to loosen up, feel free, get creative, and get into it. Many of the lessons I liked this semester also involved not so common materials like the puppet lesson as well as Tanya's 3-d lesson with the foam boards, push pins, and mystery boxes. I feel that those were the most exciting lessons that we did in class. The teachers were having fun and were really excited about it which made everyone excited. What I also noticed was that no one really wanted to stop working which is an excellent sign of student learning and engagement. I definitely plan on snagging some of the lessons student's posted and using them in my own classroom some day with slight modifications. In the end, theory and practice really taught me a great deal and I feel that it was my most productive and interesting semester yet.

Student teaching next semester

I have recently received e-mails about student teaching next semester. My placement back at Ketcham is still pending. I am not sure what is going on about that. However, I was told that I would be placed at Vails gate High Tech Magnet School in New Windsor. The teacher e-mailed me saying she received my resume. She wanted to meet me so a couple of weeks ago I drove down there. The school seemed to be in a nice neighborhood and it was very welcoming. I went during a parent teacher conference night. While I was waiting to meet with the teacher I roamed the halls looking at the artwork that was hung up. The school is a K-5 school and I got the feeling that many of the students were of latino and/or African American descent. When I finally met with the teacher I took a look around her classroom. It was very well organized, had many motivating and art related posters, a lot of student artwork, and many supplies. She wanted to talk to me about coming in to student teach in the spring. She expressed her concern that there is only one week of school, then spring break, then the rest of the weeks. She did not want me to feel as if she was just throwing me in. She seemed very friendly and that she had been teaching for quite some time. She went over what the students would be working on in the spring which was basically form, texture, and space. Then she showed me the schedule. Many of the classes are bilingual classes and 2 are special needs. The bilingual classes are taught in spanish all day and then they get their 45 minutes of english in the art classroom. I thought this was fascinating and I am really excited about it because I am Cuban and it is a great opportunity for me to learn from students as well as practice my Spanish. Overall, I am very excited.

Surrealism in the classroom

During the presentations Tanya and Jennifer talked about how they taught surrealism in the classroom. Recently I have been working on a surrealism based lesson and when I heard that they had done this I immediately became interested. They said that they had a great outcome from it. The students were definitely really involved. One student even said it changed his/her perspectice on art because they did not know that art could consist of nonsense. I personally find surrealism fascinating and wanted to connect it to my body lesson, the one that is about the body and its extensions. In the lesson I am having students paint surrealist landscapes based on their dream, but they are also painting with a physical body extension like the artist Stelarc. I would also be teaching them about Salvador Dali. What concerns me about this lesson is whether or not I should show more surrealist painters or just keep it simple with Dali examples. I do not want to over complicate it, but am unsure if maybe instead of complicating it the lesson would be more interesting. Though I do feel that the lesson itself is a bit complicated and will need a great deal of explaining and visual examples. Explaining what I mean by an "extension" might be difficult. Not only would I be showing Stelarc but I also found child artists who have artificial hands (prosthetic hands) and they still are able to paint and even paint with their false hand. I think that the idea of adding a physical extension to the lesson really could challenge the students. Also the idea of painting a dream is an imaginative extension of the body. A concern I have is that maybe the physical extension does not relate to painting a surreal dreamlike landscape, however they are both 2 extensions. But should they relate?

Today's powerpoint presentations

I  enjoyed today's presentations very much. There were a lot of great discussions going on and it was really great to see what everyone else did. It was also awesome to hear about the differences between schools, students, and environments. What I found really interesting was the diversity in classes we were sent to. Some students were sent to Viscom classes, which I had never even heard of before. Some were sent to graphic design, ceramics, AP classes, photography, and sculpture. It was really was also realy refreshing to see that some students even got to observe glass blowing classes. I definitely got some really great ideas for lessons too from seeing what others did. One in particular that stands out was a painting in watercolors lesson that incorporated using wax paper and saran wrap to create different effects with the paints. The final paintings were beautiful and I feel that it is a great way to teach color and texture. Another great lesson was Joe's in which he taught graffiti. I respect him for teaching something that was completely new to him, but since he knew the kids were interested in it he taught it anyway. The student's drawings came out pretty awesome and he said that they were all really into the assignment. Overall it was really great to see what everyone else had done, what problems they had, what things they learned, and what schools and classroom environments they went to. Everyone had such different experiences and I think that we all learned something from each other. Watercolor and saran wrap video demo

joe and davids lesson

I really thought this lesson was very interesting. I feel the directions and guidelines were a little confusing as well as steps to do in order. When they were explaining things in the demo I thought that they needed to use more invitational language and use less complex words. Some vocab words that were used I didn't even understand so therefor I immediately was lost. However, one thing I really liked about the lesson was how they were able to connect art and reality. For example, they used mugshots and criminal description. They talked about how sketch artists listen to and draw descriptions of criminals in order to come up with a picture to help find them. I thought that this was really awesome because a lot of people have the attitude that art isn't important or it's just a class they have to take in order to pass. But actually art is important and here is one major reason why. We are able to catch criminals or missing persons through art.

The actual lesson and assignment of pairing up with a partner and drawing their memorywas challenging. First it was hard to think of a memory because it is such a vague task. We have so many memories, which one do we choose? Second, I found the work sheet to be a hassle, distracting, and complicated it even more. I was trying to describe my memory while also drawing things which got very confusing. The packet was a really well made packet, but I think it should have consisted of questions we could ask our partner about their memory like "Where were you, who were you with?" etc. And many of the vocab words were way too complex and some even irrelevant to the assignment. It would have also been helpful to sketch out our memories first before we described them, and used pencil. However, I really thought it was a good idea but needs to be more developed an worked out in order to have the effect and success it could have.

Comic Phobia Lesson

The last lesson taught in class was theme based on phobias and they carried out this theme using comic art. I thought that this was a really interesting fusion and has a lot of potential in being an awesome lesson. I felt however that it should be a requirement to make props for the comic. Working in groups was nice because it was great to share ideas. I felt really rushed however because there were so many things that I thought had to be done in one class period. There was the narrative, the 3 different shots that had to be used, a quick sketch of the pictures that were to be taken, prop building, and photographing. It was a lot to think about and a lot that had to be done in one day. Plus it was unclear what had to be done in what sequence, how much time we had, and what we had to accomplish in one day. I feel that the lesson should have been more clear, broken down, and scheduled out. Our group had the most fun in propmaking and overall everyone was really interested in the assignment. Also, the presentation was lacking in how to set up shots and take photos. The demo was really quick and simple and should have had more on photography and perhaps explanations of the assignment. However, I really enjoyed the activity and liked the introduction of the comic. I think that this would be an excellent assignment in a high school classroom, even middle school.

The Body- Our Lesson

The other day Justin and I conducted our lesson on the Body as a Canvas in class. As nervous as we both were I feel that it went over pretty well, but definitely in need of improvement. The opening activity  to teach symmetry was fun and very effective. It got the class moving and interested right away.  I wish we had developed more of a discussion during the presentation by asking thought provoking questions to the class, getting them to think about the techniques of the artist (Judith Braun), make observations about her work, and offer insight about the images we showed. I feel that I rushed through this part and it would have been helpful to take it slowly and really observe and talk about the work. The demo went over smoothly, except it was unnecessary when Justin washed his hands. This could have been fixed if we had wet papertowels already on the table. We also should have clarified the directions, informing the students to first create an abstract fingering, followed by a more figural defined fingering. Also clarification on time to work and time for the lesson and clean up should have been more clear in order to avoid confusion felt by the students. Setting up the room was a challenge in itself. Only 2 students could work per table, therefor we had to utilize the back two tables, move them into view, and stagger all of the tables to make the classroom navigable. The 2 back tables alienated 4 students in the class. This is not something I had considered, but was brought to our attention later so placement of the tables is definitely something I need to keep in mind when setting up a classroom. When everyone was working I was trying to walk around, distrubute my attention evenly, answer questions, but also just let the students work. I tried not to budge in or bother anybody when they were intently working, but when I saw something interesting and innovative that a student was doing I had a mini conversation with that student about it. The butcher paper was definitely a distraction and should have been ripped beforehand. After the lesson and clean up we had some leftover time for a quick recap and questions concerning how the students felt during the activity and using a new part of their body. Overall thought I think it was a fun lesson that the students were excited about doing. They seemed interested in the working process. A few students told me later on that they really liked the activity and thought it was a lot of fun and they learned a lot about using another part of their body to create art.
Judith Braun video