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Teaching, Testing, and Creativity

  • Posted on December 31, 2013 at 5:51 pm
Blue Angel Wings by Katherine Svoboda

I encourage creativity in my students. I cannot imagine a life without making something new.

Where I am teaching I see a high emphasis on test scores.  Since I teach in an area that we are not able to “score”, I find that the administrators and teachers don’t really understand the value or creative aspects of art.  Consequently, the course is treated by some as a “filler” so that they can have their planning periods.  If we are to educate children for the future, we will have to begin by first educating the educators. Since there hasn’t been a clear-cut way of gauging creativity, it has been grossly over looked in the schools.  Even the physical arrangement of our classrooms does not support creativity.  I sense that “learning for tomorrow” is learning how to be a creative individual that can handle a variety of situations, whether they be emotional, physical, mental, or whatever.

Strangely enough, I wrote these words way back in the early eighties when I was teaching at my first teaching job and attending graduate classes.  I recently came across an old notebook that I use to write in.  When I came across these words, I couldn’t believe it.  Test scores?  My how things don’t really change after all.  We are living in a high stakes time of testing but the push for testing has been going on as long as I have been teaching.  The thing I find frustrating is how unimportant creativity seems in all of this.

However, my perspective on creativity has never really changed.  I have always felt that the most important thing for learning is creativity.  Students need to have time to explore when they are learning.  This exploration needs to involve the student in ways that force him/her to create something new, to come up with new ideas, to think outside of the box.  Most people are not aware of the many known cases of creative people that were not recognized in regular school education, but somehow through their own creativity became successful.  Of course, Thomas Edison comes to mind right away.  However, are you aware that people like Ben Franklin, Bill Gates, Albert Einstein, Walt Disney, Richard Branson, John D. Rockefeller, George Burns, Colonel Sanders, Charles Dickens, Elton John, Harry Houdini, and Ringo Starr all quit their formal schooling at young ages?  Some went back to school, like Einstien, but others flourished by finding something they really were interested in doing.  I think the way we school students today we do not allow children to discover what truly interests them.   If you can find something that you are interested in doing and you spend countless hours perfecting your abilities at getting better at it, you may become an expert in that field.  I often think about the first time I threw a pot on a wheel.  Of course, I could hardly center the clay, let alone create a worthy piece of pottery.  It actually took years before I felt like I was somewhat of an expert, and even that meant that I could not necessarily throw huge pieces of clay.

Why have we, as parents, allowed schools and government to take our children and push two subjects at them as though that is all that is important?  It is reading or it is math.  These two areas count for everything these days.  Of course, I think these subjects are important and obviously, if you cannot read, your opportunities will be limited.  However, the next Einstien may be sitting in a classroom where a teacher thinks he is “slow” or dim witted because he doesn’t score well on government-mandated tests.  Seriously, we are messed up as a society, when all we care about are test scores.  As human beings, we are more than our last test score.  The measure of a man or a woman is not what they scored on their ACT or SAT but on how they live their life.  I worry about our society as we elevate the students that score well on tests and ignore the students that may be daydreamers or late bloomers.  We cannot discredit the different ways people learn and we should not treat students as a one size fits all mentality.  We should embrace their differences and encourage creativity and original thinking.  People that are willing to make mistakes and try something new will be willing to think outside the box and come up with new ideas.  Those new ideas may be the next invention or innovation of an old idea.  No one knows what the future is going to hold.  I didn’t have a clue almost thirty-five years ago when I wrote that paragraph about testing that it would hold true today as well.   As a society, we say we appreciate creative people but we try to put square pegs in round holes every opportunity we get when we ignore the natural creativity of children.  Ken Robinson explains in this video how our formal education system does everything it can to undermine children’s creativity.

http://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity.html

In the end, we must teach our children to discover their interests and really follow their dreams.  What is it that is going to take to make them better people?  What is going to make them reach their full potential?  Should it be just about making money or is there something more?  What is going to make them truly happy?  We all want to produce something.  We want to feel joy and nurture our interests.  I have to agree with Alan Watts when he asked a simple question:  What do I desire?  What if money were no object?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_sbcSRMsOc
As a society, what are we teaching our children to value?  Is it all about making money or is it about something more creative than just that?  How do we stand out in a world where we are asked to all conform to that square peg?  The artist in each of our children wants to stay an artist.  Why are we happy when our children put away what we deem to be “childish” things such as art?  Art is our humanity.  It is what differentiates us really from all other life forms. We should embrace our creativity, nurture it, and develop it.

 

 

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Art Education and High Stakes Testing

  • Posted on July 16, 2012 at 9:07 pm

Above are artworks created by some of my middle school art students this year.  Keep all of this in mind as you read on about what I’m thinking about today!

It has been about a month since school was let out for the summer.  I have been busy working on curriculum for a new course I will be offering this year.  It is an animation/film class for seventh and eighth grade students.  I am very excited about the plans I am working on for the course and I have received much needed support from my principal.  However, as I sit here thinking about the excitement I will be creating and developing in this course, I wonder about all of the schools that have chosen to dismiss the arts in their curriculums to give more time for developing test taking strategies.  In the infinite wisdom of our federal and state legislators, the bottom line is how students perform  on a standards based test.  This test is basically a multiple choice test about information that the students will probably never use in the most important parts of their adult lives.  We have become a nation of test takers.

If we aren’t testing our children through these standardized tests then we are testing them for ADD and many other worrisome things to try and “fix” them.  Our children are being judged daily on their fitness.  They are told they are stupid and over weight.  The remedy seems to be to make school even more miserable for them!  In the high stakes environment of test taking our children are the human guinea pigs, chess pawns really, in the ever changing education system that tells them that they are failures on a continual basis.  With each test that tells them they are not proficient how does a child cope with this news?  Even in our adult lives we have become test takers.  For many adults this involves being urine tested in order to get a job.  Teachers take tests to prove that they are intelligent enough to become teachers even though they actually graduated from universities and colleges that gave their stamp  of approval.  We seem to be obsessed with testing.  Unfortunately, our adult compulsion is driving our children crazy.  What child wants to be stuck in a classroom where they are routinely told they are not measuring up?  It is a frustrating time in education.  I have said on many occasions that I am glad my child is not in school at this time.  I just want the insanity to stop!

What I know to be true is that creativity is very important for the development of the whole individual.  Frankly, if you are not able to think outside the box, you will not be able to invent and be innovative.  Our growth as a nation has depended on the innovation and inventiveness of its people.  If we teach our children that the only thing that is important is passing a test,  we do them a disservice.  I came across a document this past year called, “Critical Evidence…How the Arts Benefit Student Achievement”.  The document basically explains that testing has been done and there is proof that the arts, such as visual arts, music, dance, etc., help improve the SAT test scores of students that are consistently involved in them.  I just want to say, “Duh!”  However,  many people don’t understand the value of the arts in the thinking and learning process.  While the document stressed that No Child Left Behind treated the arts as important as the core subjects, the reality is that in order to achieve the adequate yearly progress required of NCLB many schools left the arts and made more time for drilling students to try and get them to “learn” the material.

We have been fortunate here in Sturgis as the arts have been an integral part of our students’ learning and have been supported by the administration, board members, teachers, and the community at large.  It doesn’t mean we aren’t feeling the pressure though.  I have had to become more than the visual arts teacher in recent years.  My evaluations will be based on student’s reading scores just like many core teachers’ evaluations.  It doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me but after all I’m just one of those creative thinkers that tends to think outside the box of legislative opinion.  I do everything I can to help my students become better students, better people, and over all better equipped for their future but sadly what the legislative body wants to measure is what a student does on one particular day in one particular year of a student’s life to determine not only the student’s fitness and progress but also the teacher’s fitness and progress.  From my point of view I think this is just basically stupid.  I was at the 8th grade awards’ presentation last month.  I noticed that many students that I had taught that are very bright did not get an award for being proficient on the MEAP.  There has to be something wrong with this test when I see students that are top in their class walking away without that word “proficient” attached to their name.  They have been deemed not proficient.  How sad that we have labeled students in such a manner.  I think most people that are not in the education system might not be aware of everything that is going on in schools all across America.  Parents have been told that it’s the teachers fault that their child is doing poorly in school.  Teachers have targets on their backs and I feel it even on my back although I know how hard I work and how dedicated I am to my profession and my students.  From my point of view, the test making and test preparation companies are making a lot of money off education today.

I’m not saying that there aren’t problems in education today.  I just think that the future innovators and creatives in our community are at risk when we expect our children to just regurgitate information on a test without regard for the art and music of life’s challenges.  The divide I see in my classroom has more to do with the economic problems than anything else.  Let’s face facts; students that come from economically deprived families have a bigger struggle than students from the upper middle class and wealthy parts of society.  Over the past twenty years this has become even more apparent.  The answer to me seems to be in fixing the economy as well as always working to improve our education system.  Times have changed and with that change we should be embracing the technology of the 21st Century.  Teachers that do this will probably remain relevant.  Those that don’t may be kicked to the dustbins of the past.  In my own teaching, I have embraced technology in my classroom and in my life.  I think that living in today’s society is much more involved than just taking a state mandated test of proficiency.  We will not know what this grand experiment will reveal until the students of today are the adult citizens of tomorrow.  I do believe if we don’t change this high stakes testing we will create a world full of neurotic adults that will certainly keep the psychoanalyst’s sofa warmed up with their compulsions and obsessions and feelings of inadequacy.

Will all of these thoughts interrupt what I do in my classroom?  I will continue to work hard on my plans for all of my classes including my new animation/film course and I will remain fully engaged and thrilled to be working with the middle school students that I feel so privileged to teach.  However, this past year was extremely stressful for me.  It had nothing to do with the students and everything to do with this constant testing.  If I can feel it when I absolutely love being a teacher, think how the students are feeling when they are faced with stressed out teachers that are forced to jump through hoops to get their students to pass a test.  It is a sad state that we surely must change.

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The End of Summer Vacation

  • Posted on August 31, 2011 at 12:35 pm

Beautiful Duck Lake in Norhtern Michigan

This year has been challenging for me.  In addition to teaching my regular art classes at school, I chose to take some courses so I could move up on the pay scale.  Originally I was going to take my 20 credits over a period of two years.  However, with everything our governor was busy doing in Lansing, I decided to escalate my goal to be completed in one year.  The classes I took were online courses that were actually very involved and demanding of my time and effort.  This summer I took the final two courses, both involved with using technology in the classroom and developing 21st Century literacy skills.  Now that I have finished my original goal, I have some time for reflection before the students start coming into my classroom.  I am really proud of what I accomplished this year.  While I’m glad I was able to get a pay raise, I was actually surprised at what I have taken away from the courses I took.  I know that I am a better teacher today because of them.  I always thought I was a pretty good teacher.  I have always been very dedicated to my profession and to my students.  What I have learned over this past year were some very useful strategies for helping students to become more motivated in the classroom, better classroom management skills, a greater understanding of adolescent student behavior, and ways to develop and integrate 21st Century literacy skills into my art classes.  That sounds like a lot and trust me it was!

I finished my courses on July 18th and since I hadn’t had a moment from the time school was out until then to have any summer at all, I decided to see if I could find a cottage where I could spend a week on a lake just relaxing.  My online search led me to Traverse City Chalet which is a cottage on beautiful Duck Lake near Interlochen and Traverse City.  As the picture reflects, this decision gave me a peaceful summer retreat.  This was just what I needed to get ready for the next school year!  I even managed to spend some time drawing and painting.  I loved it so much I’m going back next summer.  Two of my brothers, Joe and Paul, reside in Leelanau County so I invited them over for a barbeque.  I really didn’t want to leave the lake but I wanted to see them.  My brother, Bob and his wife, Sue, were also visiting Michigan from Alaska.  The dinner party included Joe’s wife Karin and Paul’s ex-wife Bonnie as well.  I am so happy that I got to see everyone as I haven’t been up north in a couple of years.

Given my families love of politics and discussing political issues it didn’t take long before the conversation turned to politics.  What I noticed was the fact that I was surrounded by political conservatives.  I consider myself to be a liberal.  These of course are just words that we attach to ourselves and most people don’t really understand exactly what they mean so I’ll explain what I mean.  My parents were really FDR Democrats.  They were married in 1934 and lived during the Depression and their experiences were shaped in many ways by the Depression.   They were savers and they didn’t waste anything.  My mom and dad were both teachers and my mom was very involved in the union at her school in Kingston, Michigan.  They supported the Reese teachers during their strike.  I can remember going to Reese as a kid!  In my young life both as a Catholic and as a child of my parents, I learned about caring for other people.  So when I say I’m liberal, the policies I’m talking about are policies to help and lift up people so they can become productive citizens.  I believe in helping people that may not be in the best circumstance to be their own advocate.  This doesn’t mean that I think I know what is best for people.  It just means I believe in finding ways to level the playing field.  This can be done mostly through public school education in many ways because the truth is education is the big divider in most countries.  Those that have a good education can usually attain a more successful job and lifestyle than those that don’t.

So I’ll get back to the dinner I shared with my brothers.  What I came away with was how deeply divided politically my family really is.  My brothers grew up with the same teachings I did but we are a world apart in our views.  Bonnie and Sue both like Representative Michelle Bachmann because she is a tax attorney.  I was shocked because in my mind she has said some crazy things.  My brothers are over the top conservative.  Paul even talked about child labor laws and how they are detrimental to the work ethic for young people.  I said the laws are put in place to protect children.  Of course it made me think about the governor in Maine that is working on changing those child labor laws.  This divide that I witnessed at our dinner really seems to be all across our nation.  It isn’t just my family.  It may be your family as well.  The next day my brother Bob came back because he forgot his hat.  We chatted a little longer and I asked him how he could possibly have become so conservative given our parents and our upbringing.  He said he was a Mormon.  Several years ago Bob became a Mormon and that was his response.  I don’t personally know if all Mormons are politically conservative like Bob, but that was his response.  It felt like that was a standard answer.  I didn’t get an in depth response and of course religion choices are always very personal and I don’t think it’s my place to question him about his decisions any more than he should question me on mine.  This dinner party was relaxed and fun and nobody was fighting about politics.  Paul did bring up my hefty donation to John Edwards and made some snide remark about how I helped pay for John’s mistress.  Of course, I told my brothers that I don’t look to politicians of any type for my moral code of ethics and that I still believe in what John Edwards talked about.  He wanted to give a voice to the voiceless, you know the poor!  Of course Paul says John’s a big old phony and that’s the end of that.  Unfortunately, with Edwards being the constant poster child for scummy politicians that voice for the poor is silenced.  On both sides of the political arena politicians have been all too human.  I wouldn’t put any of them on some kind of moral pedestal.  Some of them have even been fairly good presidents though.  Everyone knows about FDR and his mistress or Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings.  Bob said FDR was a terrible president.  Bob said he read some books and I could feel hatred from him for FDR.  My parents loved FDR and they lived during the time.  I have to wonder if Bob’s feelings have more to do with the morality issue than the policies.  It doesn’t matter.  Our country is divided.  We can’t even agree on how to teach our kids.

The conversation moved on to education.  I personally think the push for constant testing is crazy.  Of course we have to meet certain standards but there is far too much emphasis on passing “The” test.  I told my brothers that a test isn’t what any of us remember from our days in K-12 education.  We may remember taking the ACT or SAT as those were memorable days because we were getting ready for college.  However, what most of us remember about our schooling is either some teacher that made us feel great or some teacher that made us feel lousy!  The rest is probably not that important to us today.  What is important for students today is still having great relationships with teachers.  Students need teachers that truly care about them, not how they perform on some test, but about them as children.  Teachers have a powerful position.  They can elevate dreams or crush them!  To me the No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top are both programs that have forgotten the key element to a quality education.  Money is tied in both of these programs to test scores.  This is ridiculous.  The push towards merit pay is not a true standard for teaching quality.  Ultimately, what will be retained by the students in the end after all the dust settles is whether a teacher cared about them or not.  Those students won’t remember the test as being important to them.  They will remember the teachers that treated them like an individual with a heart and a soul.

Monday and Tuesday of this week we had our first “teacher days” at Sturgis and our open house at Sturgis Middle School.  Of course I was in my room last week unpacking my supplies that were ordered for the coming school year and working on my room getting it ready for the open house.  Last Friday I invited a couple of seventh grade girl students to come in and help me and we had a lot of fun.  We took a break and ran to McDonald’s to get some lunch.  We brought it back to the room and those two girls had me laughing so hard I could hardly stop.  I know they are going to remember that silly day they spent with Ms. Svoboda and I will also remember it.  They felt special and I felt special to have some time alone with these two girls to get to know them even better.

Last night we had our open house.  I came away from that open house knowing how much so many of my students really do love me.  It is a wonderful feeling to know that I am having a positive influence on a child’s life.  I had a girl come back to see me.  I was astounded to realize that she is a senior this year.  I told her I wanted to show her something.  Back when she was at the middle school she gave me a student picture of herself.  I had taped it inside this swivel draw under my desk.  Whenever I open that swivel drawer, I see that picture and think of her.  I know she was blown away that I really do remember her and care about her.  She told me she is going to bring me a senior picture.  The point I’m trying to make is when these students are treated special by their teachers, they will remember those teachers.  I love teaching and I love middle school students, even the ones that on occasion drive me crazy!  I know they can have bad days but I also know that if I can reach them and develop a positive relationship they can accomplish great things.

I ended the night an hour after open house because I had a long conversation with a parent and a child that I really care about.  I gave them what I felt was some good advice so that this child will hopefully have greater success in her other classes this year.  As they were walking out the door the little girl had to come back to give me a hug!  I know she knows I care about her.  The point I’m trying to get at is not how wonderful I am but at how important it is for all of us teachers to remember that what is most important in our students’ lives today is not some test, but is still the relationship you create as a teacher.  As a teacher, I feel I wear many hats.  I have to teach, sometimes be a parent, sometimes a friend, and sometimes a counselor.  I have to know how to get a student back on track when their having a bad day, or had a fight with a friend, or seemingly doesn’t care about anything.  Anyone that thinks being a great math, science, art, music or any other type of teacher can be scored by a single test a student takes is just plain stupid!  The true measure of a teacher has more to do with what they have in their heart and their capacity to be persistent and patient and loving with the children they mentor and teach.  I don’t know exactly how this can be measured but I do know that when you can see it in action, you can recognize it!  Great teachers are those teachers we all remember in a positive way.  We hold them in our hearts and remember how special we felt because of them.  I have two teachers that I remember the most.  One gave me a briefcase for my books when I was moving away.  I was in second grade.  The other was a teacher that I remember paddling a boy almost daily when I was in fourth grade.  I know which one I have always aspired to be like.

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A Tale of Two Cities

  • Posted on February 27, 2011 at 8:20 pm

This weekend, just like every other weekend this year, I have been busy working on assignments for a couple of courses I’m taking.  When I finished today, I sat down and watched CNN and HLN news.  I couldn’t help but notice two news posts that seemed like a strange juxtaposition to be next to each other.  One showcased Oscar opulence and the other a scene from the state house at Madison, Wisconsin where protesters are camped out and being asked to leave.  http://www.wkow.com/global/category.asp?c=123753

Tonight belongs to Oscar but I, for one, could care less who or what gets an Oscar.  Watching the news where Wolfgang Puck showed off little Oscar chocolates coated with 24K gold just kind of repulsed me as I thought about what is happening in Wisconsin.  The heat and pressure is really being put on the teachers.  The next move is layoff notices which are now being sent out to teachers by many school boards across the state.  http://lacrossetribune.com/news/local/article_4f6825c2-4160-11e0-afd8-001cc4c002e0.html

Of course we all know that Governor Walker is threatening to layoff state employees as well.  While this is being played out in Wisconsin, Hollywood is busy with all the Oscar parties and events.  The Oscar swag bag could pay for a teacher, benefits and all.  http://www.hollywoodtoday.net/2011/02/27/oscars-2011-even-the-losers-get-75000-plus-in-swag-bag/

It is kind of scary the tale of these two cities.  One full of opulence and one filled with normal people doing normal jobs just asking for the right to negotiate.  It’s even scarier when a simple gift bag for the 1600 or so Oscar elite is worth more than what most teachers received in a year’s salary and benefits.  Winners’ swag bags are worth twice as much.  Imagine a gift worth $150,000!  It’s hard to fathom how the rich, powerful and famous live.  I’m just a teacher.  I drive a 2001 Ford Taurus and I live a simple life but now the government has put a target on my back because I’m paid too well.  I have to “share” the sacrifice.  I don’t have a problem with sharing a sacrifice as long as everyone has to give their fair share.  What I want to know is what sacrifices are the wealthy facing?  What will they be missing in their opulent lifestyles?  Will the Koch brothers have a few less billion to throw around?  Will the Hollywood elite have to give up a few thousand from their swag bag?

Educating our children should be the top priority in our country.  Our children are our most precious resource.  The best thing you can give your child is a good education from dedicated professionals.  I know what I put into my teaching and I see my colleagues doing the same.  I’m sure Wisconsin teachers are dedicated as well.  There may be a few bad apples as every profession has those people that might be considered “lazy”.  However, the truth is teaching is a profession that has come a long way.  Teachers used to be able to teach with an 8th grade education.  Those days are long gone as most teachers have earned the equivalent of their Masters and beyond.  Teachers want to be paid for being the professionals they have become.  Teachers have had a lot of pressure to keep up with the times.  For years teachers have been the first to learn about the new technologies when they come out and they have worked hard to get that technology installed in school districts.  There is much more to the profession of teaching today than has been in the past.  Teachers have to learn new strategies for teaching the 21st century student who has been raised with an appetite for TV, video games and computer gadgets.  Teachers attend conferences, take more college courses and get involved in professional development to improve their teaching ability.  This effort is on going and lasts for the lifetime of the teacher.  Many people have no idea what is really going on in schools today.  They hear something about a test score and think they know the whole story.  Much of what a teacher does on any given day could never show up on a test.  I’ve listened to children tell me how their parent died and why their sad to letting me know they’re hungry, to even showing me their excitement at learning something new in my class.  These are precious moments.  Sometimes I’m teaching and sometimes I’m listening and sometimes I’m just someone showing a young soul that I care about them.  You may see me as someone that needs to share a sacrifice.  I see myself as someone that puts her hand out every day and lifts up children that need a helping hand!

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We’ve Gotta Have Art

  • Posted on April 2, 2010 at 11:11 am

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dG6A71py9nE

Teaching middle school art today is very different from when I was young and just out of college.  I remember the enthusiasm I had for teaching my first class in Fowler, Michigan.  It was so exciting to be out of school and to finally get a job.  I graduated in December of 1977.  It was in the middle of the school year and there weren’t any jobs really available.  I started working at Sugar Loaf Mountain resort as a hostess for the restaurant.  It didn’t pay very much and I didn’t stay long after they wanted me to design wine labels for the same pay as the hostess job.  I also found it very elitist in their attitude.  As an employee we were not supposed to fraternize with the tourists coming to ski the mountain.  I didn’t have a problem with that but they really didn’t want us to even go to the bar or restaurant.  It felt more like the hired help wasn’t good enough to sit next to the wealthy establishment.  I found the place rather stifling with their rules and expectations for the “hired help”.  They found out I had an art background so they wanted to use that.  Regardless of their motives I soon found employment at Kmart in the camera department.  I really enjoyed working at Kmart as they put me in an area where I had a lot of expertise and they respected my intelligence.  In the summer when I was interviewing for a teaching position the management was overwhelmingly supportive.  I was given the time I needed to interview and people were very happy when I snagged my first teaching job.  It felt like a family at Kmart as everyone was very encouraging of the young people that had gone to college and were looking for jobs in their fields.

When I arrived at Fowler I got right to work on working with the young students to create art.  We had so much fun together.  At the end of the school year I organized an art show while the gym teacher organized a dance and the music teacher had a concert.  We had a great turn out from the community and this was established for each year until I left a few years later.  I did manage to paint an eagle with two boys, with scaffolding, on the gym wall.  What an experience that was for someone who is afraid of heights!  I took a break from teaching and devoted myself to my art, making pottery and traveling to different art shows in Oklahoma and Michigan.  For many years I was happy doing this but when my son started kindergarten I volunteered to bring in my pottery wheel and demonstrate for the students.  I fired pottery pieces the students made and fell in love with the idea of teaching again.  I decided to update my teaching credentials.

A lot had happened in my years away from teaching.  Something called D.B.A.E (Disciplined Based Art Education) happened.  I was out of the loop but I easily got back into the loop.  However, teaching art has to be more about art production than anything else.  The art history, aesthetics and art criticism are all important but working with young people today it is so important to actually get their hands on the art materials and help them experience what it feels like to produce art.  In this age of text messaging and quick technology fixes I think it is more important than ever to develop creativity within my students.  So many students don’t have a clue how things are really made and why we buy the things that we do.  While art is all around them in designs that they purchase from their shoes, totes, mp3 players and phones so many of them are clueless about the thought that these items are purchased because of their interesting design concepts.  Some of them think that a computer spits out the design.  They don’t think about what person may have put the idea into the computer.  I try to point this out to my students because there is vast ignorance from most people about these issues.  Art is so important in all of our lives today whether we are aware of it or not.  We are surrounded by art in many forms and we make decisions about art on a daily basis whether it is decorating our homes or buying a car.  Art surrounds us in ways we don’t even think about!

I had an opportunity to review my art curriculum this year.  I was able to add a document camera and a projector to my teaching tool box.  This has resulted in a major change in my instruction delivery.  When I would show students how to do things in the past they would have to look at a mirror placed strategically over my head.  Now it’s projected.  If I’m doing something very detailed I can even zoom in for the students.  That student sitting in the very back of the room can now actually see what I’m trying to show them.  I marvel at this new technology and how computers have snuck their way into the art classroom through art programs and even online galleries.  Some people might think art is a thing of the past but art really is evolving and is the future.  We, as consumers, will always be drawn to beauty and grace.  Art will be in our future designs and really the creativity of our nation is dependent on the continued exposure to all the arts in their many forms.  Without art we become a mass produced society, plastic in many ways, without a heart.  It is art that nourishes our souls and completes our craving to be unique, to know that we are original beings and that we aren’t just one of many but one in a million!

When I was young and a beginning teacher I never thought about how teaching art might change.  It was all pretty basic in my mind.  You draw, paint, and sculpt; whatever medium you use art remains fairly unchangeable in its end result.  However, now I realize that art and its medium is constantly changing.  Today we have artists creating art through recyclables, computers, videos and much more.  Art is never stagnant and never stays the same.  Art is truly the most original thing that one can do.  Art continues to allow our imaginations to soar and our creativity to flourish.  Today there is more to art than ever as we search for new ways to express ourselves.  The importance of art in this rigid testing structure of education cannot be overly emphasized.  If we are to truly think, dream and imagine we must have art in our lives and we must nourish our souls with the making of art.

A video from our high school art teachers and the 2010 Scholastic Art Awards

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Teaching in a Disconnected World

  • Posted on January 9, 2010 at 12:59 am
Global Children

Let's Embrace the Creativity in our Children

The word we always hear about today is “global”.  We are either “going global” or we’re standing still.  However in the American classroom my life as a middle school art teacher has probably helped to make me a bit skeptical of new government educational plans.  We seem to be pressured to make our children “global” beings that will “beat” all the other “global village” people as the government keeps telling us our children are not quite up to par.  The arts are always the first to be cut because greater minds than mine have decided that they must be a “frill”.  I always think those people simply must have absolutely no talent and imagination.  The arts are far more than a “frill” and serve a far greater good than most people can even imagine.  If you are wearing beautiful clothes, driving a highly designed vehicle or live in a fabulous home thank the artist that brought the design to fruition.  I know that many people have absolutely no idea of how most items are created and even brought to market.  If it wasn’t for the very artists that create the cool designs that make us all want to buy the next great thing, we’d all be driving around in box shaped cars and still be computing on the old box shaped computers.

Artists have been treated poorly in this old educational process of teaching for a “test”.  I think picking a, b, c, or d on a test is basically pointless.   The truth is no one will really know the end result of all this testing until these test takers become productive tax paying citizens that the government and business clearly want to be the next little worker bees.   I, on the other hand, believe that a true education will encompass all aspects of our intelligence.  This fight for the “core” subjects is disheartening to those of us that are on the cutting edge of embracing our creativity.  It is through real creativity that we all can find our true purpose in life.  Creativity allows you to learn how to think and make decisions based on realizing that there might be more than one answer to a problem.  Test taking makes us believe there can only be one answer and it is the “right” answer.

In life we all know that sometimes things aren’t easy for us.  Sometimes we actually have to think our way out of problems.  The answer isn’t covered on a test.  I think it’s time that we taught students how to think and make creative decisions.  Many children are lost in this test taking mold.  Many have shut down because their exuberance is not appreciated.  Sometimes teachers are so busy teaching for the test that they can’t see the marvelous gifted mind of the student that may be simply struggling with the test taking process.  I don’t blame the teachers or even the administration.  I blame a society that allows arbitrary politicians that promote programs that are just a boon for the test taking industry and a peril for the poor student confronted with all of the tests they have to take.

I think students need to spend much more time using their hands and brains in the classroom whether it be a core subject or my art class.  Students today are spoon fed information and then given countless hours on the computer where things are really quite pointless in many ways.  It’s just a click here and a click there browsing through things but usually not really reading them all that clearly.  We are in such a hurry today that I think we have forgotten the true wonder of education.  It is a joy in my art classroom when I watch a student that didn’t think he or she could draw figure out the drawing process.

Education used to be a wonderful thing to embrace.  Students need to feel that thrill that comes with the discovery of new intelligence.  If we want students to be excited about learning then we have to embrace the creativity that the arts empower in individuals.  The true joy of learning comes through self expression.  While the arts are a power onto themselves they can also enhance the learning in the core classes as well.  It is the individual we need to embrace and cultivate to be the creative adult they are meant to be.  It is not the test taking process that is going to build the next “greatest” generation.  It is the almost innate creativity we all have within us when we are a child that has been suppressed through years of “drill” type instruction that needs to be embraced and nurtured.  If the government wants us to be a “global village” then we should empower our children through creativity in all of their classrooms.

Below I have included an excerpt from Eliot Eisner that I think needs to be examined further.  The truth is number 10 is what I have really been talking about.

10 Lessons the Arts Teach

1. The arts teach children to make good judgments about qualitative relationships.
Unlike much of the curriculum in which correct answers and rules prevail, in the arts, it
is judgment rather than rules that prevail.

2. The arts teach children that problems can have more than one solution
and that questions can have more than one answer.

3. The arts celebrate multiple perspectives.
One of their large lessons is that there are many ways to see and interpret the world.

4. The arts teach children that in complex forms of problem solving
purposes are seldom fixed, but change with circumstance and opportunity. Learning in the arts requires the ability and a willingness to surrender to the unanticipated possibilities of the work as it unfolds.

5. The arts make vivid the fact that neither words in their literal form nor numbers exhaust what we can know. The limits of our language do not define the limits of our cognition.

6. The arts teach students that small differences can have large effects.
The arts traffic in subtleties.

7. The arts teach students to think through and within a material.
All art forms employ some means through which images become real.

8. The arts help children learn to say what cannot be said.
When children are invited to disclose what a work of art helps them feel, they must reach into their poetic capacities to find the words that will do the job.

9. The arts enable us to have experience we can have from no other source
and through such experience to discover the range and variety of what we are capable of feeling.

10. The arts’ position in the school curriculum symbolizes to the young
what adults believe is important.
SOURCE: Eisner, E. (2002). The Arts and the Creation of Mind, In Chapter 4, What the Arts Teach and How It Shows. (pp. 70-92). Yale University Press. Available from NAEA Publications. NAEA grants reprint permission for this excerpt from Ten Lessons with proper acknowledgment of its source and NAEA.

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