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.
The Art of Teaching the Arts: A Workshop for High School Teachers - Nurturing Independent Thinkers
Arts teachers use formal and informal strategies to assess their students’ progress, and to modify their own teaching practice. In this program, participants meet a vocal music teacher who splits his choir into groups that give each other feedback; he also has students tape record themselves during rehearsal, so he can judge their individual progress. A dance teacher critiques original choreography by a student and asks the student's peers to participate in the process; this feedback helps the choreographer deepen the impact of her work. Next, theatre teachers give an in-depth critique to a student, and then ask him for feedback on their teaching. Finally, a visual arts teacher helps students develop their observation and analysis skills throughout their high school careers, so that they learn to be their own best critics.
The Arts in Every Classroom: A Video Library, K-5: Introducing Arts Education
This program includes three segments. "What Is Arts Education?" shows a montage of insights from teachers and administrators, plus examples of successful arts instruction in classrooms across America. "What Are the Arts?" features presentations from teachers, administrators, students, and parents, who offer thoughtful and sometimes humorous comments on what the arts mean to them. In "How Do You Know They’re Learning?" educators from several schools tell how they know if their students are learning.
The Arts in Every Classroom: A Video Library, K-5: Expanding the Role of the Arts Specialist
Three arts teachers work with colleagues around their schools, using collaborative techniques that go beyond the traditional work of arts specialists. Kathy DeJean is a dance artist at Lusher Alternative Elementary School in New Orleans; Mary Perkerson is the visual art teacher at Harmony Leland Elementary School in Mableton, Georgia; and Amanda Newberry is the theatre specialist at Lusher.
The Arts in Every Classroom: A Video Library, K-5: Teaching Dance
Two teachers with contrasting training and approaches to teaching bring rich dance experiences to students at their arts–based schools. Kathy DeJean, the dance specialist at Lusher Alternative Elementary School in New Orleans, promotes inquiry and self-expression in a multi-grade dance class. Scott Pivnik, a former physical education teacher at P.S. 156 (The Waverly School of the Arts) in Brooklyn, New York, uses African dance as a gateway to geography, writing, and personal growth for a class of second–graders.
The Arts in Every Classroom: A Video Library, K-5: Teaching Music
Two music specialists from arts–based schools demonstrate different approaches to serving diverse student populations. At Harmony Leland Elementary School in Mableton, Georgia, all 500 students study the violin. Their classes with Barrett Jackson become lessons in character and discipline. At Smith Renaissance School of the Arts in Denver, Sylvia Bookhardt and a class of fifth–graders explore the Renaissance through choral singing.