Child WOrkshop Reflection

Reflect on your time with the child you worked with. What succeeded and why - refer to Dewey and other readings? What did not succeed and why not - again, try to find a reason based on the readings you have done for this class. If you could work with this child again, what would you like to do next time to develop what you today's experience?

In my project I worked with Tristan aged five. We created the most wonderful earth sculptures and indulged in photography. This project succeeded on all levels largely due to the fact that both myself as the teacher and Tristan as the student had room for flexibility and were open to changing and growing our plans and concepts. I think the main lessons an educator I would take from this project is to adjust to fit the needs of my students and I think having that flexibility, that movement and adjustment that comes from being in tune and aware of your students learning is very much a concept of Dewey. I know now more about focusing my students attention and how to listen more carefully when they share with me because it is important to documenting and understanding their learning but I don’t believe I would change anything were I to do it again. The learning I gained even when my project didn’t go to plan were valuable to me as a teacher and even to Tristan as a student as in a classroom setting as with our time together we can never guarantee that the day will go exactly to plan.

Special Education

How does learning in, through or about art change when we begin to look at moving beyond a standard, Western European based, middle class curriculum? What to these “special” cases reveal to us about the central issues for our practice as art educators?

When we teach we have the fortune to teach children from all walks of life with all sorts of unique skills and abilities. In addressing all of these differences we must recognize accept and accommodate all of these differences. In the past we may have separated our special needs students from those we classified as “normal” because we didn’t ant coping with the special to handicap the majority now however we have grown past this older notion.

Practice now is to integrate our students and all of their abilities and skills into one classroom. This aids special students in avoiding being ostracized by their peers and encourages tolerance and acceptance amongst all of the students. While benefiting the students socially and even in many ways developmentally having integrated classrooms also presents an interesting challenge. Teachers must be versatile and open minded in addressing the needs of all their learners. Whether that means going slower for children with delays or providing special programming for children who are gifted and have passed the knowledge of their peers. Classroom assistants can help monitor the special and gifted children to ensure all needs are met.

In Art we have a special opportunity for this integration. The creative side of art the freedom and ability for self expression and self discovery allows for every child to find their own spaces and own expressions based on skill and developmental levels. Art can cross the bridges between these differences because it can embrace differences and highlights the benefits in diversity.

Community Based Learning

What does learning in a community-based setting afford children? What are they able to learn in a community-based setting that they would not be able to learn in a school setting? What does teaching in a community-based setting afford the educator? What can one do in a community-based setting that one could not do in a school?

Community-based learning is very valuable for children. It allows children the opportunity to learn outside of a traditional setting which can afford them a certain amount of freedom and flexibility. This can mean more diverse experiences, often culturally based as well as more involved and hands on projects that they would not normally encounter in everyday life. It also allows an opportunity for new teachers with new perspectives that will broaden both student and teachers perspectives helping them grow as humans and artists.

Additionally the generally voluntary nature of involvement on the behalf of the participant lets the participant take much of the control and lead in their own learning. This can often mean learning in new avenues or directions than are covered in the standard curriculum. The smaller groups and less structure also allow for more individualized learning suiting the varied developmental levels found in modern classrooms.

When teaching in a community setting the educator can take more ownership for their lessons and programs. Developing it and tailoring it to the specific needs of their students once again taking education in new directions and into new subject areas accessing new resources even as far as new educators.

Museum and Gallery Experience

Describe your most meaningful learning experience in a museum or art gallery. What elements made it so. Relate this experience to Dewey’s notion of a “good” experience.

My most meaningful experience in a museum or art gallery occurred fairly recently, last year in fact at the Glenbow Museum. It was my first time participating in a museum school tour and in the Art of Asia gallery the first gallery on our tour Michelle Gallant the head of the Museum school program had us all, students, teachers and volunteers sit as she showed us a Buddha statue and told us the story of Buddhism. Though she didn’t ever say it the lesson Michelle taught us that day on that tour were of how to look listen and truly engage with art in a museum or gallery setting. It was the first time I actively connected with a piece of art and was able to spend time with it, engage and learn. It was a good experience because it opened my eyes and gently led me to a more in depth understanding. In regards to Dewey it was a good experience because Michelle used art to provoke and foster further learning and investigation.

Lesson Plan Issues

What issues arose as you tested your lesson plans? Why did these issues arise? Can you ever fully anticipate every detail of the situation you will be working in? What role does planning play in a responsive teaching approach? After reading Chapter 19, do you need to modify your plans to address safety issues?

The main issue that I encountered when I was testing my lesson plan was my child’s disinterest. He did not fall neatly in line with my plans but had strong ideas of his own about what he wanted to do and where his interests lay. I had underestimated his creativity level and understanding. This was actually a valuable thing to have happen because you can never fully guarantee or anticipate every detail of your working situations and having an unexpected hurdle with my plan reminded me to be open and flexible.

Planning plays an important role because without planning and premeditated ideas of how your lesson is meant to go you wont be familiar enough with the skills and objectives or goals you mean to teach to flex your lesson and activities to meet the goals if you do encounter obstacles. A plan gives you guidance and a fallback plan to keep you on track even if you go a completely different direction.

As far as safety is concerned I do not think I will need to modify my plans, except I will need to remember to reinforce the guidelines and boundaries between Tristan and I before we depart on our trip to Nose Hill so we don’t have disagreements or misunderstandings when working in a large park with a number of strangers.

Studio Reflection

Reflect on the studio work you have done this semester. Which experiences did you find the most successful, in terms of Dewey's criteria of a "good" experience, and why? Which experiences did you find least successful, again according to Dewey's criteria, and why? What have you learned about art and learning? What would you still like to learn

I found all of the studio projects I did this summer were very successful. They provided useful ideas of projects we could implement in practical settings when we actually begin to work with children. They also helped us understand the process of creation and planning that goes into various projects.

The first project we did, my project, the one with painting and drawing as effective because it helped us relate symbols and shapes to reality, providing understanding of the construction of images and art and how symbols connect to our work and the world around us. The creative aspect and the flexibility of the creations fed the development and fluidity of the story telling age of our children.

The second project, our fish sculpture/diorama project was engaging as we were able to use both visual cues such as books and tie them to our imaginations to create in 3D. This helps us understand special awareness and distance as we could manipulate our sea creatures in the environments we created. It also encouraged us to explore new textures, shapes and tools.

The next project, where we created a book with our own characters using technology and PowerPoint to bring the book to life. This taught practical computer skills as well as fine motor definition in manipulating the mouse to make our creations.

The last project, our bubble painting and paint mixing was good as it brought in our understanding of states of matter, taught us about the creation of color and also allowed us to freely create without guidelines.

The variety in our projects and what they taught us allowed a strong understanding of the fact that the key to art is flexibility. It taught me that art can be created and defined in so many ways and used to teach and grow in so many ways that they are an invaluable tool to allow for children’s developmental growth. Art is significant as a tool to teach children to be well rounded and to explore their world, moving outside of the box. In my continual learning I would like to develop my own skills and do more research into intergrated learning.

Learning Characteristics Questions

Questions I will ask my child's parent about her learning characteristics:

- What are your child’s reactions to art and his current involvement with and preferences for art?

- Is your child willing to move outside of his comfort zone to create art?

- What experience or exposure has your child had to art created by others?

- Where is your child comfortable creating art?

- What other learning’s would you like to intergrate with your child’s art?

Drawing Experience

What is your drawing history? Where have your notions of the role of drawing in art come from? How do you manage your “drawing anxiety?” After reading Kalin’s chapter, describe how you might mentor an anxious draw-er into the joy of mark-making.

I have an extremely limited drawing history. While I used to sketch and draw a lot as a child I do not do it so much anymore. While I doodle in class or when I am on the phone I very rarely attempt realistic interpretations. The feelings and notions I have about drawing in art come from my early experiences with art. I was never could at creating drawings that were true to reality and this resulted in my having negative feelings about drawing. Those negative feelings transferred into a feeling of failure in terms of drawing and therefore art, I felt art to be defined by your ability to draw and as I felt I couldn’t draw I felt disconnected from art.

In terms of how I manage my drawing anxiety I don’t really I guess. I mainly avoid drawings I would have to share others or make jokes and use humor to distract from what I feel is my lack of drawing ability and the lack of realism in my art that makes me feel like it is not very good.

After reading Kalin I would mentor an anxious drawer by trying to teach to engage with their creativity and understand there is value in whatever skill and skill level they have. I would share with them work outside of realism so they understand that they can create their own art and not to get discouraged. If they understand there are different styles of drawing they will be encouraged to embrace drawing for how they can use it to express themselves and their unique personalities as well as embrace who they are as people.

Discuss the importance of documentation to teaching and to a child's learning

Discuss the importance of documentation to teaching and to a child's learning. What are the challenges of documentation to the classroom teacher? What are some strategies that would help address these challenges?

Documentation is important to teaching and to the learning of children because it helps to reinforce the ideas and objectives of the teacher. Documentation also shows valuable information about the progress of the children, which could otherwise be lost in the larger classroom setting. Documentation allows for children to become better listeners who are more in tune with their students.

The challenges to documentation for the teacher involve one teacher trying to monitor and take note of the behaviour and development of group of students that outnumbers them significantly. It is impossible for the teacher to monitor the entire class at once. To aid in the documentation of the entire class the teacher could implement a number of strategies. They could utilize parents and classroom assistants to monitor the children and help with documentation to ensure no aspect of learning and development is overlooked. This will also help in overcoming another obstacle, which is the challenge of distraction from teaching that can arise from documentation distracting you from your focus to teach.

What were the benefits of the peer teaching events? How would you incorporate peer teaching in an elementary classroom?

There are many benefits to peer teaching. It enables us to enhance our teaching skills and practice in a safe and constructive environment. It allowed us to experiment and to learn from our mistakes and take growth from it. As the students in the exercise we got new and interesting views into how the lessons worked and saw new ways to improve and grow with them. It also allows for brainstorming and cooperation resulting in the best lessons possible.

To incorporate peer teaching into an elementary school classroom in many ways. In the younger grades like k-2 I would have the children “teach” by having them share what they had created and explaining their procedure. This way the students would learn from what their classmates did and gain new perspective on the class projects. In older classes 3-6 I would assign small projects to the class and in small groups they will teach each other different lessons. This could be integrated into almost any subject. This will give the students experience in sharing and communicating with their classmates while also instilling confidence and creativity n how they present and develop their projects to their individual interests and abilities. The students will be able to learn like we did and also enjoy learning in a non-traditional setting that gives them more freedom then they may normally enjoy.