Well, I need to begin with explaining that when I chose this week to lead the discussion I had no idea what these blogs/websites were about. I had decided to pick them by title and could not resist the first of the three (and my personal favorite out of the three we viewed this week), called The Carrot Revolution. My first thought was carrots and I thought of Anne of Green Gables and Anne of Avonlea; some of my favorite film and book series since childhood. When I actually got to visit the website the header had the title and then a quote by Paul Cezanne "The day is coming when a single carrot freshly observed will set off a revolution"; this was nice and then my thought-process led me to one of my favorite bands, The Modern Lovers and their song entitled Girlfriend when he sings about Cezanne in the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.
Okay well, here we go to the actually blogging.
The Carrot Revolution
http://carrotrevolution.blogspot.com/
As noted earlier this was my favorite reading of the three we had this week. I am just going to lay out for all the websites the way I navigated them, trying to follow my top five theme.
1. I almost always first and foremost try and figure out what this website or blog I'm looking at is all about. So, my first instinct was to read the about located in the top right of this blog.
- The Carrot Revolution is an art education weblog and a resource page for art educators, art students, and artists in the digital age. Our goal is to fight the tyranny of the ordinary and to liberate from the status quo.
2. Instead of scrolling down the homepage, I moved to the left of the blog and checked out the Disciplines.
3. The first that I checked out was animation and I found this fantastic blogpost titled The Rant. But more importantly, I found this great new video.
4. Digital Flipbook
parkour motion reel from saggyarmpit on Vimeo.
5. The idea generator app. for your iphone was such a neat teaching tool (of course if you have an iphone). Here's the info: Do you have any projects that include storytelling? The Idea Generator also has an itouch app, great for coming up with writing prompts. This has worked very well with my film and video classes. There is also a Movie Idea Generator, but I've found the suggestions here too convoluted to be developed into workable.
There were many other fantastic posts on this blog under the disciplines, but it is time to move on. But please, leave your thoughts and tell me what you liked or disliked about this blog.
The second website we visited this week was for the Pros Arts Studio.
1. It's a very simple website with a lot of negative space but very easy to navigate. They had everything laid out right on the top of the webpage.
2. What do you know... the first thing I looked at was the history, however on this website it is also the first tab as well. So, here's a bit of the history...
- Pros Arts Studio is a multi-disciplinary, multi-lingual, non-profit organization dedicated to enriching individual and community life through the arts with a primary focus on the inner city Pilsen/Little Village neighborhoods of Chicago. Founded in 1978 by professional artists, Pros Arts began during an Arts-in-Education Residency at St. Procopius (known locally as St. Pros, thus the name) School. Thirty years later, Pros Arts continues to bring the arts - visual, media, and performing arts - to over 20 community centers and schools.
3. In school:
- * The Art of Change integrates the visual arts (clay) into earth science curriculum and performing arts (circus) into astronomy and will be implemented in 24 classrooms in four schools, funded in part by The Chicago Community Trust and the Polk Bros. Foundation.
* Drama Integration with Literacy engages grades 1-5 in an ambitious curriculum weaving together drama and language arts, with an added inter-grade mentorship component in its third year at Cooper Dual Language Academy funded in part by the Fry Foundation.
* Pilsen Arts Partnership integrates the arts into the curriculum at Walsh School and also in the community at large. Teachers and artists develop units that integrate the arts with the Open Court Basal Reading series. In addition, the Partnership presents several cultural celebrations with its community organization partners. Initially funded by CAPE (starting in 1993) the Partnership program draws support from various sources.
* Multi-Arts Performance Residencies will be conducted at three Chicago Public Schools using the drama, visual arts and music to support social studies and language arts culminating in a stage production. PS Wish You Were Here! with 5th graders at Cooper Academy; Distant Drummers: a Civil War Story with 5th graders at Saucedo Academy, and Fever in Philadelphia 1793 with 7th and 8th graders at Walsh Elementary School. These residencies are funded in part by grants from the Arts in Education Residency program of the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency.
* “Changing Perspectives” Professional Development Institute will TRAIN a mixture of CPS personnel including classroom teachers, fine arts and science specialists on how to deliver and assess integrated arts and science curriculum enhanced by a presentation from Dr. Barbara Greenberg, author of “The Art of Chemistry and the Chemistry in Art”.
4. Community:
- Youth Arts Programs are provided at our home Dvorak Park and other partner sites. In a typical week we welcome 200 students through our doors, exposing them to experiences in the performing, visual, and media arts, after school, in the evenings, and throughout the summer. We also offer paid internships and apprenticeships for up to 75 teens each year. Youth Arts Programs include: Kidz Circus, Media, Hip Hip Open Studio, Ideas en Arcilla: Community Clay Program, and other special programs.
- Cultural Celebrations are held each year at various sites and bring the community together for innovative activities marking the neighborhood’s Mexican heritage: Dia de los Muertos/Day of the Dead (Oct/Nov), Carnaval (Feb), and Dia del Nino/Day of the Child (April). Pros Arts teaching artists provide workshops prior to culminating events (parades, performances, interactive exhibitions ) drawing an average of 300 community members.
5. Performance:
- Performing since 1979, the Pros Arts Ensemble presents its shows in English, Spanish, Italian, and Clown, and has performed in theaters, libraries, classrooms, and playgrounds, on Main Street in rural Illinois and on the street corners in the barrio. Pros Arts Studio is on the Illinois Arts Council’s ArtsTour roster.
Clowns!!!
Moving on...
We are at the final reading called YouthLearn. It's a great title for a website.
1. The about us (of course)...
- Inspiring young minds through technology-enriched learning
Ever since the Morino Institute launched the YouthLearn Initiative as a pilot project in 1998, we've seen that after-school instructors and classroom teachers are hungry for relevant, creative materials that can help them make good use of new technology and help them turn good learning programs into great ones.
The YouthLearn Initiative, consisting of this comprehensive website, a growing online community, a free electronic newsletter, and an extensive manual called The YouthLearn Guide, goes a long way toward meeting that need. In 2001, the Morino Institute and EDC entered into a strategic partnership to help ensure the long-term growth and advancement of the YouthLearn Initiative. EDC now champions YouthLearn as a national center of excellence on youth, learning, and technology anchored around the original Initiative's approach.
2. Learning:
- Teaching
Regardless of what topic you're teaching or the age of the kids you're working with, you'll want to make certain teaching techniques a standard part of your routine. By internalizing these fundamentals until you don't even have to think about them, you'll become a better coach, leader and teacher.
Perhaps most important is that you understand and master sound modeling techniques. Kids learn much more by watching you than from anything you say. Good teaching is intentional, and it should be reflected in every thing you say and do.
Some other techniques described in this section include activities to do every day to reinforce learning objectives and create continuity; pointers for reading aloud and sharing ideas; and advice on using journals, a tool we find extremely helpful for kids of all ages.
Entire books have been written about classroom management, but a few simple steps can make a big difference in maintaining an energetic environment and keeping kids focused. Also check our basic information on ages and stages to help you plan, teach and lead different age groups.
Teaching about (and with) technology offers some special challenges, especially when instructors worry that they don't know enough themselves. This article provides some pointers for being an effective coach in a technology-oriented program.
3. Activities:
- Categorizing Ideas: Helping Kids Develop Reasoning Skills in
* Literacy
* Critical Thinking
Part of growing up is developing reasoning skills, such as logical thought processes and the ability to discern multiple types of relationships between concepts. Reasoning skills are an important part of organizing thoughts for a report, constructing a story, using a reference book, conducting an interview or navigating the internet to find information.
4. This website has some fantastic resources for teachers with lesson plans available under the activities tab sorted by subject.
5. Projects that the organization has done is located on the website as well under... projects! Check them out!
Okay... so I'll go into more detail in the class but feel free to post here as well any thoughts, concerns, likes/dislikes, questions, randomnesses, etc.
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