Arts Portfolio: Research Into Practice

Part 2: Visual Arts Education with Hilary Inwood

Kimberly Auger
JI252
December 14, 2015

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Personal Experience and Inquiry Questions
In elementary school I don't remember a lot about art, except for the usual making a
poster or holiday craft activity. In grade 8, however, I had a homeroom teacher whose teachable
was Visual Arts. It was in this class that I thrived in playing with media and colour. I was praised
by my classmates for being talented. Compared to my siblings, however, my artistic talent was
minimal. For that reason, I was self-discouraged away from visual arts and pursued drama
instead.
In my second practicum placement I had the opportunity to teach visual art. I was lost.
Luckily, I had a colleague in the school with me who was very informed about arts education and
was able to help out. I ended up doing a lesson and art piece inspired by Maya D'Angelou and
Jean-Michel Basquiat who was at the time featured at the Art Gallery of Ontario. I read the
students the book written by Maya Angelou featuring the art work of Jean-Michel Basquiat
called "Life Doesn't Frighten Me" (1993). Together we made a mind map describing the
elements of the artwork in the students own words including childish and messy. We then created
a success criteria with the students based on our mind map. The only requirement was that they
use multiple kinds of media. The art work that the students created was incredible.
Connecting the Readings to the Classroom
After having taken this art course at OISE, I feel more postiviely about my foray into art
education in my second practicum. We discussed the importance of bringing accomplished artists
into the class instead of using teacher made models (Buffington, 2015; Roberts, 2005; Gude,
2007). I like that I was able to use an artist who was relevant and featured in the area. I also
appreciate the fact that I was able to talk about the social justice aspect by discussing Maya
Angelou's background. This allowed me to reach a deeper stage of art education.
I'm proud that I did not give the students set expectations or limitations (Buffington,
2015). That said I wish I had taken it even further. I was able to provide students not only with a
concrete example of the importance of art in social justice, but helped to create a deeper
understanding of why art is important. In hindsight I would like to have done more build up to
the creation of the artwork, perhaps having deeper discussion and more information on Maya
Angelou, Jean-Michel Basquiat and their social justice work (Gude, 2007; J.R, 2011; Rushlow,
2007).I would have had the students perhaps do their own mindmaps based on their inspiration
and reflection on the discussion (Buffington, 2015; Roberts, 2005). This may have helped them
with their artistic growth and to make personal connections with the art (Gude, 2007; Roberts,
2005).
I would have liked to also have the students choose their own social justice issue in which
to inspire their work of art which would have allowed the students to create a personal
connection with their work and a sense of pride (Gude, 2007; J.R, 2011; Inwood, 2010; Roberts,
2005). Lastly I would have given the students an opportunity to present their art work and social
justice issue to the class and perhaps had them write or present a reflection on their preparation,
process and product. I would have also displayed the work with the title of the piece in the
hallway of the school to help the students begin to make real world connections and inspire their
ability to make a change in their worlds (J.R, 2011; Inwood, 2010; Roberts, 2005; Rushlow,
2007).

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I took the connections I had made with my little experience in the classroom and my
personal experience in order to develop my inquiry questions into arts education:
1. How can I authentically incorporate social issues that matter to my students into art?
2. Why does art matter in elementary school teaching?
3. How do I teach the importance of art education?
Connecting Further Research to the Classroom
While my inquiries into arts education will always be evolving and have already evolved
through my interaction with this course, I have learned through my research that in order to
address my inquiry questions I have to educate myself. It is important for me as a teacher to
understand what is going on in the world in terms of social issues in order to help educate my
students (Garber, 2004). Furthermore, it is important for me to see myself as an agent of change
and to bring in examples of art that discusses world issues (Garber, 2004; Rushlow, 2007). Only
once I educate myself will I be able to instill in my students the importance of art in a real-world
context and their importance as agents of change (Garber, 2004).
The overall theme of my inquiry questions and therefore of my research seems to fall
under what is known as Transformative Education (Bastos, 2010; Garber, 2004). This idea is that
we educate our students in order for them to change the world (Bastos, 2010). In order to do this
in the classroom there must be space for students to explore their own passions, and ideas. That
said, there also needs to be actual education which means teaching children how to think
critically and develop their own opinions perspectives, and interpretations of the world (Garber,
2010). In other words, this means developing an art curriculum where students are not consumers
of art or artists to-be but are creators of real and relevant artwork (ibid).
Some resources that I will be relying on as an arts educator include bringing in guests
from institutions such as OAC Artists in Education or the Ontario Art Education Association as
well as leaning on my colleagues. I also look forward to visiting Arts Junktion the TDSB
warehouse in order to gather supplies and ideas. Other fantastic resources include nature itself,
youtube videos and the art displays that are found all around Toronto. The Royal Ontario
Museum, the Art Gallery of Ontario and even Casa Loma or the Bata Show Museum would also
be wonderful resources and field trips.
Cross Curricular Connections
Integrating art into other subject areas is a wonderful way to not only cover curriculum
expectations, but also to differentiate instruction and provide more engaging and deeper thinking
assignments and lessons (Gude, 2007; Rushlow, 2007). Furthermore, by integrating art into other
subject areas we are validating the importance of arts education and teaching creativity, open
mindedness and deeper reflection (ibid).
As Rushlow emphasizes in his article the arts is a perfect way to address, Integrating
learning experiences, [] students own questions, and [] real-life issues relevant to the
student (page 2). This directly addresses my inquiry question of how to authentically
incorporate social issues that matter to my students into art. I can take an issue being discussed in
the news or have students do their own research into world issues that mean something to them

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(Roberts, 2005). This allows integration with technology, research, and literacy. From there I can
have them create a work of art inspired by their choice.
Another cross-curricular connection could be art and history, geography and social
studies. One fascinating assignment in which I read discussed using historical objects and
repositioning them or reimagining them in order to change the interpretation of their importance
(Garber, 2004). While that specific assignment was directed towards a much older age group, I
can see breaking it down to make it accessible to younger students as well. This allows students
to not only perhaps make their own ancient artifacts, but to better understand bias in history.
Ken Robinson discusses the importance of actually teaching creativity in the classroom
(Gude, 2007; Robinson, 2014; Rushlow, 2007). This creativity reaches every aspect of education.
By integrating the arts cross-currciularly we are teaching our students how to be problem solve,
be independent, be creative and see the world from multiple perspectives (Rushlow, 2007).
Conclusion
Overall Visual Art is an extremely underrated subject area. Visual art and the arts in
general can and should be integrated throughout elementary and high school education to teach
students creativity, inspire independent thinking and reflection, and to feed their need to create
and exist artistically. I can say that I am no longer afraid to teach visual art, in fact I'm excited. I
want to give my students the type of art education that I wish I had had as a student. I am excited
to teach creativity, inspire them to change their worlds and discuss world issues. Mostly I am
excited to see their reactions when they realize that "talent" has very little to do with art.

References

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Angelou, Maya; Jean-Michel Basquiat; Sara Boyers and Paul Zakris (1993). Life Doesnt
Frighten Me. New York : Tabori & Chang.
Bastos, Flavia. What does Social Justice Art Education Look Like? (2010). Art Education, 63(5),
2-3.
Retrieved
from
http://search.proquest.com/docview/749642485?
accountid=14771
Buffington, M. (2014). Power play: Rethinking roles in the art classroom. Art Education, 67(4),
6-11.
Garber, E.. (2004). Social Justice and Art Education. Visual Arts Research, 30(2), 422.
Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org.myaccess.library.utoronto.ca/stable/20715349
Gude, O. (2007). Principles of Possibility: Considerations for a 21st century art and culture
curriculum. Art Education, 60(1), 6-15.
Inwood, H. (2010). Shades of green: Growing environmentalism and sustainability in art
education. Art Education, 63(6), 33-38.
J.R. (2011, March). My Wish: Use Art to Turn the World Inside Out [Video file]. Retrieved from
http://www.ted.com/talks/jr_s_ted_prize_wish_use_art_to_turn_the_world_inside_out.
Roberts, T. (2005). Teaching Real Art Making. Art Education, 58(2), 40-45.
Robinson, K. (2014, August 30). Can Creativity Be Taught? [Video file]. Retrieved from
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlBpDggX3iE.
Rushlow, B. (2007). Why middle school art matters. Middle Matters, 16(2), 1-2