Basically, this was a class that was preparatory for student teaching. I was assigned to work with 2 partners and we taught lessons at two jr highs (inner city schools located in Erie) each week as part of an after school program named CHAMPS. Other groups were assigned to one high school, they visited their schools twice a week. Overall it was a busy, crazy semester, but it went well and I was thankful for the experience.
Junior High #1 was a class composed of mostly girls and one boy who has Downs Syndrome. We didn’t really have to adapt much of our assignments for him, he could do most stuff. Everyone was pretty much the same age and overall they were the easier, more responsible group. It was pretty much the same group each week. You could trust them with more. Overall they were more dependable. You get the picture.
Junior High #2 was the opposite, and provided a great challenge. It was much harder to teach and motivate this group. The numbers of students fluctuated wildly, there was a much wider age range (some were elementary students), more boys, bratty girls, some students were siblings and had petty fights, more students had behavioral issues. There were just a lot of factors that interacted and created CHAOS. They were great kids, but overall it was much harder to gain their attention and keep them on task. Let’s just say they were really good at making messes!
And don’t forget that we were trying to teach kids that had already been in school all day. Challenge accepted!
We were given a surprising amount of freedom when it came to planning our lessons and curriculum. We had to write lesson plans for each assignment but we were pretty free to do what we wanted. Our teacher pushed having a “service learning” aspect in our curriculum, that was really the main requirement. Since we were only at each school once a week and you never knew if students would show up the following week, we mostly did projects that could be completed in one class period. We only did one project that lasted two weeks. We had 11 weeks of teaching classes, so we selected different mediums-drawing, painting, clay, etc- and devised projects that would give them experience with a variety of mediums. We wanted to give them a range. Plus, it was the best way to try and please everyone- not everyone likes drawing. We also tried to design projects that would build their confidence and where they could be successful regardless of ability.
The first week we had two class periods, 1) spent with our crazy teacher and 2) spent with the ladies from CHAMPS. We then got our partners assigned and had only a couple days to plan what we were doing with the students! It was crazy. We were totally thrown into things.
During our first class, our unique teacher had us chew gum and make a sculpture of the gum using a toothpick! And yes, we went around the room and talked about what we’d made and how we felt about the process. It was a bit of a gross assignment, but it broke the ice!
What we basically found ourselves doing was using Junior High #1 as guinea pigs and then adapting it for Junior High #2 since we knew things would be messier and more chaotic for that group.
The first week with students was totally a get to know you week- we played a decent get to know you game (I don’t play lame ones!)and had students fill out a survey about what they liked and read it out loud as part of the game. Us teachers filled one out too, so they could hear what we were like. The session was spent also seeing what these students could do- they’re neither kids nor teens so it’s hard to know where they fall as far as abilities go. We tried a paper cutting positive/negative activity that didn’t go so hot- our scissors from the college supply closet were totally crappy and probably wouldn’t cut butter, let alone paper. We also found that it was also a hard concept for them to grasp and that we needed to break things down into smaller, simpler steps.
For week one of our official unit we started our “real” lessons by drawing- we tried to teach the students how to draw faces and learn a little about proportion. We had the students try to draw their faces and do one side more realistic and one side more creatively or abstract. They did a good job but it was probably a bit too advanced for them. It was good to see them work through frustrations. What I didn’t really expect was so many self depreciating comments from students. They were more self conscious then we thought. Some girls fixed their hair for 20 minutes before drawing themselves, despite repeated nagging from us!
It was about in here that I went from having one partner to two- K had added the class late after our partner assignments were given out. Since we were the only group with two and not three, we were glad to get another person to help with the work! It was a bit of a challenge to get her caught up to speed with what we were doing, but she turned out to be a great asset. It was just one more thing to add to the chaos.
Week two was spent doing a “Picasso Dog” assignment. After giving the students a brief background about Picasso and Cubist art, we had them follow directions blindly and create their own cubist-style dog. You have them draw an eye anywhere and then turn the paper, then draw another eye, turn, then a snout, turn, then a tail and paw and connect it somehow and color it in. It was meant to get them experimenting and not worrying so much about being “perfect” in their art. There’s no way to be perfect in this assignment! The students used markers and did a pretty good job. It was pretty funny to see their reactions to Cubism.
Week three was spent having the students explore with watercolors. Our supply closet had some wonderful watercolor sets with lots of colors. We had the students explore with color and technique and then they could go back and draw a picture over it. We also had them create two little paintings that were woven together and matted. The students did well with it and liked painting. Once again, the assignment was focused on experimenting and not being “perfect”.
The next week was spent learning a bit about Pollock and how his drip style of painting was different. We were able to show them a clip from the movie Pollock where he explains why he painted like that and it also showed how Pollock intentionally flipped and splattered his paint onto the canvas on the floor, almost like a dance. The schools wouldn’t let us use You Tube, so we couldn’t show a video of the real thing and had to improvise. We then were really brave (or stupid) and had the students make splatter paintings of their own. The kids did well and everyone really liked the assignment, but Junior High #2 went wild and caused a big mess. They got paint all over themselves and the walls and floor! We even had a splatter box to try and keep it all contained, really we tried to make it less messy. It was a nice try. The other problem was that some kids did the paint WAY too thick. Both classes we had to leave the paintings behind to dry, even though we had brought hairdryers. That was a nice try. The kids did some good work, I loved the expression in each.
This is a long post, so I’ll stop here. Stay tuned for Part 2!
The saga continues…
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