Secondary Student Teaching
Archiving the Domestic
High School Lesson Unit taught at Kelvyn Park High School in CPS
Lesson 1: Writing Autobiographical Prose
In preparation for developing an autobiographical artist book, students will write poetry or a short story that involves a memory from their childhood. Students will be shown autobiographical and story-telling poetry examples by Clarissa Thompson Sligh, George Ella Lyon and Gwendolyn Brooks, as well as the teacher’s example. Using prompts, students will explore facets of using words to represent human experiences, and have in progress feedback from peers to analyze the perception of their words, before moving onto the next lesson of the unit.
Lesson 2: Building a Database
High school students, in preparation for developing an autobiographical artist book, will start preparing imagery to use in the bookbinding process. Inspired by Clarissa Sligh, Regin Igloria, and Lynda Barry, students will both search for collage materials in magazines and scrap pieces of paper, and make illustrations of scenes from their story. They will consider the effectiveness of their drawings and photos for conveying the stories that they wrote about during the previous lesson.
Lesson 3: Designing Artist Books as a Way to Visually Share Memory
High school students, after accumulating a database of images, drawings, and poetry, will develop an artist book as a way to narrate a personal history or memory. Inspired by Lois Morrison, Hedi Kyle, Clarissa Thompson Sligh’s What’s Happening with Momma?, students will make collaged accordion books and compose the pages with written and visual components based on their childhood experience. Students will be given the opportunity to look through the library of their peers during an in progress gallery walk and a summative partner critique. They will also be expected to fill out a rubric to explain their own pieces and align their work with the objectives.
Sculpted, Painted Space: Color Field Bas Relief
High School Lesson Unit taught at Kelvyn Park High School in CPS
Lesson 1: Sculpting Space: Using Air Dry Clay to Make a Bas Relief Sculpture
Inspired by Sophia Vari, Heather Knight and ancient stone carvings from Assyria and Mexico, high school students will make an abstracted bas relief sculpture with air dry clay or paper cellulose on cardboard based on a texture found in nature. In the first lesson of the unit, they will intuitively carve, add and sculpt natural textures into a relief using clay tools and their hands.
Lesson 2: Painting Space: Adding Color to the Bas Relief Panel
High school students, inspired by Color Field painters Helen Frankenthaler and Alma Thomas, will use watercolor painting techniques to add color to their bas relief panels they made with air dry clay or paper cellulose in the previous lesson. They will play with mixing colors, building in light layers, and design a saturated color palette. Students will participate in an in-progress gallery walk, a summative partner critique, and a self reflection.
Collaborative installation with students' panels to be hung up in the school!
Notes from the gallery walk
Sisyphus recreation!
Notes from the gallery walk
Notes from the gallery walk
Teacher Exemplar with air dry clay
Teacher Exemplar with paper cellulose
Portraits of Identity: Arte Popular Inspired Oil Pastel Self Portraits
High School Lesson Plan taught at Kelvyn Park High School in CPS
Honors Creative Studio students will use oil pastels to make a colorful self portrait through direct observation. They will learn facial proportions and utilize comparative measurement strategies to draw their portrait. Inspired by Arte Popular of Mexico, they will develop a highly saturated color palette and design a motif filled background inspired by their own culture and identity. Students will participate in both an in progress gallery walk, where they can revise based on peer feedback, and in a summative small group or partner critique, before filling out their own rubric.
Teacher Exemplar
Designing Wallpaper: Natural and Personal Motif Making with Stamps and Stencils
Two Day High School Lesson Plan taught at Kelvyn Park High School in CPS
High school students, over the course of two class periods, will design a “roll” of wallpaper with a motif made from natural and personal symbols. They will be introduced to the unit with Edgar Miller’s prints, Mexican papel picado, Faheem Majeed’s wallpapering of Dr. Margaret Burroughs’s Black Venus linocut, William Morris’s wallpaper designs made with woodblocks during the Arts and Craft Movement, and the nature-representative and patterned appliqué Molas of the Guna people of Panama. On the first day, students will brainstorm their motifs and have the choice to make their wallpaper from the options of a stencil or a foam stamp. They will fabricate their stencils and stamps by the end of the first class period. On the second day, students will view a demonstration on how to use paint with their stencil and how to print their foam stamp with a brayer, ink, and a barren. They will make an individual roll of wallpaper with the repeated use of their stamps or stencils, as well as adding to a collective class or group wallpaper roll. Once they all finish, we will have a group discussion about their collaboration and they will have a personal self reflection worksheet to complete.
Teacher Exemplar
How to Make a GIF: Short Form Image and Illustration Animation Using Photoshop
One Day High School Lesson Plan taught at Sullivan High School in CPS
In one 44 minute class period, high school digital art students will analyze short form animation in the form of a GIF, and how it can be used to express interests and communicate with the digital world. Students will discuss how, when and where they encounter GIFs in their daily lives, and discover the animation work of Joe Maccarone, as one contemporary example. Students will learn how to use images and digital drawings to create GIFs using Adobe Photoshop, and create one GIF that has at least 5 frames. After the fabrication of their own GIFs, students will be prompted to present their piece with a partner and discuss the showcased work, their process and the inspirational interests behind their GIF.
Student Work
The Art of Scavenging: Making From and With Found, Natural Objects
Five Day High School Lesson Unit
Over the course of three activities, early high school students will experiment with the curation of collected natural materials, rubbing as a printmaking technique, layering with painting and drawing, all culminating in a mixed media weaving. Students will be able to walk away looking at the world around them for inspiration, as well as a resource to use in their practice. They will be able to connect material play with multitudes of contemporary and modern artists who use the natural world and fibers in their repertoire. Students will learn how to document the evolution of their work over the course of the unit in order to look back on the iterations throughout the lessons. On the last day of the unit, students will reflect on their progress over the course of the lessons and consider the interconnected lessons, and how they can keep wield iteration and the natural world.
View Lesson 1, Lesson 2, Lesson 3, and the Unit Overview here.
