Teaching Philosophy

The purpose of our education is to gain insight into the world around us. This insight can be through several different aspects such as learning from our history, gaining new perspectives, understanding how your society functions, and how to be successful. I believe that a school is a tool for students to be successful in their future aspirations. Each student has their individual needs and wants within them. School has the opportunity to inspire, facilitate, and excite kids about their future.

Within my classroom, the learner is a unique individual with their perspectives, experiences, and wants out of life. Each student learns differently and at their own pace. They are collaborators who adapt and learn from one another. They are intuitive and aware of the world around them. Your job as an instructor is to facilitate their experiences and guide them toward critical ideas. These critical needs are only obtainable through the expectations of the classroom. The expectations of the classroom facilitate a safe space of empathy and understanding for each student's perspective. Allowing for the allowance of new perspectives and critical ideas.

The teacher is a curator of the learners' education. They are the core of the classroom. They set the standards and expectations in and outside the classroom. A good teacher is proactive rather than reactive, setting students up for success. They curate their lessons critically and are prepared for them to go wrong. They learn from their mistakes and continue to research new methods that lead to their students' success. Teachers are the foundation of the classroom and require passion and drive to be successful.

The learner's work should be centered around critical substances within our society. This is centered around the ideas of Critical Theory. This perspective empowers humanity by transcending the constraints placed upon them by race, class, and gender. Students should challenge and deconstruct the society they live within. This deconstruction will be through lessons that evoke research, creation, discussion, and reflection. Sparking the need to create change within our society and learner’s future.

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Unit Plan

Identity

Identity is the distinctive qualities or traits that make an individual unique. It is the distinction between self and others. It encompasses many facets of ours including the memories, experiences, relationships, and values that we hold. Throughout our lives, we use these facets to build our sense of self. When you are confused about who you are it can create feelings of isolation and loneliness—not allowing you to identify or relate with others. This can be referred to as an identity crisis. When growing up this can be a large issue for children of all ages. To prevent this crisis we can use tools such as art to help students discover what makes them unique and special. This will allow students to improve decision-making, create self-awareness, foster community participation, and enable healthy relationships

Essential Questions

What is an identity?
What makes your designs unique?
How can we express and reflect on our identity?

Students Will:

Students will analyze works based on their design choices conveyed through ideas and concepts (Va Reflection: Anchor Standard 1.1)
Students will explore spontaneous creation to generate ideas about design and identity (VA Creating: Anchor Standard 1)
Students will gather research on what design means and how it is affected by identity (Va Connection: Anchor Statement 10)
Students will present reflections on their work and designs to classmates to understand others' identities and designs (Va Presenting: Anchor Standard)

Development Stage: K-1st grade

Five and six-year-olds have vivid imaginations with intuitive thinking skills. They love to play while learning and have fun. They are engaged and love sharing what they know. They enjoy the process of creating and are not always concerned with the end product. They are starting to understand the connection between images and ideas.

Lesson Plan

Identity Pendants

Lesson Summary

This lesson goes over the importance of fashion to students' identity through creation, analysis, and reflection. This lesson will begin with the design of the student's favorite outfit or outfit they would wear all the time. This will then transition to more specific fashion accessories that are functional. The functional pendant will be made of air-dried clay and be painted the following week and hung on a string for the students to wear. This lesson's goal is to give students a sense of identity through the cloths that students wear. Allowing them to express themselves through fashion and design choices.

Specific Objectives

Students will…

Analyze the meaning of fashion
Understand how to create fashion styles
Synthesize materials to design their outfit and pendant
Reflect on how their choices connect to their identity

Materials List

White paper
Paper dolls
Markers
Trays
Clay tools
Air dry clay
yarn
scissors
Alphabet cookie cutters
Cups
water

Vocab

Identity
Fashion
Design
Outfit
Pendant

Motivation

I will begin by welcoming in my students and begin our daily routine of coming in and sitting on the carpet and going over the expectations for behavior. This includes respecting yourself, respecting others, and respecting the classroom.
We will remind ourselves that we are artists, “I am an artist! I am talented and creative! I love to make art! I can make mistakes! I am an artist!”
After the introduction activities, I will then introduce the schedule of the day, remind them of what their identity is, and the theme of the day is: fashion. Explain the significance of fashion and how it connects to their identity. I will ask questions about their favorite color to wear and connect it to their identity.
The motivation for the pennant will be the students doing a warm-up activity and doing a self portrait of themselves in a favorite outfit that they would wear all the time. Before they begin creating I will go over things that they might add to their outfit by asking them questions about clothing. This will be done with paper dolls and markers allowing them to really plan out their outfits.
As they are going through this warm up I will go around and complement them on their choices and connect it to their identity. When they are done with their self portraits I will have them return to the carpet and share what they created. We will then reflect on how their choices show their identity.
I will then reveal that we will be creating our own fashion statements today by creating our own necklace pendants that we can wear. Make sure to go over the purpose of a pendant and how it is worn. Before dismissing them to their seats I will go over the procedures with clay and the tools that we will be using. After saying the procedures I will dismiss them one by one to their seats.

Art Activity

After you dismiss your students one by one to their seats you can begin to pass out the slabs of clay on trays. Each student will be making one pendant with their initials and various textures rolled into them. You will begin by asking the students to stamp out their initials and choosing the textures they will be putting on their pendant.
Make sure students are aware not to use excess water when working with the clay and show an example of how to score the clay together.
After the student is done with their initials and choosing their texture, have them raise their hand for the other slab. Explain that they need to cut their pendant out of the slab and place their initials somewhere on the slab.
When students are done with their pendant, have them raise their hand and create the hole for them for the string to eventually go through. After you are done with that, have them wipe their hands with a wipe and dismiss them to the carpet to do the closing art activity.
You should have a designated spot to put the trays of clay to dry and make sure students' names are on the trays.

Reflection

After all of the students are complete with their pendants and are at the carpet doing their closing activity use a call back to get their attention. After they are listening, explaining that we will now clean up the closing activity and reflect on our pendants.
After students are done cleaning up, ask them questions about their design choices and how they constructed the pendant. Making sure to highlight how everyone made unique work that showed their identity.
Explain that in a few weeks after the pendants are dry we will be painting them. You can ask the students what colors or patterns they may add to their design.
Wrap up your statement and conclude with the artist chant and get ready for pickup or play a game until pickup.

Journal Entry

Using fashion as a vessel for students to understand their identity was very beneficial. It showed them that they always have choice when creating outfits and their choices make up their identity. We created pendants that reflected our identity in fashion through either using your initials or things that you like within your fashion. These pendants were very successful and every student was very creative with how they made their versions of the pendants. After that lesson was over we started on the special outfit project where they created an outfit. This outfit was based around a place they wanted to go and what they would wear. I had many very creative outcomes such as going to Jurassic World wearing a caveman outfit or going to the Mushroom Kingdom in a special Mario outfit. We got about halfway through this lesson before running out of time and will continue it on week 6.

Some things that I would change if I would teach it again is having more stamp options for animals and other geometric shapes. I had plenty of letters but was limited in other shapes students related to. Leading to some of them becoming frustrated. In the end, I taught them how to create their shapes. Some struggled with this concept and I guided them through the process. In the end, they all created what they wanted to and had a lot of fun experimenting with the clay.

I used a lot of pretend play and questions to engage the students. This was done through imagining traveling to different spaces and brainstorming what to wear to these locations. The students seemed to respond to this well and were eager to answer. I made sure to connect these choices to their identity and how their choices affect them. This seemed to encourage individuality within their work. The only thing that I would change about this portion is to add more outlandish places that the students would have to travel to. These places could range from a Disney castle to an alien planet, or the bottom of the ocean.

I think that at the beginning of Saturday's art, the students were very nervous so they listened to the expectations without question. As they come out of their shell they are beginning to show a lot more energy. This has been harder to contain as the weeks go on but is still manageable. The biggest thing that I have been struggling with is at carpet time students either blurting out answers or interject when it is not time to answer. I often kindly remind them of the expectations to listen to others when they are speaking. This often works but happens again a few minutes later. They do this out of excitement and are eager to be heard so I do not wish to punish them for it. This is a part of classroom management that I wish to work on. If I were to restart my classes I would have introduced a reward system from the beginning. This would hold students accountable for their actions and be rewarded for positive behavior. I think that this would help with their need to use energy and put it towards something positive they can earn.

So far this experience is the most helpful class that I have taken at DAAP. It is combining everything that I have learned throughout the years and putting it to the test. It helps me drop my imposter syndrome and feel comfortable in front of the kids. The lesson planning aspect also really prepares me for the future. It allows me to understand not only the logistics but also the tricks to creating an effective lesson. Each lesson has turned out differently than I thought. This is not a bad thing; it allows me to prepare better for the future and make changes if I need to.

Camp Counselor

In the summer of 2022, I became a camp counselor for the Cincinnati Nature Center. It was an amazing experience that not only taught me a lot about nature but also about being a teacher. Every week we had a new group of kids with a new exciting theme. Some of these themes included Survival Week, Creek Week, Earth Kids, and Earth Wind and Fire. Counselors were given a curriculum for each theme and came up with lesson plans for every day. This created amazing opportunities for growth as a teacher. Some activities that we curated for the campers included fort building, log rolling, deep water hikes, kite making, solar ovens, and canoeing.

"I believe strongly in the power of arts education to engage and empower young people."

Teaching Philosophy

Unit Plan

Lesson Plan

Journal Entry

Camp Counselor

-Heather Watts-