PERSONAL TEACHING STATEMENT
a. A Rationale for Elementary Art Education.
Elementary Art Education should be about many things. It is a time where most young people are first introduced to the vast array of mediums artists can use to create with. Much of what happens in the Elementary Art classroom should be about experimentation and exploration, but it should also be about discovery. As an art educator, it is my job to inform, guide, and excite the young people about what the art realm has to offer them, and how it is possible for them to make a difference through their art making. Within my art lessons, different techniques will be taught along the way, along with knowledge surrounding artists, their artworks, and concepts coming from not only traditional backgrounds, but contemporary as well. It is also important for me as an educator to instill the values of class cooperation, clean up, and the appropriate way to use the materials during this time, considering that most young people will be completely new to art making and the art classroom. I will do my best to teach the young people to appreciate and respect the materials that we have available, and hopefully to be resourceful artists. As an art educator, I am given the opportunity to present our young people with new ideas, and perspectives through my teachings in art. By teaching meaningful concepts within my art lessons, I will be able to open their minds up and get them thinking beyond what they are just surrounded by. I will design fun projects to go along with meaningful lessons, hopefully sparking something within the young people and leaving them with ideas to reflect on. They will learn to love art with me as their art teacher, I hope.
b. A Vision for the Elementary Art Classroom.
The Elementary Art Classroom should be different than any other type of classroom. Unlike other classrooms in an Elementary school that are specifically dedicated towards the teaching of core subjects such as math or science, the Art Classroom should inspire creativity. The Art Room seems extra special to me, not just because I have this passion, but also because as art educators, we are able to incorporate concepts and themes from other curriculum into our classroom more easily (it seems like). The Art Classroom serves as a more open thinking space for the young people, where what I will be teaching can be black and white, but also sometimes gray. The classroom should serve well as a studio space for the young people to create and think, but in order for the classroom to be a successful space, it must be mindfully arranged. Most Elementary Art Educators seem to teach grades ranging from Kindergarten all the way up to Sixth Grade, meaning that the art classroom needs to be set up in a way that will keep students captivated and focused no matter what the age group. There has to be a balance within the classroom. I want to cover my wall spaces with colors, and ideas; I look forward to decorating my own classroom one day, but I am aware that it is all too easy to overwhelm the young people with what I surround them with. I will create a balance between surrounding them with new knowledge, artworks and artists, and also giving them opportunities to rest their eyes. The environment should promote creativity by providing them with an organized area for them to create. A successful Art Classroom environment will also promote group discussion, along with peer collaboration and cooperation, and this can be done through the way in which you arrange their workspaces.
c. A Teaching Philosophy.
My teaching philosophy has been developing for a while now. Only after immersing myself in an actual Art Classroom, was I able to really visualize myself being the teacher. I have learned so much this past semester; so many articles have been read about Art Classroom set-ups, gender issues, the importance of teacher and student assessment, how the visual culture in our world is influential, technology aspects in the art education realm, the list could really go on. My personal philosophy for teaching can be defined by my caring though. I care to teach art lessons/projects that incorporate themes that force my students to think. Most people think that within in Art Classroom, you just have free for all doodle time, I think that there must be a balance between freedom to express and also guiding the students towards developing an awareness through the art lessons/projects. When I say awareness I mean presenting knowledge on a more global scale to the young artists, getting them to think about their communities, along with how the other side of the world functions. We are all connected, and this can be discovered through powerful and meaningful Art education. As an Art educator, I feel that it is also important to think about teaching from a multicultural perspective. The following three statements I have collected from articles from this semester, all of which I felt were associated with concepts that I want to include within my own teaching philosophy: “Artifacts and their environment become significant only when their human elements are examined. These elements range from the cultural, sociological, historical, national, symbolical, structural, and behavioral, to the environmental and functional,” these elements help art educators to connect education to material culture studies (Kader, pg. 20). “Contemporary art offers rich resources and models for radically reshaping and updating art education as it presents new processes) that emphasize the learning at the core of art), hybridized forms (that allow for multiple and fresh models of expression), sources of content (that arise from disciplines outside of art or from real world issues and ideas), and goals (that are educative, journalistic, and/or scholarly)” (Marshall, p. 289). “The importance of assessment on education and educational reform cannot be over emphasized. Assessment initiates change in that it evaluates student progress and points out areas in need of improvement” (Beattie, p. 10). Overall, I want to teach an awareness of self, of world, of life in general, through Art Education.
References
Beattie, D. (1997). Introduction to Art Assessment. In Assessment in Art Education: Art Education in Practice Series (pp. 1-15). Worcester, Massachusetts: Davis Publications.
Kader, T. (2003). Connecting Artifacts With Making Art: Material Culture Studies and Art Education (pp. 19-23). Art Education Magazine.
Marshall, J. (n.d.). Exploring Culture and Identity Through Artifacts: Three Art Lessons Derived from Contemporary Art Practice. In Pedagogical Strategies (pp. 279-289).