Community Based-Art Education
The goal of these lessons was to find ways to incorporate community-based art education into a curriculum and explore the impact it had on my students, school, and the surrounding community. To achieve this goal, my students were introduced to six pieces of local art with the theme of the environment and sustainability in the classroom. Inspired local artist, Susan Stelzmann, my students worked together to create a piece of public art that also embraced the theme of sustainability. Stelzmann visited the classroom to discuss her art making process with her public art piece, Gaines Street Tree Wall and guide students in creating their public art poetry stones. Last, I organized a public art walk where over 100 students, parents, administrators, and community members viewed 44 pieces of local public art, including my students’ public art piece. Through action research and the collection of qualitative data I found ways to collaborate with community members, local artists, parents, teachers and administrators. My students learned ways to work together to create art and learned the value of collaboration. I experienced a ripple effect of enthusiasm from the surrounding community by re-introducing my school to their community through the arts. Click on the links below to learn more about the different phases of my project.
Findings
1. Student art making and collaborations
Students worked with local artist Susan Stelzmann to create public art for their community. The students learned to mold 4lbs of ceramic clay, apply text, and work together. Above all findings, students mostly noted the appreciation for collaborating amongst each other to create art about sustainability.
Through this study I was able to create and revise a fifth grade CBAE curriculum unit. The unit I created centered around group work and collaboration. It included a lesson oriented around the discovery a common theme among six different local art pieces, and a lesson for a collaborative public art piece. What I found from implementing the lessons is that the students learned the value of and gained an appreciation for collaboration.
The public art walk event created a way to expose my school to local public art. What I found exceeded my expectations. Not only did this event connect my school to local public art, it also connected other schools to art in our community.
1. Student art making and collaborations
Students worked with local artist Susan Stelzmann to create public art for their community. The students learned to mold 4lbs of ceramic clay, apply text, and work together. Above all findings, students mostly noted the appreciation for collaborating amongst each other to create art about sustainability.
Through this study I was able to create and revise a fifth grade CBAE curriculum unit. The unit I created centered around group work and collaboration. It included a lesson oriented around the discovery a common theme among six different local art pieces, and a lesson for a collaborative public art piece. What I found from implementing the lessons is that the students learned the value of and gained an appreciation for collaboration.
The public art walk event created a way to expose my school to local public art. What I found exceeded my expectations. Not only did this event connect my school to local public art, it also connected other schools to art in our community.
Recommendations
The recommendations that I would suggest for any educator that desires to implement a CBAE unit into their curriculum are to locate and establish a relationship with your community’s local arts agency, take the learning out of the classroom, foster collaborations among your students, and collaborate with classroom teachers. I found these to be the most important aspects of my study and had the most impact on cultivating meaningful learning for my students.
The recommendations that I would suggest for any educator that desires to implement a CBAE unit into their curriculum are to locate and establish a relationship with your community’s local arts agency, take the learning out of the classroom, foster collaborations among your students, and collaborate with classroom teachers. I found these to be the most important aspects of my study and had the most impact on cultivating meaningful learning for my students.