The Arts in Every Classroom: The Role of Assessment in Curriculum Design
Teams of teachers discover how to build formative and summative assessments into the units they are developing. They consider assessment strategies used and continue working on their own units by developing performance tasks that address assessment criteria, and create scoring guidelines to measure student success.
The Arts in Every Classroom: Three Schools, Three Approaches
During the school year that followed the filming of the first six programs, a television production crew visited the three Learner Teams at their own schools. Documentary segments show the Learner Teams planning and teaching arts-based lessons that grew out of what they learned. Discussions at the end of the school year, facilitated by one of the workshop leaders, give the Learner Team members the chance to reflect on developments in their teaching practice.
The Arts in Every Classroom: Building on New Ideas
In this workshop for elementary school teachers, you will see how professional learning teams have worked together to implement new ideas in order to expand arts instruction into the general curriculum at their schools. The professional learning teams featured in this program, which are comprised of principals, arts specialist teachers, and classroom teachers, are guided by workshop leaders from the Southeast Center for Education in the Arts.
The Art of Teaching the Arts: A Workshop for High School Teachers - Principles of Artful Teaching
The program opens with teachers sharing passionate insights about why they teach the arts to young people. Then, short classroom segments illustrate how arts teachers employ seven “principles of artful teaching” to meet the needs and imaginations of their students. Participants explore how these principles can affect their own teaching. Subsequent sessions will examine each principle in depth, with examples from dance, music, theatre, and visual art.
The Art of Teaching the Arts: A Workshop for High School Teachers - Developing Students as Artists
In this session, participants explore how arts teachers help students develop knowledge and fundamental skills while weaving in opportunities for creativity and independence. In the video program, a dance teacher gives senior students leadership responsibilities and coaches them in their choreography projects. Then, a theatre teacher mentors stagecraft students who are responsible for the technical aspects of a dance concert. In an intermediate visual arts course, a teacher builds on students’ prior learning in a foundation course. Finally, a vocal music teacher works with two classes: students learning to read music, and an advanced jazz ensemble.
The Art of Teaching the Arts: A Workshop for High School Teachers - Addressing the Diverse Needs of Students
Arts teachers are aware of and respond to the many differences they find among their students. In this program, participants meet a visiting theatre artist who takes advantage of the different backgrounds and learning styles of ninth-graders to help them understand and embrace the playwriting process. A visual arts teacher brings together honors art students and students with disabilities, so they can learn from each other. As a music teacher works with different classes, she addresses needs common to all students. Finally, in a movement class for non-dance majors, teachers help students explore human anatomy.
The Art of Teaching the Arts: A Workshop for High School Teachers - Choosing Instructional Approaches
Arts teachers take on a variety of roles and use many different instructional techniques as they engage with their students. Teachers can be instructors, mentors, directors, coaches, artists, performers, collaborators, facilitators, critics, and audience members. In this program, participants follow a vocal music teacher as she takes on different roles in order to encourage students to find creative solutions to artistic challenges. Next, an acting teacher becomes a facilitator as his students report on research about theatre history. Then a visual arts teacher guides her students in a drawing assignment, varying her approach based on the students’ individual needs. Finally, two dance teachers engage students in critical analysis of a painting, as a way to encourage expression with words as well as movement.
The Art of Teaching the Arts: A Workshop for High School Teachers - Creating Rich Learning Environments
Arts teachers create a safe environment where students feel free to express their thoughts and feelings, and to take creative risks. In this program, participants meet an Acting I teacher who helps students let go of their inhibitions, and an Acting II teacher who encourages students to take creative risks as they interpret monologues. In dance class, a teacher asks students to work closely in pairs so they can study subtle aspects of movement technique. In a visual arts department, the teachers work together to create a community that gives students multiple outlets for artistic learning. Finally, a music teacher builds his students’ confidence and skills as they learn the basics of improvisational singing.
The Art of Teaching the Arts: A Workshop for High School Teachers - Fostering Genuine Communication
Arts teachers communicate with students, and students communicate with each other in respectful ways that encourage communication of original ideas through the arts. In this program, participants meet a dance teacher whose students draw choreographic inspiration from poetry and sign language. A visual arts teacher gives her commercial art class an assignment that enables them to communicate a concrete idea through several visual media. A theatre teacher encourages student interaction around the dramatization and staging of fables. Finally, a vocal music teacher asks her students to use “descriptive praise” to critique the performance of a fellow singer.
The Art of Teaching the Arts: A Workshop for High School Teachers - Making the Most of Community Resources
Arts teachers develop relationships with community members and organizations by bringing artists into the classroom, taking students beyond school walls, and asking students to draw inspiration from the voices of their community. In this program, participants see a guest choreographer who challenges students with her working style and expectations. A visiting theatre artist helps playwriting students develop monologues based on interviews with people in the neighborhood. A visual arts teacher and her students work with community members to create a sculpture garden in an empty courtyard at their school, drawing inspiration from a nearby sculpture park. A band teacher invites alumni and local professional musicians to sit in with her classes, giving students strong musical role models.