Times They are a Changin'

An Art Room for the 21st Century

A Contemporary view of the 21st Century Art room Sheryl Lamme

I f it is indeed true that our notions of the real and the possible are shaped in cultural discourses, art teachers have the potential to change the world. Olivia Gude

Art Education’s role in society has changed powerfully over the years. As we face the return to being a visual culture, students now need the tools to closely examine and interpret their world. Technology has, in many areas of study, eliminated the need to learn a skill set. Instead, as they wade through a vast sea of technological information, students need critical thinking skills and the ability to both discern and appropriately use the information they encounter. Art making must present playful opportunities that challenge students to master the use of materials, facilitate problem solving, personal response, and greater degrees of exploration. The art room is the ideal setting for the continuing development of Gardner’s Five Minds, a place for acquiring those skills needed to thrive in the ever-changing future.

While some art teachers have readily embraced this change, others cling to the safety of teaching what they have always taught. State standards and Grade level expectations create a need to develop lessons based solely on demonstrating an understanding of the elements and principles of design, art vocabulary, art history, and successful execution of art processes. Art making, though a pleasant experience, lacks depth and meaningful connection.

I have created a contemporary view of the way the twenty-first century art room should look. I plan to display this piece along with a brief artist’s statement at my school’s annual back-to-school open house. I want parents, students, staff, and administration all to realize that art is so much more than making pretty pictures. When the time is right, I also plan to share this piece with art teaching colleagues in my district, and perhaps at an MAEA conference.

References

Carroll, K. L. (2003). Better Practice in Visual Arts Education: Vol. IV. (J. L. Tucker, Jr.). Baltimore, MD:

Maryland State Department of Education.

Churches, A., Crockett, L., & Jukes, I. (2010). The Digital Diet : Today's Digital Tools in Small Bytes. Charleston, SC: 21st Century Fluency Project Inc & Corwin Press.

  

Duncum, P. (2010). Seven Principles for Visual Culture Education. Art Education, 63(1), 6-10. Gardner, H. (2008). Five Minds for the Future. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press.

Gude, O. (2004). Postmodern Principles: In Search of a 21st Century Art Education. Art Education, 57(1), 6-14.

Gude, O. (2007, January). Principles of Possibility: Considerations for a 21st Century Art & Culture Curriculum. Art Education: the Journal of the National Art Education Association, 60(1), 10-17.

Home Visits [Video file]. {2003}. Retrieved fromhttp://www.pbs.org/art21/artists/osorio/clip2.html{2003}.

Developing the Ethical Mind

Popplet

Easy to show on a mind map, difficult to put into words!

Philosophy of Art Education

Art offers a way of understanding oneself and it enables connections between art and

our own culture and the cultures of diverse peoples. –Eliot Eisner, Stanford University

Due to the continuing rapid advancement in technology, students of the 21^st Century face challenges that previous generations could not have imagined. Culturally diverse global citizens with global responsibilities, bombarded with a constant barrage of media input, art education provides the ideal platform for students to both make sense of their world and to respond to it in kind.

My students will explore media; traditional as well as digital. They will have the opportunity to play with the materials, processes and techniques, to examine potential, and limitations. They will explore and consider copyright and copyleft. I will encourage deep exploration and imagination, ever posing the question, “What if?”  I will provide opportunities for the synthesis of knowledge, encouraging my students to explore and solve problems in a variety of ways.

As an elementary art educator I will introduce my students to the use of Duncum’s principals: power, ideology, representation, seduction, gaze, intertextuality, and multimodality. I will build on this framework developmentally, guiding students through the exploration of visual media ranging from fine arts to the applied arts.   My students will learn to deconstruct visual culture, and analyze its meaning.  Students will then create art, with an understanding of the message it communicates.

As much as possible, taking into account the age of my students, I will employ Gude’s postmodern art making practices into lessons: Juxtaposition, Recontextualization, Layering, Interaction of text and image, Hybridity, Gazing, Representin’, Imagining a future, Elaborating Fantasies, and Believing as strategies for making and understanding contemporary art.

I will use Gude’s Principles of Possibility: Playing, Forming Self, Investigating Community Themes, Encountering Difference, Attentive Living, Empowered Experiencing, Empowered Making, Deconstructing Culture, Reconstructing Social Spaces, Not Knowing and Appropriation when planning units of study to foster meaningful representation of personal experience and in doing so, contribute to the development of respectful and responsible global citizens

Carroll, K. L. (2003). Better Practice in Visual Arts Education: Vol. IV. (J. L. Tucker, Jr.). Baltimore, MD: Maryland State Department of Education.  

Churches, A., Crockett, L., & Jukes, I. (2010). The Digital Diet : Today's Digital Tools in Small Bytes. Charleston, SC: 21st Century Fluency Project Inc & Corwin Press.

Duncum, P. (2010). Seven Principles for Visual Culture Education. Art Education, 63(1), 6-10.

Gardner, H. (2008). Five Minds for the Future. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press.

Gude, O. (2004). Postmodern Principles: In Search of a 21^st Century Art Education. Art Education, 57(1), 6-14.

Gude, O. (2007, January). Principles of Possibility: Considerations for a 21st Century Art & Culture Curriculum. Art Education: the Journal of the National Art Education Association, 60(1), 10-17.

More on the Secret Lives of Grocery Shoppers

As I peruse my book collection, it seems that I have compiled several books relating to found lists....hmmmm, what's that saying about me? In addition to Milk Eggs Vodka I also possess a la Cart, where not only does Hilary Carlip collect found list, she takes matters a step further and actually puts herself in the shoes of the list maker. Check out this link, the video intro says it all.

http://www.alacartthebook.com/

This book by Kerry Miller is a 'curated collection' of Passive Agressive notes, you get to envisualize the writer. Miller's website offers a huge collection of these notes. Here's a link to one of my favorites. Warning, this site is addictive.
http://www.passiveaggressivenotes.com/2007/06/03/when-phds-get-frustrated/

Another favorite from Miller's book

Milk Eggs Vodka

   

 In his book A Whole New Mind, Daniel Pink suggests several techniques for increasing the power of empathy, the ability to put yourself into the shoes of another. As I went to bed last night, today's presentation circling in my brain, ping, pinG,piNG,pING,PING, from the deep recesses of my brain there came a connection I feel compelled to share.
    I remembered Milk Eggs Vodka, no not my shopping list (though it well could be) but a delightful book by self-described, maker, breaker and collector of things, Bill Keaggy. Here's what Keaggy has to say about this book, basically a collection of various, found lists:

"These found grocery lists are rare specimens. I have a collection from around the world that numbers in the thousands, but it has taken years of hunting and gathering. People are very protective of their grocery lists. I call it selective littering. Seems most folks would sooner dump their car ashtray in the grocery's parking lot or toss a week's worth of soda cans and fast food bags on the ground outside the store (and they do) rather than leave their list in a shopping card. It's because grocery lists are supposed to be private. Never mind that all of us have to go through the checkout in public. Our lists are supposed to be private, and that's why it's so enjoyable to look through them -- unless one of the lists happen to be yours." 

 Reading through these random lists offers a voyeuristic view into the life of the list maker...the paper, the list, the spelling, strange little doodles, all work together telling a short story about the list maker. Some funny, some perverse, others sad, all provide an opportunity for story. Empathy building? I'm not really sure, but in reading these lists you can't help but put yourself in the shoes of the list writer even if only for a moment.

Keaggy's other collections are delightful as well. http://www.keaggy.org/