Was it just me, or was this chapter begging to be published online? There were so many wonderful links embedded in this chapter that I wanted to just stop and play with all of them. I wanted to read and click and read more and click more so I could see all the great opportunities the author was talking about. I thought this chapter was fantastic; there was so much content to explore.
I am pleased to say that in our school we have four of the five arts areas covered. We offer wonderful art courses and a thriving theatre program (which I taught for 13 years). We have a first rate music program and even have our own recording studio, thanks to winning the NESCOM competition two years in a row. We have a burgeoning technology program. My friend and colleague Jeff Bailey teaches broadcasting and video production and next year is thinking of expanding his offerings. Truly, the arts are alive and well at MVHS. The only area that we are lacking in (as a school) is dance, but there are multiple dance studios in our area, and the kids take advantage of them.
I also enjoyed the emphasis on incorporating the arts into our classrooms. I do a fair amount of this. When I used to teach freshmen, art was an inderdisciplinary strand that I taught in conjunction with English. It was fun teaching the kids about the three periods of Greek art, and I loved learning new things. Now I try to incorporate art and music when I teach poetry. This reinforces my opinion that literature cannot be studied in isolation. The reader needs to understand the history and culture of the period in order to truly understand the work. This, of course, means more reading, more studying...but I find it endlessly fascinating.
This year, I tried using multi-genre papers in my classes. As a result, many kids utilized skills that I did not know they had. I got many pieces of artwork and some pieces of music. No one has tried dance yet, but I bet it would be really great to see that.
I loved this chapter. It seemed to me to be the perfect blend of useful links and ideas and helpful guidance for how to incorporate TPCK in our classrooms.
Cindy, I really enjoyed exploring the ArtsEdge site! There is a plethora of material there available for me. I am developing units on dystopias and also (for this course) a unit on Puritanism. Both of these themes are found in the ArtsEdge site. I will have to explore them further.
ReplyDeleteStacey, I really liked the Top Ten Arts website. Again, lots to explore (and not a lot of time to do it in) but I think that I will be able to find many areas of interest on the site.
Another great site is http://www.ushmm.org/
This is the site for the Holocaust Museum in Washington DC. I like to use this site when my kids read Night. There are great art, literature and social studies resources available on this site.
Thanks for some great links!
I found from this chapter that there are lots of resources and materials out there for integrating arts in the all content areas. I did like the top ten websites, a place where you can easily find resources and start thinking about art in the classroom, there is a lot out there and i like you need to figure out how to find the time to explore, think, reflect, and utilize these great resources.
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