Rule for Life, Rules for Living ~Curriculum Document

Rules for Life, Rules for Living ~ A Curriculum Unit for the Conceptual Age

Today's fortune, how fitting.

More than anything else, mankind is hardwired to search for meaning. A large percentage of the world today lives an abundant lifestyle with a vast wealth of information no more than a click away. Pink describes this combination as the optimum conditions for man to seek meaning. Current research indicates a gradual shift in values, from an emphasis on materialism to an emphasis on “self-expression and quality of life.” (P 219) Pink describes this as the *“Fourth Great Awakening.” (P 219) There is no one size fits all in this quest for meaning, but the quest for purpose is a fundamental part of who man is and what he does. The fields of medicine and business are beginning to recognize the importance of spirituality, not in a religious sense, but as part of the quest for meaning. Productivity and interpersonal communication is enhanced when a person is able to view himself and others in a holistic manner versus compartmentalized versions of self.

Pink referenced Robert Inglehart (p218-19) and Inglehart’s World Values Survey. I wondered how my students would respond to such a survey. What do they value? I think it would be interesting to conduct a pre (beginning of the school year) and post( EOY) survey and see if there’s any change that I could link to the art curriculum. (My little lab rat students, it’s fortunate that they seem to enjoy SurveyMonkey as much as I do.) If medicine and business are realizing the importance of meaning and spiritual values, then why doesn’t education? Can’t people see beyond the separation of church and state and realize that spirituality is part of the whole person? (I think it’s important to point out, as did Pink, that in referencing spirituality I mean the desire to find purpose and meaning, not necessarily religion.) What if the school day included time for quiet meditation, what if playgrounds included labyrinths? What if we taught our students the process of engaging the left-brain in order for the right brain to flow with creative thought?

 *This led to my questioning the other three great awakenings, here’s what I discovered. This information directly cut and pasted from http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/256626.html

“To understand what is taking place today, we need to understand the nature of the recurring political-religious cycles called "Great Awakenings." Each lasting about 100 years, Great Awakenings consist of three phases, each about a generation long.

A cycle begins with a phase of religious revival, propelled by the tendency of new technological advances to outpace the human capacity to cope with ethical and practical complexities that those new technologies entail. The phase of religious revival is followed by one of rising political effect and reform, followed by a phase in which the new ethics and politics of the religious awakening come under increasing challenge and the political coalition promoted by the awakening goes into decline. These cycles overlap, the end of one cycle coinciding with the beginning of the next.” These cycles are further defined on the website.

Pink ~ Empathy

One of my first graders tries on a different hat.
I have to credit Pinterest for the  lesson Spark.

Empathy is the spontaneous act of identifying with the emotions of another, putting yourself in their place and feeling what they feel. It is through empathy that one becomes aware of ‘self’ in relation to others. Pink says that it “…provides the scaffolding for our morality.” (p 160) . While undervalued in the Information Age, empathy is a requirement for the culture of the Conceptual Age. Empathy is the human connection that sets man apart from computers.

I find it ironic that the child growing up in the Information age had far more opportunities for developing empathy in a time when empathy wasn’t valued, yet today, when they really need it, kids are communicating via text, and social media. Without that direct face-to-face interaction, how can they develop empathy? Do role-playing games aid in the development of empathy?

Reflecting on my own students, I think that the fact that my school is located on an army post creates a different atmosphere than in a regular elementary school. My students are well practiced in the art of empathy. New students are greeted enthusiastically; the other students have all been the new kid before. Moving, family member deployments, living far away from your extended family are all common experiences. The risk of losing a parent is a reality to my kids, they don’t speak of it often, but death is a real part of their lives. I think the result of all of these shared familiarities makes it easier for me to tap into the sense of empathy. The library-media specialist in my building and I do a lot of collaborative lesson planning. One lesson we’ve talked about doing is to have students assume the role of a character in a book and to create a piece of art related to seeing the world through the character’s eyes. How would it feel to be old, to be a baby, to be a person in another land, an animal, or even a plant?

Pink ~ Symphony

Pink defines symphony as the ability to make unique connections between disparate concepts resulting in a blend that is novel. He asserts that success in the conceptual age requires this ability to see the “relationship between relationships,” the ability to “see the big picture." (P141) Convention and memory interfere with a person’s ability to see things in new and different ways. Successful orchestration of symphony requires the ability, in Pink’s words, to successfully: Be a boundary crosser – see relationships that no one else notices. Be an inventor - putting together ideas that no one else has ever thought to combine. Be a metaphor maker – “understanding one thing in terms of something else” (p139). This ability to symphonize, to highlight the important details of life and ignore the rest, may well offer a healing effect to a world society struggling to find meaning amidst chaos. 

 With symphony being the topic for my group presentation, I have spent more time with this chapter than I have the previous sections. The first thought that comes to my mind was Melanie Griffith in the movie Working Girl. In the movie Tess, (Melanie Griffith) accidentally ends up impersonating her boss while the boss is out of town. The boss returns, and, of course is terribly angry. The boss tries to claim Tess’s big, hugely important idea as her own, but can’t explain how she came up with the idea. Here’s Tess’s explanation of her idea: 

Tess: Okay. See, this is Forbes. It's just your basic article about how you were looking to expand into broadcasting, right? Okay now, the same day, I'll never forget this. I'm reading page six of the Post, and there's this item on Bobby Stein, the radio talk show guy who does all those gross jokes about Ethiopia and the Betty Ford Center. Well, anyway, he's hosting this charity auction that night...real blue bloods, and won't that be funny? Now turn the page to Suzy, who does the society stuff, and there's this picture of your daughter. 

Trask: Ah. 

Tess: See, nice picture. And she's helping to organize the charity ball. So I started to think, "Trask, radio...Trask, radio." And then I hooked up with Jack, and he came on board with Metro, and...and so now here we are. 

This probably makes more sense if you’ve actually seen the movie, but the way the character explains how she made the association, it’s the perfect illustration of symphony.

I find that I do my best symphonizing when I’m in that “Creative Zone,” which for me usually takes place when I’m seriously relaxed such as the space in between awake and asleep or even better standing in a long, hot shower. That’s when I come up with the most amazing associations and best plans for everything. In agreement with Pink, they truly are “Ah Ha!!!” moments. While my students have some moments of creating symphony, I don’t think I spend enough time asking them to look deeply, go beyond what they know, and consciously practice making associations. It’s something I really want to incorporate into my curriculum design.

Loved this combination of nostalgic images and the thought provoking questions posed. How did we make it and more importantly, how will the the iKids fare?

Daniel Pink, A Whole New Mind ~ Design

Pink defines design as “utility enhanced by significance.” (p70)  Good design is now accessible to most. Businesses utilize design as a way to stand-out, and according to Pink, good design has the potential to “change the world.” Man has been a designer since the dawn of time, though, for the most part, only the affluent could truly afford to possess objects with that certain little je ne sais quoi which set them, as a result of their possessions, apart from the rest of society. In the conceptual age, famous designers are pairing with mainstream businesses, bringing the design element to mass merchandise and making good design assessable to all. The entire model of business has changed to reflect a population that seeks to standout, to be different from everyone else. The future of design has the power to make the quality of life better. Research has shown the design of medical settings has a direct correlation to health and healing.

As I reflected on this chapter, it dawned on me that I have personally experienced this shift in the accessibility of design. I know it shows my age, LOL, but I clearly recall Brooke Shields and,” You want to know what comes between me and my Calvins? Nothing!” Everyone I knew had to have a pair of designer jeans. I’m not sure that there was anything that made them any better than the Levi’s I normally wore, but I too, gave in to the appeal of having something that was  designer.  Over the course of the past thirty years I have observed famous designers have lending their magic touch to everything from Perrier bottles to hand-held vacuums.

I agree with Pink, quoting John Heskett, “Design, stripped to its essence, can be defined as the human nature to shape and make our environment in ways without president in nature, to serve our needs and to give meaning to our lives.” (p 69)  The type of clothing or possessions a person wears or possesses gives us clues about their identity. Even my kindergarten students make observations about dress / lifestyle when they participate in VTS discussions. Because they are so closely entwined, it is easy to see the relationship between Design and visual literacy. Students of the conceptual age need the skills to be both the producers and consumers of design.

A Good Case for Visual Literacy

How did the advertisers decide that EXTREME was better than BEST?

LTC 8740 - Day 5

Chapter 6 Eisner

Thus far, The Centrality of Curriculum and the Function of Standards has been my favorite chapter in Eisner’s book. Chapter 6 is covered with bright yellow Sharpie gel highlighting and the margins are filled with an assortment of stars, YES, and ME TOOs.

Both Freedman and Eisner agree that there is no one right way to create a curriculum. Additionally, there is a need for some form of standards and guidelines, but they need to have room for flexibility. No two students are the same, no two teachers, are the same, and the arts are definitely not one size fits all. Arts integration appeals to me, because real life is not separate. It makes sense that meaning-making take place across and through the subjects. However, please don’t expect me to sacrifice the quality of what I do to meet the criteria for another class. Integrated learning has to be meaningful for all those involved. Eisner says this makes more demands on the teacher. Amen to that, and you risk creating a really sticky wicket when the classroom teacher assumes that their model of project based learning fits into your curriculum. Anyone up for building salt dough maps of the state? No thanks, but thank you for offering!

In the amount of time I have been in my district we have rewritten the art curriculum twice. The first time I was a baby teacher, and remained very quiet, taking everything in and trusting my more experienced colleagues to do the job. The last time, and some of you are familiar with this story, I was quite vocal. “The curriculum,” I argued, “ needs to be based on more than the elements and principals, we need to focus on overarching commonalities and big ideas.” My colleagues were aghast!” What?! That’s too hard and besides, I already have all my examples and lesson plans for teaching the Elements ad Principals.” “ We’d be limiting ourselves and locked into teaching the same things.” “ It takes too long to teach big ideas and we’d never have any student artwork for the annual art show, nor good student art to hang on the walls.” Yes, I’m telling you folks, it was BAD! Oh, I failed to mention that we were expected to accomplish the arduous task of writing the entire K-6 curriculum in a time span of three hours. More BAD. I’d like to say that I was able to convince the group that my way was the best for students, but sadly enough, I was kind of ostracized from the group. (Don’t mind her, she likes to toss around fancy words, but clearly she wouldn’t know a good art project from a hole in the ground. She barely had anything to hang on the bulletin board for her month at the administration building. Okay, so I probably just imagined that last part.)

Chapter 6 Freedman (Concepts and Fragments and Culture – OH MY!)

“If we choose, we can promote ideals that have been impor-

tant to the arts and to democratic curriculum, such as intellectual free-

dom, creative imagination, and social responsibility.” (p 106) YES, and, (my new way of thinking, thanks Michelle R!) In the words of my hero, Olivia Gude  “We must also acknowledge that there is also too much time devoted to teaching skills or perceptual awareness with outmoded, time-consuming methods and that this takes away from the time in which students can develop creative capacities and complex critical thinking while engaging in authentic meaning making art activities.” (https://naea.digication.com/omg/Welcome/published)

Both the ways and the content taught, or not taught affect the student’s outlook on the way he perceives the world, and his role in the world. When the curriculum places too much emphasis on formalism, it is easy to perceive the subject as a frill. However, as Freedman says, when art education focuses on meaning, interpretation, and representation, learning in and through the arts is critical and essential. 

The Visual Literacy White Paper Dr. Anne Bamford

“To be an effective communicator in today’s world, a person needs to be able to interpret, create and select images to convey a range of meanings.” (p 1) Bamford asserts that visual literacy, like curriculum, is something that cannot be fixed. Visual literacy is social, and requires a skill set that should be taught across subject areas. A higher level of understanding in visual communication does not develop on its own without being taught.  One strategy described for developing visual literacy is the study and discussion of images in what the author describes as a “creative and innovative way.” VTS immediately came to mind.

As I said in an earlier post, learning in and through the arts is not about teaching students what to think, but giving them the tools to think on their own, a critical skill for a democratic society.

LTC 8740 - Day 4

Chapter 5 Eisner Describing Learning in the Visual Arts

“…Situated learning: the child is situated in a social and material context, and this context, viewed as a culture, teaches.” (p 93) 

Optimal learning in the visual arts takes place when:

There are opportunities for group work

Learning is connected to real life activities

Lessons that are sequential and interrelated

Lessons offer the ‘just right’ amount of challenge

Work is meaningful and has “something to say”

Technical skills are taught and practiced

Situations are created which refine the senses

Enable students to use metaphor

Encourages flexible thinking and analysis

There are several differing theories on the things that children draw, the reasons they draw them, as well whether or not meaning is intended in these drawing. Eisner argues that the act of creation “calls upon the use of the mind.” (p 107) “Human performance in the arts is the offspring of a dynamic medley of interacting features: development, situation, and the cognitive abilities the child has acquired as a result of this interaction.” (p 107)

I agree that group work is beneficial, but struggle with motivating the students who don’t want to work in a group. I encountered this situation this year, even after they were allowed to pick their own group. I loved observing social skills at work, the way that various teams elected to divide roles, the way the groups worked democratically to distribute the labor within the groups. I thought it was interesting that Eisner mentions the fact that children frequently make gurgles or other sounds when they are painting, an indication that they are deeply immersed in their work, both visual and kinesthetic. I have observed this in action more than once, now I understand why Johnny hums a low monotone tone as he executes his art.

Chapter 5 Freedman ~ Interpreting Visual Culture, Constructing Concepts for Curriculum

Curriculum created for postmodern education must reflect our students need to be literate in the multi-layered texts that permeate postmodern culture. “Interpretation is the process of giving meaning to form.” (p 104) It is not enough that students learn to merely interpret, they must be taught the skills to do so in a critical and intentional manner. When interpretation is inquiry based it allows for multiple meanings. Personal interpretations of postmodern art, based on the past experiences of the viewer, may possibly provide a, as Freedman says, “better” meaning than that originally intended by the artist. (p 92) 

I keep returning to the passage from Eisner, “Teaching like knowledge, cannot be shipped, pumped, or transmitted like the contents of a letter into the heads of students.” (Eisner p 47) Though the skills of interpretation may seem as something that would be automatic and transferred from the ability to decode written text, Freedman asserts that this is not the case. Interpretation skills need to be taught, the repeated act of interpretation facilitates growth. Freedman’s description of this growth is very much in line with Abigail Houssen’s stages of aesthetic growth. In reading this chapter I could see connections to everything I have learned thus far in my graduate studies – curriculum must allow for personal and meaningful connections, skills must be taught to comprehend the sophisticated (and frequently deceptive) nuances of visual culture.Although this sounds cliche, postmodern times mandate that students learn not WHAT to think in terms of visual culture, but instead, HOW to think.