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WOW! There is so much that I have learned in this course. I am so thankful for every experience that I have had in this class. Everything that I have done has been so beneficial and I feel so much better prepared for student teaching and getting my first job. Although going to the alternative high school was very different from most experiences we are going to have teaching, I feel that it really gave me a better sense of what goes on in a teenagers mind and really opened my eyes to the many backgrounds that my future student's are coming from. I really formed some strong bonds with the students and it was a really amazing experience to watch them succeed.
I also really enjoyed and learned alot from visiting the two other secondary schools in Iowa City and the Maharishi school. It was really beneficail to see the many alternative settings that students can learn art in and the different approaches that teachers can take to teaching art. I saw many different discipline strategies, and approaches to lessons that I would like to incopperate into my future teahing. The Maharishi school was unlike anything that I have ever expereinced and it really expanded my horizon in terms of the ways people live. The students are so different from most average high school students and I will take many of their outlooks on teaching into my won classroom.
I also learned a lot from the texts selected for this class. There were many artists that I had not heard of in In the Making that I would really like to incoperate into future secondary lesson plans. Fires in the Bathroom and Adolescents at School were both really eye opening in terms of what to expect from your students and how approach some of the more personal problems they might be having. I REALLY like From Ordinary to Extraordinary because of all the lesson plan ideas. I already altered one of them from my unit in this class and I truley plan on using it. I think that book will be a great resource in the future. This class also provided with a lot of practice in wirtting thorough lesson plans and I have gotten really used to the format that is suggested for seconday students. The two movies we watched were REALLY interesting too. Although it was slightly intimidating, I thought the first year teachers movie really gave me a better idea of what to expect next year and in student teaching.
Thank you so much for all the opprotunities that have been presented to me in this class. I appreciate all of them. In the future I would really like to consider working in a alternative secondary placement and prehaps look into art theopy because of my expereince. I would also like to continue to look into relfective lessons that incopperate found or recycled materials that have a community aspect to them. I would also like tocontinue blogging with other art educators to get new lesson plans and bounce ideas off of each other.

Reflecting on your teaching Experience

At the alternative high school we have been working at this semester, I worked with a small group of boys on a mural. I let the boys choose the topic, scale, and medium they wanted to work with and then guided them in technique and execution of the work. The end result was a huge 9x5 foot canvas of a cartoon dinosaur, named Reptar, standing on the moon. The mural was really well done and accompanied by glow-in-the-dark stars and metallic sharpie.


Although I had a plan for making the mural and each day I gave the boys a goal for what was to be accomplished, it was not a very formal lesson. So I think this was what I would change. In the future I think I would incorporate more background information, and other mural resources to them. Maybe give them different books/slides of mural artists each week or talk about the different way murals could be Incorporated into the community. Although really good work was done and the final product turned out beautifully I feel like they developed their skill level as an artist but not in their knowledge of the history/world of art making.


In terms of the way I got the student's motivated, I think I would change that too. Although the students were invested because they had choose their own topic and felt very much that this was their mural I think in the future I would have them do more reflective writing about their work. That way I know what it going on in their head and what more I can do to motivate them to do their best. I am not sure that I pushed them enough in my daily goals and I this is one way that I could have done that. This way the students would have a deeper emotional connection to the piece too and perhaps had come up with more ideas about ways to change the mural.

Ex. 8 for In the Making

The photograph that is featured on page 188 in In the Making is the photo I have chosen to critique because I feel that it has the most emotion. Looking at it makes me think that Cooper was overwhelmed by the vastness of the water to which the explorers came across and he was in awe of the power that a body of water can have. The lack of horizon line and intense gradation of tone lead me to this conclusion. The way he has composed these elements makes it seem like the water goes on forever and although it is calm it does not seem approachable or welcoming. The fact that the photo is very clear in the front and foggy towards the back give it a large depth of field and sense of uncertainty.