Entry #12:
Revising Teaching Philosophy
May 1st, 2022
#goals
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My (New) Top 10 Teaching Philosophy :
1. Teaching for diversity and inclusion.
2. Remaining flexible with my own personal expectations.
3. Keep log and hold myself accountable when I need to improve my teaching methods.
4. Try and find significant contemporary artists to inspire my students.
5. Seek out challenging projects to help push students to think harder.
6. Continue to refine and develop my own skills, so I can be a better instructor.
7. Have lots of conference with my students, and foster a good relationship with my students’ caregivers.
8. Utilize holistic grading for my students.
9. Create stimulating projects that excite my students.
10. Keep my enthusiasm for art teaching high, and try to always lift my students’ energy level and confidence.
Going over my first art journal, and my original philosophy list, I see many similarities— especially regarding teaching students new and exciting methods, and trying to foster strong and confidence-building relationships with students. I wrote my new list without looking at the old one first, and when I looked it over, I was surprised how similar it was. I did change some of my choices, but my old list still has some good points, (like trying to inspire students that might not like art class.)
Over the past semester, I’ve learned more about how important it is to be flexible and accommodating. I had certain goals and expectations for all of my BRAINY teaching tours, but each time presented very different student groups, even though they were all the same grade level, and often were from the same school. For the most part, the places where I had to be flexible and change my teaching ideas, turned out better than my original plan. Students weren’t interested in the same thing I was, so I did more research and tried to shift to ask my students what they were inspired by, or what caught their attention. At first I was worried that I wasn’t doing the exact tour I had planned, and that I had “messed up,” but instead I realized that I should always leave room for backup plans, plans for extra time, or plans if we run out of time. Each tour was totally different, but also incredibly valuable.
The Family Day lesson was the same one that I had taught several times before at the museum, but was also a completely different situation, and I maintained a completely flexible attitude, and I think it helped the students enjoy the project more, compared to me forcing my own ideas onto their artworks. I definitely thrive in a longer-form classroom setting, where demos aren’t lightening-fast, and students have time to think about their design choices and ideation.
Peer teaching as a group is still very challenging, and I think I do better on my own, but I also saw a lot of value in working as a teacher group. I know a lot of newer school programs are encouraging “teacher teams,” where two different subject instructors work together on a project. I can see how my experience with troubleshooting in my peer group could help me prepare for any bumps while working with another teacher— who has their own ideas of what they want students to take away from a lesson. Peer teaching also was a fun way to see all of the applications for new technology, in a way that I never would have asked for. I learned how to use laser cutting software, 3D printing programs, and painted my first real mural. All of those lessons made me realize how much I need to push myself to learn these methods, so students can experience more new media.
My artwork series has been challenging, since often I find myself bouncing from project to project when I get “bored” of it. For this one, I had to think each week, for several weeks in a row— How do I convey my feelings about my learning development, and translate it into a landscape metaphor? The second hardest part was actually painting the pieces, since I really liked how simple the line drawings were. In reality, I often leave my work unfinished because I am too scared to ruin it, but then I avoid the actual learning process. I knew it would be a challenge when I set the goal for myself early in the reflexive art journal process, but it was rewarding. Now I have some nice pieces that go together as a sketch log of my feelings during this semester. There are plenty of places where I wish I had used better paper, or re-drawn my idea over, but I pushed through, and I think it reflects the ideas of art education well. Sometimes it may feel frustrating and easy to give up on something, but pushing through to the end gave me even more fulfillment.
