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I was struggling with what to make for this weeks reflection but something came to me today while i was discussing my lesson with my co-op. My co-op essentially told me that I should go over GA's community agreements with the students before teaching a lesson related to social issues. He said I should review these with students to make them feel safe to express themselves in the classroom because he doesnt ever have them share their opinions on society. I thought this was a pretty solid idea but when i was looking at the agreements posted on his wall vs. the agreements this year I noted that the line "its a safe to make mistakes and for growth" was omitted! I asked my co-op why this was, and how detrimental it probably could be for the kids and he just responded with, admin thought it was best I guess. This really upset me because growth does come from mistakes! Especially in a highschool classroom. I made it my goal from now on to make sure in my one on ones with students they know its still a safe space for growth and failure.

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This week I've spent a lot of time prepping for an upcoming project I will be starting to teach tomorrow. Tomorrow will not only be my first day teaching this lesson but my first time ever teaching students in Kindergarten, 1st, and 2nd grades. Additionally, I'm being supervised during the first time ever teaching this lesson so the nerves are definitely high! So far I have all the supplies, worksheets, PowerPoint, Wall Sample, and SWBAT and Standards Page prepped, just some finishing touches to complete in the room in the morning. Additionally, this week I will be teaching every single class minus one Kindergarten class which occurs when I am commuting to class on Wednesdays. This new chapter is definitely scary and exciting and I'm hoping I do well, not only for myself but for the sake of my students and to also make my new mentor teacher proud. I'm looking forward to more feedback as this lesson and my other lessons unfold as my mentor teacher's suggestions are always super insightful.

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This week I'm really appreciating the routines I've built with students throughout the semester, and the relationships I'm just starting to build. I feel like it's been keeping me stable, and hopefully contributing to some stability for my students. Every morning I talk to Christian about the latest Nintendo news, and Jovi shares the Sanrio gear she's got on that day with me. This week I taught part 1 of my sticker lesson plan, and found a lot of ways it needs to be tweaked, but students really enjoyed part 1 regardless! One student who I have never seen really engage in art class, Taaj, eagerly sat down and got to work on a drawing of Kakashi from Naruto; Taaj is a "problem kid," who is often told to sit on the carpet for disrupting class. He often provokes Jasmir, another student with an IEP who is easily sidetracked; but on Tuesday I saw that a large part of Taaj's disinterest in class has to do with it not being relevant to him or his interests. Although there's some room for self expression in the projects Tamara teaches, it seems like nobody ever told Taaj that anime is art, so he never tried drawing it in art class. I was really proud of him for his drawing- I'll take a picture to share next time! For this visual note I represented these little connections by tracing and collaging, & finished it with embellishments in a way that felt good to me. :)

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For some reason I have been struggling lately to feel inspired when it comes to my visual notes or just making art in general. It is not that I have no experiences, positive or negative, that I can write about. It is just that I have been having trouble translating my thoughts into art. Maybe it is because I am feeling burnt out when it comes to doing work/homework. It could also be that it is getting to that point in the semester where it is almost the end and I am just trying to push through. I was thinking all weekend of how I wanted to make my note and kept drawing a blank. So here is my brain right now with no thoughts in it. Hopefully next week something will really strike me that I will be able to visualize into a note.

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This week I chose to draw one of my students, Kexin, during art club. Kexin is one of two male students in Art Club (out of 20 students). I talked to some folks in our class about art club before and my problems with how it is run, but basically the artist year person working at our school created art club where students were "chosen". 67 students signed up to be in the club but they only picked 20 of the "best" students. (I have opinions about this). One of the students they chose was Kexin, and each week the other two teachers will always say really negative things about him like "He never does anything in art club" and "I don't know why we picked him because he doesn't even want to be here" etc, etc. Last week, my co-teacher and artist year teacher were away during art club so there was a substitute & me. Kexin made this AMAZING puppet and completely sewed it together himself. He added all these googly eyes and sequins. It's the first art activity that I have seen him do during art club and I wonder if it was because the environment was different. I chose to draw Kexin working on their project because it was really cool to see what students can make when they're uninterrupted by adults assumptions about them.

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This week brought a lot of unexpected complications into play. Here’s an article detailing what went down with an update on the board’s reaction:
https://www.inquirer.com/news/hoodie-ban-arrests-academy-park-sharon-hill-fights-20221103.html?outputType=amp
There’s a lot of fear, chaos, miscommunication, and since the marking period ends this Friday, many students are now behind on their work. I’ve spent this week trying to sift through how I’ve felt between anger at the board for their lack of leadership/planning and the pushed back fear that comes with being the adult responsible for the safety and lives of students during a lock down. Overall it’s been tiring because I would just like to teach and continue building relationships with my students. Now, there’s a huge, assumed divide between teachers and students and I’m worried about how it will impact the last few weeks I have with the kids.

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This week I learned a student in our class is on the autism spectrum, which I had suspected but never could get any information about. This student is quiet and sits in the back of the class creating amazing and precise work. I was really excited to have this student as my case study subject so I reached out to the school counselor, and to my surprise I was met with a could shoulder. They essentially told me this student is prohibited for my study and no information of any kind can be released to me at all about him. They essentially told me, any other student with a reading or math disorder was fine. I am very disheartened by this information because I have been making rich observations about him and would love to know more. The situation is so sensitive that I feel like I cant even talk to him anymore without raising suspicion.

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There is a first grade student who never attended kindergarten so he is still learning how to be in school. Every art class he will kind of start drawing something related to what we are doing and then totally go off and draw his own thing which are usually these little stick figures or circles. When class is over ever single time he gets up and either puts it behind the white board cart or throws it in the trash. This week while the class was making some foldable pumpkins he drew these figures and then threw it away. I gave him another paper and he asked me to help him draw an OC which I assumed was original character? I drew the top left face like he asked me to and then he drew the body. At the end of art class he threw away his paper and then got very upset and started tearing up. It seemed like he didn’t want to leave but from what I gathered he was upset that he still didn’t make an artwork that he liked. I tried to cheer him up and told him that we could draw some more characters together next time. I hope that before I leave I will be able to better understand this student and maybe see him not throw away his artwork at the end of class. This week I fished this out and the trash and made a collage of as many as I could fit on this page.

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This week I got to attend my new school's stage crew club for the first time! There was around 10 students as well as my mentor teacher and myself. The students were so excited to continue working on the mural for the play (Winnie the Pooh) for the second day. At the end of stage crew, everyone (including myself) was sad it was over (it goes from 3:40-5PM) but so excited to see our progress. As we all stepped back and turned off the projector, the students awed in amazement at our progress. It was so wonderful to see how accomplished the students felt and to see them all working together towards a common goal. I drew up this little Posca drawing of the background we're working on. I'm excited to show it to the students during club tomorrow to show them what we're working towards! They've all seen the projected background image from a Disney artist but maybe seeing my artwork will excite them even more (I hope)!

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This week I chose to draw a few of my students from the costume parade we had this week at school. It was a lively, exciting, and really community oriented event and it was such a nice experience to be a part of. I saw so many K-2 students came to school and all of their teachers work really hard throughout the day to make sure every student was included in a culturally appropriate way (the students that didn’t celebrate Halloween were given toys / face paint that they could choose from and a lot of students came dressed in traditional costumes from their cultures or something else). It was a really, really special day and I’m happy that I got to be a part of it. There are so many different personalities present and there were so many different students able to do different things during that parade. I was especially nervous about any kids feeling left out (I remember when I was in school, especially when I was little, a lot of these events feeling left out of or certain kids were left out of their family wasn’t present / or if you didn’t have money to participate). No school is perfect, but I think my school did a really good job making sure this wasn’t the case. I was laughing so hard all day and we ended up scrapping a lot of our plans because students were having trouble focusing but it was so, so, worth it.

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As I'm cutting out, laminating, and cutting out images again for my visual reference binder, I'm thinking about cutting as a skill, and having a little flashback to Zhailyn being made to sit out of cutting practice. I see him struggle with scissors more now than his peers, and do my best to anticipate this issue. He's prone to crying, too, which I can relate to; if he hangs onto his frustration a little too long, he might get lost in it and all work comes to a standstill. One of the ways I'm anticipating it- and extending this adaptation to the rest of the class- is marking cutting lines in super bold marker in super bold colors: bright red or black, or a white paint marker if it makes sense for the image/task. Ali also suggested printing out/providing practice versions for cutting tasks; it won't be what is used in the final piece, so the stakes are lowered and it's just about getting the technique. My co-op is going to be absent again tomorrow, and I'm thinking about all the things I need to get done on my own to get ready for each class... I think I'll recruit the students from the pull-out class I work with to help me with prep, and one of those prep tasks will be outlining photos to make it easier for students to cut them out. I'm really loving the time I spend in the pull-out room, and want to reinforce the relationship I have with that group of students (which includes Nasir!).

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This week, my Art 2 class started their contemporary master copies. I’m hoping the lesson can introduce some current artists they may find personally interesting while also building some foundational painting skills. In order to accurately transfer the content of the work onto a canvas however, we first had to tackle gridding which involves a lot of math.
I am not good at math. Like at all.
So that was a big struggle and led me to appreciate how teaching what you’re passionate about (i.e. painting for me) allows for lessons to be naturally invigorating. It was also a good lesson that built some relationships between my students and me as we tried different learning methods together.

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I am sorry that this visual note is out of order (this is from week 7). Life has been really life-ing lately. For this visual note I took these two different drawings I made for an example project we worked on and redrew them in with different student quotes saying "Can I have that?" I have been really really hard on myself because I spend soooo muchhhh timeeeee on making examples for the student projects. It will sometimes take me like 4-7 hours just to make a single example for a class. I know that spending this amount of time on things is completely unsustainable, especially for the younger grades and I find myself like in my own head a lot being like why are you spending so much time on this. However, when I show my examples in class there are particular students that get PUMPED. In every class there is almost always someone who asks if they can have it. At first I would say no because that is. what the other teachers did and that we needed to use them for examples but I always felt icky / bad / not like myself. I feel like all the art I make I usually share or give away. So I made digital copies of all my little illustrations I would make and now. when kids ask if they can have them I can just give them a copy of it. They feel super special and now I've also been ale to use them as like "rewards." I feel like I have been so caught up in like the "teacher" thing and essentially like pretending to be a teacher (lmao that's what it feels like) that I forgot completely about how making art is super important and can connect with people and excite my students. Lesson plans aside (lol) I guess spending that much time on little drawings and stuff can matter because it's important that they see what I make also even if I can't always communicate verbally about it.

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I'm having trouble staying afloat recently, and this visual note is late as a result. It also started as an image about drowning, but I tried to focus on process; I have been really admiring the work of K-3rd grade (generally), because of their natural focus on process and experimentation over outcome/final product. I used the space to think about my week, and the variety it's presented; I taught by myself on Thursday because my co-op was out, and it was amazing. We (students and I) had so much fun, and they made some really cool stuff. I'm excited to keep teaching on my own, which I will get the chance to do a few times in the coming weeks! I've also started going to Ms. Angela's room for her 5th grade math class, which Nasir is in. I got a sketchbook and some supplies for him to take home; he's still pretty shy around me, but I'm going to continue going to the pull-out room during that period. If anyone has any ideas for art lessons related to math, let me know! It's great getting to know the whole group, too- it's really sweet seeing them supporting each other, and seeing Ms. Angela teach is really great as well. Making the effort to befriend and take care of students who are seen as "difficult" (by Tamara, at least) has been really powerful for me in the classroom. So this is a visual note about finding friendship & support when you feel in over your head, and about using artistic process to gain some perspective!

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This last week my cooperating teacher has been kind enough to let me teach you a lesson using clay with the 6th through 8th graders. It has been so so so much fun, but also really difficult in some other ways. One student I was working with, Brenden, (8th grader) came in with a really nice almost brand new hoodie on. I told the group a bunch of times at the beginning of class to roll up their sleeves or take off their jackets so that when they were working with the clay it wouldn't get too messy. Brenden really didn't want to take off his jacket because it was brand new and really cool. So the first 20 minutes of class he wasn't touching his clay and saying over and over again how he hated art. I felt really bad because I could tell he was frustrated because all of his friends were making different cool things at the table. I prompted him gently a few times and tried to encourage him to take off his hoodie because I think that he would have an easier time with the clay if he did. Each time he said no. Finally, I went over and I Showed him my jacket from the morning and how I set it privately at my desk so that I can make different things. I told him (again) how I would put his hoodie with my jacket and make sure no one touched it. He reluctantly agreed just because he liked my jacket and said his brother had the same one. FINALLY! Brenden was having an absolute BLAST. The problem was that they were making Philadelphia cultural icons out of clay. I heard him whisper to his best friend “This is a lot more fun now that I took off my jacket.” He ended up building this huge pizza shop that had his friend's name on it with a pizza, a drink and all these different toppings!! It was amazing. He ended up building like 4 different personalized clay sculptures that were really advanced in the last 15 minutes of class. He was so proud of his stuff and I asked him if he liked clay and he still said “no” but once I put his project on the rack, he asked twice if he could stand on a chair to look at it to make sure it was still there. Since this day, he has stopped by the art room on two different occasions to ask about his clay piece and my co-op is shocked because she said he has never come down before. I think this truly is my favorite story so far during my student teaching experience. My motto for myself from now on when I’m having a hard time is ““This will be a lot more fun if I take off my jacket.”

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This week I started at my new placement on Thursday. My new mentor teacher is so sweet, supportive, respectful, and informative. One of the highlights of this week was seeing her teacher Kindergarteners about lines. She showed them a video talking about line and used movements to convey the quote "a line is a dot that went on a walk." Then they watched a video that was a song about lines. Finally, my mentor teacher did another song and dance with the students making different types of lines with her body and arms and they followed along. By the end of this activity, the whole class knew the difference between vertical, horizontal, and diagonal lines. I wanted to illustrate and write the lyrics to the song so I can remember them as this was such a fun activity! I got to see first hand how repetition can help students learn new terms and information.

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This week I taught my Art 2s the color wheel/color theory and terminology. I was surprised (and excited) at how engaged they were even though it was another conceptual based lesson. They got to paint for the entire week and it was interesting to see how even the students that normally talk instead of work were invested in their projects. The class was a quiet, almost meditative time during the week and I hope that the kids could feel that calmness too in their painting.

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This week I had a day where my co-op was absent so it was just the sub and I which was pretty nerve racking. In second grade we were using chalk pastels which can get pretty messy. I was going around checking up on everyone when I heard the kids gasp and then say that one student had put pastel all over her face. I wasn’t sure how to react at first. I just told her that I wouldn’t do that because it’s hard to get off and it isn’t good for your skin, but I could see why she thought it was similar to makeup. There are a lot of moments when I am not sure if I am doing or saying the right thing, and I know kids will be kids and are curious about things so I also don’t want to be too harsh. Her and another student who did the same thing then went to the sink to wash it off and I had them help me clean up in order to give them something else to do. (In my drawing I tried to make it look like one of those makeup face charts where people draw out the makeup look they’ll do)

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Sorry this is a bit late, I did not catch the memo that they are now due on sunday. That was in the emails when my head was spinning from Covid. Anyways, this week the 9th graders are working on isometric perspective and the first thing my co-op had the students do was make a bunch of cubes. While I was walking around a student pulled me over and was like, "Why cubes? This is art." I explained to them that the cube practice is to practice for the final which is using forms to make whatever you want. This got me thinking that maybe it should have been stated by my co-cop and myself that the cube exercise was just that, only practice. I think this would have garnered more student engagement.

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Wednesday night I spent over 1.5 hours folding 26 blue and pink Zines in preparation for teaching the thirteen 4th grade students the next day (I made sure I had enough of each colour, that way the students could pick the colour they preferred). Thursday, I went in to school very excited, expecting to teach 7th, 3rd, and 4th grade classes 2 different lessons (as the 4th grade were already finished with the previous lesson). I got to school, prepped the paint for the 7th grade class’s lesson, and met my mentor teacher in an 8th grade classroom for breakfast. My mentor teacher chose that moment, in front of the whole class, to get visibly angry at me over a question I texted her the day before about lessons I taught at the school, which she answered (most our correspondence happens over text), and she was furious that my Temple Supervisor asked her the same question as well (what were the lessons I had taught thus far). She told me she had not documented what, when, and which grades I had taught. This spiraled into her being visibly furious with me, stating that “maybe you can’t be my student teacher anymore,” and that I should take the day off (among other things); meanwhile the 8th graders were watching in shock. I assured her I was ready to teach and did not want to leave. To diffuse the situation, I excused myself to go to the bathroom. While in the bathroom, my Mentor teacher slammed her fists on the bathroom door yelling my name, she alerted me to collect my things, and I was to leave with a school monitor escorting me to the Principal’s Office, and that she “didn’t do it”. The Principal then told me I had to leave school as Temple “just called”  and my “monthly partnership with the school expired,” and Temple did not update my partnership agreement. This is just a very brief summary of my extremely bizarre and heartbreaking week. I am awaiting reassignment.

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This week I tried spending time in some other classrooms, working with other teachers, doing other things; one of those things was the origami elective. I really like the teacher who runs it, and am totally gonna go back next week. This wasn't the project we did in the elective, but I was reminded of these little stars. That night I started making little stars and have been making them all weekend in my down times, and I'm planning on bringing it to the elective next time; I find it really therapeutic and I'm sure plenty of students will, too. It can at the very least be an alternative if a student is getting frustrated with the more complex project the group is doing. I think other therapeutic elements could be introduced, like writing messages of some sort on the paper slips that make the stars. Maybe anonymous kind messages to classmates, or wishes/dreams, etc... I think something that's really missing from the art room at WCS is a sense of community/group ownership of the room, and this makes it hard to get students to collaborate on art; "specials" (art, music, gym) are one of the only places in school that are inclusive at all times, so I think it is especially important to foster student camaraderie in art. Finding small ways for students to uplift each other in art class is a step in that direction.
Sorry this is sort of all over the place!

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This week I attended my first in-service/professional development day. It was at a different elementary school in the district and included some academic teachers as well as all the music and art teachers (or at least all of the ones who didn’t take a personal day that day). The workshop was about strategies to teach literacy and did not relate much to art or music. One of the workshop leaders told me that I “better participate” when I was on my laptop writing a lesson. I just felt like I had many more important things to do and I could not relate much because I was not actually a teacher in the district, which made it awkward when they had us peer share with other teachers. They had us fill out this feelings heart which is meant to be something to help students talk about their feelings, so I included it in my visual note. I felt pretty out of place and luckily my co-op sent me home early. Overall, my favorite part of the workshop was just meeting the other art teachers and learning about what their jobs are like at each school.

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I had a hard time coming up with art to describe this week. I’m trying to focus on the positives and bright moments but as I do, I encounter a lot of “but”s that highlight some of the negatives (i.e. one student was creatively engrossed/engaged in their work but the majority weren’t). I’ve also been thinking a lot about the balancing act we engage in as teachers. Sometimes I find it difficult to understand the correct amount of compassion balanced with accountability, or teaching comfortable material balanced with challenges. I’m hopeful it will come with experience and have been trying to use this student teaching time as an opportunity to try different balances.

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When I sat down to do this visual note, everything went wrong- my materials didn't work on the surface, colors looked wrong, pen died, etc. etc... I didn't start over because "everything went wrong" is sort of a reflection of how I felt this week! I'm trying to focus on the students right now and drown out the anxiety about my co-op and teaching in her room. Written around the edges are some of the character requests I got this week for the visual reference binder, and the faces of some of the requesters. There are little moments every week, good and bad, that stand out; the same problems persist in the art room, like students being disqualified from activities because of undesirable behavior. I am hoping to work more closely with some of the IEP caseworkers (specifically Nasir's caseworker) and other teachers, to see how they handle the same students my co-op seems unable to handle. This is sort of a vent visual note. I am feeling overwhelmed, but hanging in there (kind of).

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This week I had a really interesting/cool/ important conversation with one of my fourth grade students. This particular student has been working on the same drawing/painting series that they titled “my brother as a foot “. Every week they come in and draw a different version of their little brother has different types of feet with different emotions. There is spent so much time on this drawing and it’s really funny and goofy and cool and weird in the best way, you can tell that they have a lot of love for their little brother and this is a secret shared place space between the two of them. They really are brilliant and imaginative. this week they are turning in all the finished paintings. As other students begin, turning in the work, this particular student started to get really insecure about their work. I think it was the first time they even looked at other students drawings. They noticed that all the other kids at their table had drawn different versions of the exemplar (ufos, rocket ships, etc.) before I could really tell what was going on, they kept coming up to me at different times throughout. And asking if they could start over. I kept trying to encourage them about how creative and cool their drawing was. I was explaining how unique it was because it was an idea they came up with all in their own. There is a point where they got pretty upset and I was concerned that they were going to throw away their painting. I said, “Even if you don’t like it, do you think it would be cool if you could give it your your little brother as a gift?” They really liked this idea and I think it helped them feel less insecure. I think this age is really hard when it comes to art because the student really wanted to hold onto some more silly things from childhood but was also experiencing compassion and “coolness” of their peers. I also struggle with this in my own practice where I have made a lot of art that I think is weird / different compared to my peers and I feel like keeping it private and I want to allow space for that also. The brother foot drawing will stick with me for a while! I don’t know if I’m describing this situation well, but it definitely had an impact on me.

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This week a student was catching up on a project after being absent. This student always has a sort of concerned look on his face and will raise his hand to tell me if someone so much as looks at him the wrong way. Often times he will ask to sit at the back table and work by himself because other students are bothering him, but I think he is just a very sensitive student. This week when he was finishing up his tree house painting (he decided to put trains in his tree because they are his favorite thing), I demonstrated to him how the crayon resists the paint and how to paint back and forth over it. While he was painting he had the biggest smile on his face and told me, “this is sooo relaxing.” It warmed my heart to see him enjoying art so much after seeing him upset before. It reminded me about why I wanted to teach art in the first place. I tried the crayon resist painting in my visual note and would have to agree that it was relaxing.

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So on Tuesday I tested positive for Covid which completely de railed my life. Even though I have little to no symptoms I am still testing positive so I cant go back to teaching. This has led to me mostly laying bed with my cat and trying to do things that are productive like catch up on work and start thinking about my second lesson. Im feeling pretty excited to go back to waking up at 6am and get back in the groove of things.

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I also taught my first lesson this week and introduced the students to a two-point perspective project. The initial day of teaching made me feel like a Charlie Brown teacher at times since this method of drawing is super rule-heavy. It was challenging to find the right questions to ask to gauge the students' understanding of the material. However, after the first two days of my lesson, most of the class has taken off in designing their own urbanscapes. Since my only requirements were that they follow the rules of two-point perspective and their final copy be in color, they are beginning to show creativity in what buildings/businesses/architecture they include. If anyone has tips or ways they gauge student comprehension I'd be interested to hear them!

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This week I taught my first lesson that was my own! I taught it to one of the two fourth grade classes that I’ve already taught two of my mentor teacher’s lessons to. The first day, we painted textures. It was such a free flowing, fun, and productive day! The students had a lot of fun trying to use paint in a way they haven’t done before, not needing to focus on making images but just able to make different types of lines and shapes. The second day was the cutting and pasting day. This day was more difficult for some students as they didn’t see shapes or objects in their textures and it took some deeper explaining and encouragement for some students to understand but by the end of class everyone had a clear direction they were going with for their collage. I’m really excited for this upcoming Tuesday as that is when this class will finish their collages and when I will start teaching this lesson to the third through eighth grade as well (simplifying and intensifying the expectations per grade).

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It took me a little while to identify a student for our midterm assignment, but Nasir stood out to me and this week on PD day I had a chance to talk to some of his other teachers. He almost always sleeps through all of his classes, and sometimes through art; but when he's awake during art, he's one of the most skilled art students in his grade. In talking to his other teachers, I learned that they had no idea about Nasir's artistic inclinations; none of the general classroom teachers I spoke to have had more than a few sustained interactions with him, myself included. When he is awake and working, he keeps to himself, with peers and adults in the room; it sounds like I'm going to need to set up a time to talk to his case worker if I'm going to get insight about him from someone else at school. I really noticed him last week with this kite assignment, where he made a dragon, and took the assignment as far as he could; we gave students optional final touch ideas, all of which he ran with. I'm excited to get to know him a little better, if he'll let me, and hope that I can reconvene with his grade teachers, who are also curious to see what I learn about him. Ms. O was excited to hear that Nasir was an artist, realizing she could perhaps motivate him in her math class by incorporating art elements, either as a part of the assignment or as an incentive for completing something. I hope this can be a beneficial teacher partnership & it's also giving me a chance to connect with other WCS folks who maybe aren't as punitive as my co-op! (🙃)

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This week there were definitely some big downs and the realization that we're almost halfway through is hitting me. It's a lot of everything all at once and I'm finding it  easy to get caught in the negatives/chaos. However, working with the kids and seeing their enthusiasm, growth, and personalities blossom is a reminder for me to keep in perspective why I'm teaching.

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We have a teaching artist in the classroom who is doing Artist Year and really wanted to do a colored pencil landscape drawing with the middle school students. Initially I was absolutely bored to death with the idea because I personally hate sitting and coloring with colored pencils. But! Middle schoolers find a way to make everything fun and interesting. The other teachers in the room were giving each class a long lecture at the beginning of class about "respecting" the colored pencils because they were $40/box and we had to crowdfund specifically so they could have artist quality colored pencils & so on. They were explaining to them how to sharpen them and take care of them & so on. When I looked over at one of the 7th graders, Jenesis, she had hid every single colored pencil in her hair (26 colored pencils!!!) and her table was in and absolute fit of laughter. She said she was "protecting them" and for the rest of the class period whenever anyone needed a colored pencil she would retrieve that color from her hair and then they would return it to her hair. I don't know if i'm describing quite how funny it is but me & my co-op were laughing so hard I had tears coming down my face. There was like one moment when it first happened where I could see my co-op deciding in our 'adult brains' like do we say to take the colored pencils out of her hair so everyone could use them blah blah blah but Im glad we just went with it and laughed. The rest of the classes they also didn't give the colored pencil respect speech anymore (haha) so I thought this was cool. Middle school is pretty fun!!!

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This week I taught a lesson about Batik landscapes using a glue resist dyeing technique. There was a student who looked upset when we started using the glue to draw on the fabric. When I asked what was wrong she said that she hated glue and did not understand why we could not use glue sticks. I told her that it would not work the same and realized that she probably does not like the feeling of glue on her hands. She said she would not do it then. I showed her a way to use the glue to avoid the mess but told her that it was okay if she did not like it. I said that if she wanted to try it I would leave the glue for her. When I went to help another student and came back I saw that she had drawn out her whole picture with the glue and was proud that she gave it a shot. I did feel bad that I did not have gloves for her though so if I taught this again I would bring some for students who also hated glue. I also later realized that using a paint brush to spread the glue might have helped but I am not sure if it would work well enough.

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This whole week I found myself realizing how fast time is flying by. We are already starting our midterm assignments and (hopefully) slowly teaching more and more lessons. I wish I could have taught more by now but sadly it just so happens that this year is my mentor teacher's observation year as well. Since she will be observed in mid October, I haven't been able to teach most grades due to my mentor teacher wanting to keep the students used to her teaching until her observations are complete. Next week, I will be starting to teach my own lesson for the first time this year (both lessons I've taught thus far have been my mentor teacher's) other than a mini lesson I did for art club. My lesson plan is complete, what I have to prepare beforehand is almost done, and the anticipation is making me very nervous and excited. I truly hope it goes well but I just need to remind myself that even if things don't turn out perfect, it's okay as it'll help me learn for the next time I teach that lesson or another lesson in general.

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This week I began brainstorming some ideas for what project I want to teach independently. My co- op teacher showed me a bunch of mark making tools in his classroom like wooden quills, sticks and twigs and I made this note as I was experimenting with fabrics and mark making tools. I discusses potentially have students take a photo of some tectural part of nature and experiment using ink and organic tools to depict this texture. As i have been settling in more and more at my placement im finding that I really like experimenting with the different materials and aspects of the projects my co-op has taught over the years.

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This week I had originally made a different visual note which I ended up forgetting at school and losing. Right now I feel like my mind is just a jumbled mess. I’ve been planning out what my next lessons will be till the end of the semester and I just feel very overwhelmed with trying to balance everything in my life while thinking of every step I need to do throughout my student teaching. It’s making me wonder if it’s just so overwhelming because I’m new to this and I’m doing school at the same time, or if this is how art teachers feel all the time.

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I had a really cool/positive experience working with a 4th grade student, Logan. While we were working on our Tekashi Murakami paintings (the lesson I showed last week). Logan was having a lot of trouble because they had a specific idea for Sonic that they wanted to draw and all of their drawings were not turning out how they had in their mind. Additionally, they became more frustrated because their drawing was taking so long that they were falling behind other students at their table. WOW do I feel that! There is nothing worse then the pressure of other people in proximity to you moving at a certain pace / doing a certain thing where you can't even clear your head to work through your own problems! Whew. Logan really,really, really wanted to trace the sonic on the Ipad so it looked a particular way. My co-op was super supportive in saying that I could sit with Logan one-on-one to work on the drawing and if it still didn't work we could bust out the Ipad. Logan and I had so much fun!!!!!! I was able to help them work through each problem on the Sonic drawing and support them before we cried and it felt really good. They are so proud of their drawing and by the end of it literally even said "I'm so glad I drew it myself." I was like, heck yes. Logan came back during LUNCH & RECESS to work on their Sonic. I made this lil drawing of Logan holding up what I think looks like a version of his drawing because it helps me remember the little things that keep me happy!

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This week is a selfie for me. I repurposed something old I found in my sketchbook, about trying to impress people by being someone that isn't really me; I don't feel like myself most of the time when I'm at school and it stunts me professionally/creatively. I'm trying to shift that in small ways, by doing things I know are right. I'm trying to step in and stop disqualification from happening at all- if I see someone starting to melt down or struggling I try to get to them and give help before my co-op can react to their "bad" behavior. This week I also made the resource packet for a project the seventh grade is working on, and found a few ways to present the same information to students so they could decide which format made the most sense to them. The first class on it went surprisingly smoothly, so I think the effort was worth it. By presenting the info in a few formats from the get-go we offset potential problems we could have run into on day 1; more students understood the assignment right off the bat than I think would have if we had just given them one format.

So I'm coping in those small ways at school. Outside of school, I'm trying to get back into drawing like I did when I was in middle and high school (thus the old sketchbooks). I'm really frustrated by my co-op's high art vs. low art hierarchy, so getting back into drawing cute anime girls has acted as a kind of catharsis for me, and another way to feel a little more like myself- which ultimately makes me better at teaching!

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I'm beginning to feel some frustration with my co-op's choice/pacing of lessons. For the last week, students in both Art I and II classes have been drawing a still life of paper bags for 90 min per day. Many were almost finished by Thursday of last week and hopeful for a new (more involved) project. However, my co-op stated that we'd continue to work on the same still lives for the entirety of next week. I understand the importance of practicing fundamental drawing skills, but the limitations of this lesson make an already remote concept even hard to engage with. Since my co-op's given me total freedom with my lessons, I'm taking extra time to craft something the students may actually find invigorating while also learning.

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This week I taught my first lesson to a fourth grade class which I had taught most of them last year when they were third graders. My mentor teacher's lesson was focused on showing students how they can use lines and shapes that they had learned in previous years and were reminded of during the circle lesson. To prepare for the lesson I made a sample drawing, then during the lesson I made a demo drawing, and on the second day I completed another demo for the students who had not been there on the first day because of Gym Club. I took all three drawings and combined them into a singular drawing for this Visual Note. While doing these demos I would point to the main sample and would ask what shape was the head/ears/nose/eyes/etc. so the students could see that they knew how to break down shapes in a completed drawing, rather than feeling intimidated by the whole drawing. The students gave wonderful answers like that the ears are rounded triangles, the nose looks like a slice of pizza, the birds are curved V's, the body looks like a vase, etc. When talking through my drawing, I tried to break down more complicated shapes by saying the eyes are a frowny face line with a smily face line and the hind legs are like halves of a heart. I had a wonderful experience teaching this lesson and I'm so proud of the student's artwork and being able to see progress from my lesson last year.

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I am feeling a little frustrated with my co-op's lesson plans this week honestly! I'm not really sure how to actually approach the issue with her or if I should approach it at all, but boy can I share my thoughts with you all. :( The kindergarten classes have been doing a tree project for the past couple of days, where they collage a brown tree on blue paper on day 1 and then paint green leaves on the trees with q-tips on day 2. Today when we did the painting with our second group of kindergarteners, a handful of them started painting with the "wrong" techniques - smearing instead of dabbing, or in the case of Maurice, painting on the bottom of the egg carton that held the paint and using it as a stamp (creating larger circles). Maurice and his table mate both did this stamping method, and got in trouble for it, earning "negative kickback points". One student, Rafiq, started smearing paint right away and his classroom's assistant teacher took his supplies away for the rest of the class (and gave him negative points). I saw him sitting there looking upset and asked him if he had something to work on, not knowing his classroom teacher had taken his materials away as a punishment for not "doing it right". He told me he didn't, so I asked my co-op if I could give him something to do and she shrugged and said "Ms. Patrice took it away". I quietly gave his work back to him and told him he could work on it but only dabbing, which he did... It felt really wrong to me to take away supplies because a student experimented with mark making instead of dabbing the paper just like the teacher. In general students in my co-op's classroom are easily disqualified from artmaking for "bad behavior" or doing an assignment incorrectly; which puts students with IEPs (and those who should have them, but don't) at high risk of disqualification. Again, I don't know how to approach this. I would appreciate any help or words of affirmation, lol :(

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This past week, students had the opportunity to draw from a live model. Leading up to this, students had a model prep exercise where they drew from busts in the classroom. This visual note is a sketch I did of a bust of woman. The vulnerable pose of the woman spoke to me in some way, I think because I myself am feeling very vulnerable this week. I ran a small critique with the class and noticed right away that many of the students seemed confused or were zoning out and this made me feel somewhat uncomfortable. This is not new behavior though, the students do the same with my cooperating teacher. I am wondering how we can structure critiques to maybe be a little more interactive rather than the students being lectured at. Maybe students could each pose a question to each other about their work.

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This week we introduced first graders to using sketchbooks in their free time and gave them the option to use stencils. There is a student in one class who so far has never sat still for long enough to get through a lesson and often wonders around the room looking at the art posters or at the teacher's camera. This week was the first time that I saw them fully participating while drawing in their sketchbook. I think they liked the idea of being able to draw specific imagery of things they were interested in. One of those things being these "spooky stencils" which is what I used to create my response this week. My co-op encourages students to create a whole scene using these stencils which it seemed they enjoyed doing. This student also loves roblox so when they were finished in their sketchbook we rewarded their hard work with a roblox coloring sheet which they were very excited about.

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This week we had a lot of students who could not sit still which inspired my artwork where I drew the paths they would take around the room. They would usually start at their seats but as the teacher was instructing them they would wonder all over the place. It was hard for me to know how to respond to these situations because I would try to lead them back to their seats but they would usually not want to work on art. They would sometimes rip up their papers, scribble, throw crayons on the floor, or continually go up to the teacher’s desk. They loved sitting in her seat when she got up or playing with her camera that she uses to show demonstrations. We were just happy when they would sit down and do anything whether it be scribbling or messily painting. I am curious to see if these students move around less as the year goes on because most of them were kindergarteners or first graders who may be adjusting to the school environment.

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I had a really positive experience learning from my co-teacher this week. In the past, they have felt insecure about their ability to teach a particular student because this student gets in trouble for behavior / leaving their seat in other classes. They care about this student a lot and want to do what's best for them. When this student ran to the carpet during our class, my co-teacher brought the materials to the carpet and they painted on the carpet instead of in their seat. It seems small, but it made a HUGE difference. it's the first time all year I've been able to see the student complete an art task, be really happy, and be really engaged. They even looked to me for a "thumbs up" - which was huge. My teacher even emailed his mom to celebrate the win and she was incredibly appreciative. Additionally, she put a morning shout out on the announcements that said "We are so proud of Zion in art class for finishing his painting on the carpet! You go Zion!" He came SMILING and so proud to art class the next couple days  always looks for us in the hallways now. Such a little thing made such a huge difference (I feel like). For my visual note, I chose to draw Zion on the carpet finishing their painting.

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This past week, I observed an 8th grade student erase "ting?" from the word "painting?" on the board to leave the word "pain" behind. This resonated with me as I know the student is experiencing some difficult circumstances in their personal life currently and while they are a productive and talented student, I can see that they are experiencing the same mental anguish I was going through at their age. I have done my best to complement and emphasize the student's talent and successes. This moment was another reminder that students are dealing with so much, especially as they get older. They have new responsibilities such as taking care of siblings, helping around the house, and maybe even having a job all on top of going through puberty, school work and tests becoming more difficult, and other personal struggles that they may now face. We must approach every student with kindness and know that any "negative" behavior is not coming from a bad place, but potentially a place of sadness or lack of control in their lives.

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There was a girl in one of our kindergarten classes last week who was supposed to have an aide with her but didn't- she wanted to run around interact with every novel object in the art room and my co-op asked me to stay with her. It was more than I could confidently handle, especially because it was the first time we had seen them; the dreaded rules day. After kind of chasing her around the room for the first half of the directions she sat in my lap for the second half. I don't see how she could have understood the directions because she missed most of them, but ultimately I don't think it mattered when she got to work; she immediately set to work coloring  everything outside of the boxes she was meant to be working in. It was awesome. This is a recreation because she brought hers home with her to show her mom, but she was blending colors and being as thorough as someone with kid fine motor-skills could be; it wasn't what she was ~supposed~ to be doing, but it was something worthwhile. I am struggling a little with the first few LPs, as a good number of them follow this worksheet format where students copy or color in a printed image and I think it's not quite enough, most of the time.  With something like this (practicing straight lines), some kids become disengaged because it's too easy/fast for them; the alternative is usually something like what this specific student did, finding a way to make it motivating by themselves. I would like to create/find/teach some LPs that have that kind of motivation built into them, or leave a lot of room for kids to choose and be motivated by that freedom/flexibility.

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This past week I've been thinking a lot about student creativity and exploration. I've observed paraprofessionals completing artwork for their students to colour in and observed my mentor teacher draw  flowers for the K-2 Autistic Support students to colour in. There isn't anything wrong with creating art for students to colour in, but I've observed students create deeper narratives and explore more when working on their own rather than just colouring on a completed drawing. I think a way to bridge this gap is by letting students direct the drawing for them to then colour in. I came up with this after one of my students finished her drawing early (as well as two more free drawings) and asked me to draw with her. She told me she wanted a unicorn on a hill. Then she said I should draw a rainbow. As I drew the sun, moon, and birds, she asked me to draw her a tree. I asked her what fruit she would like on the tree and she said apples. This drawing we came up with was entirely her idea (other than the sun, moon, and birds I drew while she coloured in the rainbow and unicorn) which allowed her to create her own narrative and scene. If the paraprofessionals wanted to draw with the students, I think that they should allow the students to come up with ideas of what to add to the drawing as well so it can be uniquely their's.

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This week I met my students and began to get a feel for the atmosphere of the classes. In the gradebook/student info website the teachers use, there are symbols that appear next to students' names. They include medical alerts, personal records, and presence of IEPs or other disability information. The symbol for the presence of an IEP/disability is a blue rectangle. When scrolling through my student rosters, I felt overwhelmed by the amount of students with this present. I'm all the more appreciative of this class as I learn methods of adaptation, inclusion, and support for all students.

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This week a student joined our class and throughout the time either refrained from working or completed the minimum requirements. Instead of joining with other students, he typically kept his head down on the table and remained quiet. During one class, we handed out a color worksheet for students to fill in; he was the first to hand in the worksheet as he had written "I don't know." for every answer. Later in the week, one of the special education teachers reached out to my co-op asking for specific feedback of the student's behavior. She eventually came to the class to observe and speak with the student as she had supported and advocated for him for the last 2 years. I'm hoping to talk to her within the next week and learn what we can do in the art classroom to encourage/support him.

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This week before students started attending, all faculty participated in professional development. The training focused on restorative practices and how to incorporate them into classrooms. Although this was familiar to most of the teachers, it was a new experience for me and I appreciated the emphasis placed on the importance of emotions. Within restorative practice, both teachers and students are encouraged to follow the observation, feeling statement, and evaluation model. Incorporating this into the classroom allows teachers to model appropriate emotional expression/regulation and ways to handle conflict for their students.

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This week, my mentor teacher completed a similar lesson with each grade from K-8. As the grades got older, the lesson's intensity was increased and for the younger students, the lesson intensity was decreased. K-2 drew 3 circles and coloured them in with crayons in 6 different sections on the page. 3-5 traced the inside and outside of masking tape to make however many or few circles that they liked. Lastly, 6-8 already had one large circle on their page and filled in the circle with detailed linework, shapes, and symbols of their choice.

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This week I had a student who spent most of the class period peeling the paper off of crayons instead of doing the lesson. I had a few other students who did this as well from time to time and they would be so focussed while doing so. My co-op let students do this as long a they threw away the scraps in the trash which is what inspired my artwork. I think that the process of ripping paper can be a therapeutic experience and I wonder if I could somehow incorporate it into a lesson. It could be a way for students to focus more on the process of art making.

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These first two days and even know I really felt myself projecting ahead and worrying about what my career will look like after collage. Something I just kept telling myself is "youve got time' and just take it "one day at a time." This week, we really focused on scribble gestures and creating drawings with lots of energy and visual interest. While we were scribbling, a student said,"Who needs therapy when you have this." After I heard that, I took the opportunity to scribble all over this scrap of paper and decided to depict a clock in the center to describe that feeling of worrying about time.

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The past few days have made me see that first day procedures (which are supposed to/expected to be easy!) are pretty difficult for some kids, particularly kids with learning or behavioral disabilities! In each class, there was at least one student who was having a very difficult time staying in their seats or not making noise; there are half-measures in place for when doing what the group is doing is too hard (like a "break" area, a table where students can work alone), but I'm not sure how to get first day rules/expectations done so that students who may be more easily distracted get all the directions. These students would probably do just fine with the actual activities being done in class, but missing directions or feeling uninvolved (by way of sitting at the break table, for example) makes it hard for these students to get into the actual "work" part of the day.

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Thinking about: A lot of "I can't draw" and "I'm not good at art" from the middle school students that makes me really sad to hear.  It makes me sad to watch how effortlessly & excitedly the K-2's just draw endlessly without much fear and then something happens where we get messages growing up about "ability" and "good vs. bad" that sort of shifts all of that for us. I genuinely believe it is in some way the education system and art teachers fault in some way for this mindset shift where in forcing outcomes on students they then begin to believe they "aren't good" at something as they grow up through and educational system. I am having a lot of trouble seeing myself as part of this system or where I fit in this narrative. I tried to meditate & make this drawing in the style of how I was able to watch the younger students draw - quickly, excitedly, continuous, without worry. Since coming to Tyler, drawing & making art has sort of been really rough for me to feel any joy doing. If I feel this way in an art institution - I imagine this is how a lot of my students feel as well. I think what we are doing (re: art education) can be incredibly good / useful but it can also be damaging at the same time. The complexities are difficult.