Feb13

Book Review: “Hacking Assessment”

Posted on February 13, 2016 by missjaybar

I recently joined the FaceBook group Teachers Throwing Out Grades and it was suggested to read the book Hacking Assessment: 10 Ways to Go Gradeless in a Traditional Grades School by Starr Sackstein. So, I went to Amazon, saw that book was relatively cheap (and it does have a kindle version), and I ordered a copy. I mean, what could it hurt?

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This isn’t the first time I have read a book on teaching practice. But, it is the one of the rare times I read a teaching book that didn’t bore me, put me to sleep, or made me give up in the middle. Most books I read about teaching are full of wonderful ideas, but it gets lost in “grad-school paper talk”, if you know what I mean. Hacking Assessment is written in a way that is comfortable and not off-putting.

Assessment must be a conversation, a narrative that enhances students’ understanding of what they know, what they can do, and what needs further work…..they need to understand how to make improvements and how to recognize when legitimate growth has occurred. -Starr Sackstein, Hacking Assessment

Alright, let’s get to it. Hacking Assessment is one of several books in the “Hacking” series. Starr Sackstein is a teacher who actually threw out her grade book and goes as gradeless as she can at her school–she is still required to have a grade for each semester. So, she writes from a place of first-hand experience. She also adds in the experiences of other teachers who have also tried to go gradeless. One thing, for me, that was a major plus is that Sackstein is a high school teacher, and so were most of the other teachers who shared experiences. As a high school teacher myself, it is helpful to hear from other high school teachers. They understand the issues of GPA, college applications, and a whole “lifetime” of using grades as a measure of learning and smartness.

Sackstein breaksdown her book into 10 chapters or what she calls “hacks”. Each addresses a different area of grading and assessment. The different hacks include: shifting the grades mindset, promoting buy-in, rebranding assignments as learning experiences, facilitating student partnerships, digitizing your data, maximizing time, tracking progress transparently, teaching reflection, teaching students to self-grade, and cloud-based archives.

Each hack is broken down into different parts: the problem, the hack, what you can do tomorrow, a blueprint for full implementation, overcoming pushback, and the hack in action. It is this breakdown that makes the book so accessible. As I read the book, I kept shaking my head in agreement and saying, yes…this makes so much sense.

As we rid ourselves of the grades, risk taking and questioning became a natural part of the process. -Starr Sackstein, Hacking Assessment

As a TAB teacher, I already do some of the things she suggests, but I don’t do all of the things. Hacking Assessment outlines how each hack is important, but as you read you understand how they all work together to create a meaningful learning experience for the students. The addition of the hack in action section helps to put it in perspective. You start to think, if this can be done in a math class, or an English class, of course this can be done in the art class. I also really appreciated the pushback sections for each hack. It gives the common arguments against that particular hack and how to combat that. For me, having it all in one place is helpful. I have conversations about the different aspects, but they seem to be everywhere, all over the interwebs, and it is hard to gather my thoughts easily on the matter. It helps me to focus and have the conversation more easily.

Hacking Assessment is a quick read, but one I encourage if you have any thoughts about going gradeless, or even lessing the amount of grades in your class. If nothing else, using some of the hacks will help your students be more reflective of their learning and gain back a little bit of the love they used have for learning.

Aug6

Meaningfully Connecting Grades and Assessment

Posted on August 6, 2015 by missjaybar

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If you teach high school, you know that there is no way to get away from grades. Grades determine GPA, which determines the top 10%, which could mean automatic acceptance into a state college, etc., etc., etc. It’s a vicious cycle that personally I dislike. A lot.

If you have ever read a Facebook post by me about grading, then you know the struggle for me is real. I am tasked with too many “mandatory” grades in too short of a time. I wish I could be like Ian Sands and not grade anymore. However, that really isn’t an option. I already push it and not fulfill my requirement every marking period. But shhh…don’t tell nobody.

Now, we all should know that grades=/=assessments. They are not the same thing. Currently for me, grades in art are equal to the hoops I make the students jump through. Did you complete this on time? Did your artwork have 3 lines and 6 warm colors? (For the record, I don’t grade like this, and I think you should not either. Seriously, when you make artwork, do you want to be told how many colors you should have? But I digress. That’s a topic for another day.) Do you have at least four sentences in your reflection blog post?

What do these types of things tell me about how well you, the student, are doing in art? How well are you understanding the process? How are you improving your artistic behaviors in your journey on thinking and behaving like an artist? Answer: They don’t. They tell me nothing, except that you did something I arbitrarily asked you to do.

As art teachers, we assess our kids every day; or at least we should. I do. I make adjustments for what I see my students need. I make mental notes of where a student is and how can I help facilitate him/her to get to the next step or level. I am constantly thinking about my kids and where they are going and how can they get there. What resources can I share? What artists or art movements can I ask them to look up? What other media might intrigue them? I am taking mental notes of how my students are growing as artists and thinkers. Isn’t that my job?

This summer I have done a lot of thinking and talking about how to connect the assessments I am making everyday with the grades I am required to give to appease administration, students, parents, whomever. How can I make the grades I give actually mean something…both for the students and for me. I don’t want to give meaningless numbers anymore. I want my students to understand that their grade in my class is directly related to how they are growing as an artist.

This is my plan. I will no longer grade final artwork products. The product shouldn’t be what is important about the student. The learning that occurs while creating that product is. The real product is the student herself. I want to grade her. How do I do that, you ask? Good question.

I have taken something I already use to assess my students and that I ask my students to use to assess themselves when blogging about the process. Apex Art generated a wonderful list of artistic behaviors that I have adopted in my classroom. I then thought of how my son is graded at his school, and how much it means to me. I go over with his teacher the standards and where he falls on each standard. That is so much more useful than being given a report card with an arbitrary number on it. He got a 3 in math…so what?! I combined these two things and came up with a 4 level scale: exceeding, meeting, progressing, and emerging. I then assigned numerical values to each level. Now, I know this may seem arbitrary, but it is commonly understood that an A/90 is proficient in a subject. So, I figured meeting a behavior is kind of like proficient, so that would be an A/90. Exceeding=100; Meeting=90; Progressing=80; and Emerging=70. I took these behaviors and levels and put them into a chart, with a space for notes.

This makes sense to me. I plan on having the students and myself look at 6 of the 9 behaviors for each grading period. (In my case 6 weeks.) We will have discussions and meetings and the student will have his/her chart to see where they are at and where they need to go. I will look carefully at how they assess their process and work in their blog posts. For me, this will make the grades they receive more meaningful. We can have conversations about it. They will be able to explain why they are at the level they are and know why they received the grade they did.

I am very excited to bring this into my classroom. I think it will help bring forward the “for” in the Teaching FOR Artistic Behavior (TAB) classroom I have set up. I challenge you to make a greater connection between your assessments and your grades this year as well.

May15

Meaningful Grading? An oxymoronic dilemma.

Posted on May 15, 2021 by missjaybar

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At the end of the year, I start to think about the next year. I like to have some ideas written down so I can leisurely work out details over the summer so I am ready for the year in August when I return. This coming year, one thing I really want to work on is my grading system. I have been using a “Level of Engagement” system for some years now, but I’ve become disillusioned with it because I feel it is too much like a participation grade and doesn’t really show any sort of progress towards mastery or whatever it is grades are “supposed” to show.

Before I go any further, I want to say that if you are reading this post with the anticipation of some kind of answer to the meaningful grading question, I’m not sure you’re going to find it. In fact, you might end up walking away with more questions. Also, I am writing with high school grading in mind, which is a huge beast that is often wrong in what it represents.

If you Google “purpose of grading in education”, you will find that basically grades are meant to communicate learning progress and achievements. But, as we all know, grades don’t really show that at all…meaning that final number doesn’t actually show progress in learning. Because, if you get a 70 in the first marking period because you are still developing a skill/studio habit, and then you get a 100 in the final marking period because you finally mastered the skill/studio habit, you won’t receive a 100 for the year. Your grade will appear as if you just were average or proficient, even though you did what the point of learning is–you progressed and eventually mastered. Who goes to look at all the grades over the course of the year to see that your grade steadily improved? Only that final number is looked at.

As I have written about in the past, and it has be talked about over and over, grading =/= assessment. And perhaps that is why grading becomes such the dilemma. Should we, under the system we have to use, try to have our grades match our assessments that show actual progress over time, or should we just give out grades for participation? I know this is my dilemma. It’s something I’ve dealt with for years of being a TAB teacher. When I was DBAE, I used rubrics and based grades on students’ artworks having certain elements and principles, depending upon the project, as well as “good” craftsmanship and effort. But now, those things are not as important to me because of the current purpose of my teaching. I am trying to teach my students a way of thinking, a way of behaving, and having a variety of lines in an artwork shouldn’t be up to me, but up to the students. I know that some students will understand the artistic process faster than others. I know that some will demonstrate Studio Habits of Mind easily and others will need more time to develop those habits. I know that all of my student will grow artistically, both in behaviors and skills from where they were when they stepped into the classroom. I know each journey is different. What I don’t know is how to show that in our society’s “beloved” grading hierarchy.

_{Image credit Katherine Douglas and Clark Fralick}

I feel like I am digressing a little here. I was talking about moving on from engagement grading to something more meaningful. I feel like I have figured out what I want to assess my non-first level students on this coming year and beyond. Katherine Douglas shared with me a poster about the things that artists can do in art class. I am in the process of creating an assessment chart for my artists based on this image. I know it was originally meant for elementary, but the behaviors truly span through to any artist at any stage/age. Where I get stuck is the grading part. The chart is easily used as a rubric for assessing students’ artistic thinking processes, but translating that to a numerical grade sucks. There is no other way to say that. I mean, I figured out a point system that makes sense and correlates to emerging, proficient, and mastery levels. But, it does not work well with our antiquated grading system. Their report card just shows some average number that doesn’t accurately show anything meaningful to their learning.

I know that some schools have changed their grading systems, but not mine. And mine isn’t going to change for the foreseeable future. And probably, most schools won’t either. So, in the end, how do we deal with this? How do we use our grading system to truly show growth? I am unsure if it is possible in a system where high school students rely on GPAs for things like scholarships and top % for automatic admission to state schools. Do I just give in and grade on participation, continue with engagement and add in conferences with each student to talk about their growth assessment?

I think this is the hardest part of being a teacher for me. And, the hardest part of being a TAB teacher since I am teaching a way of thinking and not just something that has right/wrong answers. I told you I wasn’t going to make things any clearer in this post. And, I didn’t get any closer to solving my dilemma of how to create a point system for my assessments of artistic growth, thinking, and understanding. But hopefully this post gave you something to think about and discuss. And perhaps, the more we discuss it with each other, the discussion will start to move to those above us teachers that make decisions and we can begin to change the face of education.

I thought I was done, but I think I want to add here that I wrote this post over a week ago, but haven’t published until now because I’ve been going over and over in my head what the purpose of my grading is, and grading in general. At my school, fine arts is a required class to graduate (1 credit worth), but it is not counted towards GPA–something I felt strongly against, but now am not so sure anymore if I want it to count towards GPA. Above you read what Google says the purpose is supposed to be, but that’s not reality. And after reading several posts/conversations this week in both TAB groups and non-TAB groups, the dilemma for me is even worse. I don’t want grades to be punitive. I want my grades to reflect learning and growth, but I can’t figure out a way to where they show growth that isn’t punitive. Assigning lower grade numbers for developing habits/skills and higher grades for mastered skills averages to some number that can seem “negative”. A student that grows over the course of the class should have a 100 for their final grade, right?

Apr3

NAEA 2018: Seattle

Posted on April 3, 2018 by missjaybar

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I have always wanted to go to Seattle, so when I saw that the National Art Ed conference was going to be held there, I was going no matter if my session proposals were accepted or not. Luckily for me, I was selected to co-present twice for the Seattle conference. That meant that I could get reimbursed by my district for the cost of admission to the conference. (Every little bit given back is helpful.)

I woke up at 3:30 am to start my journey to the West Coast. It was a long day, but the beauty of the city made it worth it…not to mention that I was meeting up with 2 of my favorite fellow TAB teachers, Liz and Hillary. We were able to get out of the city proper and experience Kirkland. It was so beautiful, and if we could afford it, I would so pick up my family and move there.

But I digress. Let’s talk about the conference. I spent this conference a little bit differently than I had in the past. I barely went to sessions, and instead channeled my friend and fellow Texas art teacher, Arlene Shelton. I wandered around the city for a large portion of the time. I spent a morning walking in the rain (and snow) down to the MoPop museum. I took my time and photographed parts of the city that often gets overlooked. I spent one morning with Joy Schultz walking around Pike Place Market, getting lost in the colors of fresh fruit and flowers, and marveling over the artisans booths. Hillary and I went on an adventure to dinner one evening and along the way found Jimmy Hendrix, Dick Blick, and rainbowed crosswalks. I paused for over a half hour Saturday morning to stand in solidarity as my fellow Americans walked in the “March for our Lives” protest. And, I drank more coffee than I would like to admit.

I did go to a few sessions, and I did present twice (these 2 sessions will each have their own posts.) But, to be honest, it was tough to find things that interested me. I went to every ceramics session I could find, but there wasn’t much that was new to me. In fact, one session got me so fired up… Let’s just say, as art teachers, we need to stop perpetuating techniques that are dangerous. No matter how cute it is.

Out of the 6 or 7 sessions I attended over the 3 days, several did stand out. I went to one that was about STEAM…well…it was really anti-STEM/STEAM. One of the speakers was Cindy Foley. She is amazing to listen to and I could have just sat and listened for hours. She is so passionate. (And, did you know that STEM really means “Strategies That Engage Minds”? Yeah, neither did I until Cindy told me so.) Another session that was wonderful was by Pam Ehrenreich. She talked about how she TABs in her high school class. Ask her about her “Random Objects of Treasure” collection, you won’t be disappointed. Clara Lieu gave a session on art critique. I found it super helpful as having student critique each other is one of my weak areas in my classes. Every year I do improve though, so there’s that. And, finally I went to a session by Candi Poll-Price on assessment. It was fantastic. I was sad I had to miss the end, but my session was next, so I had to take off early. (Also, I needed some more coffee.)

I hadn’t planned on spending the conference going to so few sessions. I had hoped there would be a ton for me to learn. Unfortunately, when I looked through the program, not much stood out to me. There were TAB sessions, but many were for elementary or they were sessions to get you excited about TAB. I already am excited about TAB. I don’t need to be convinced how amazing it is–for both my students and for me. I know this is going to sound a bit egotistical, and that is not my intention. I felt there wasn’t much for teachers, TAB teachers specifically, at my level in the ways of development. Things I want to discuss and think about are above the beginning levels. Don’t get me wrong, those types of beginning level sessions are of extreme importance. And, I love presenting and giving. I just need to be getting something too.

I am glad I went because I had numerous important conversations with my tribe at the TAB dinner and at other eating events. Funny how food and drink do that. Those conversations are what I really got the most from this year.

I will not be attending NAEA19 in Boston next year. I am opting for another Boston event–the TAB Institute in the summer of 2019. I am looking forward to the amazing things I will get from it and from the teachers who will be attending with me. Until then, thanks Seahawk fans for accepting this Packer fan into your town for a few days.

Nov26

TAEA 16 in Dallas

Posted on November 26, 2016 by missjaybar

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It’s November here in Texas, and you know what that means…warm weather, rain, Christmas decor explosions at all stores, and of course, the Texas Art Ed Assoc. annual conference. This year it fell the weekend before Thanksgiving. So, that was a bonus for me because I got 2 extra days of vacation added to the week off for Thanksgiving my district gave me.

On Thursday morning, I got packed and drove on up to Dallas to stay at the Hilton Anatole. While I enjoyed having my own room and a whole bed to myself, I did not enjoy the price it all cost. I kept getting asked why my district didn’t pay for it. Well, I don’t know why, they just don’t, so I deal. I do it all in the name of continuing education, and because I love my students. If you know how to convince my district to pay for me to go to these conferences, let me know.

Anywho. Let’s talk conference. The state conference is something that when I first started teaching–I mean like still in college to become an art teacher, I religiously attended. Then, I had kids, so I stopped attending. I started attending again again 2 years ago, but since switching to TAB, I find there isn’t as much for me here anymore. TAB teachers seem few and far between here in this big ‘ole state, but maybe I’m wrong about that…who knows. So, now, my main reason for attending is presenting. If I can make a few teachers think about the way they teach and why they teach the way they do, then I’m good.

This year I presented twice. Once on assessment, and once on TAB in general. I felt my assessment presentation did not go well. Don’t feel bad. I’m okay with that. It was dry and the flow wasn’t very good. It was on assessment after all, so, no love lost. The best part of the session was when I got to grading and how I don’t grade. That was my favorite part. Maybe I will do a no-grading session next year.

My second session about TAB basics, called Embracing the Chaos, went a million times better. I had a pretty full house…well, 75% of the seats were filled and for a 4pm session on a Saturday, the last day of the conference, I’d say that is pretty good. I was able to be my energetic and animated self. There were a lot of questions. We even went over time, which I felt bad when the next presenter did come in and finally said something. But in my defense, usually the next presenter is there right at the ending time, tapping their foot, ready to set up. After we left the room, I did get to talk to a couple of people for another half hour. I think I have some converts. So, success!!!

While I didn’t go to a lot of sessions, I did have a good time. I met and befriended the Terraforma card guys, Michael and Stewart. They are a fun duo, and their cards are kinda cool. I got to catch up with Justin Clumpner and hear him speak. His session on AP art really made me want to usurp the AP program at my school, and perhaps start a Pre-AP program. He gave me lots to think about. And bonus, he took me off site to get a burger, which was a total win! I attended a session by fellow TABber, Wynita Harmon, where I got to participate in an art challenge with some strangers. I saw Cassie Stevens do a keynote and provide us with this quote full of wisdom, “Stop giving a shit.” I participated in a #K12artchat tweet-up. It was totally interesting to be tweeting to the people sitting right next to you. And, I got to throw a few pots for a local empty bowls event. I think this was the best idea this Dallas team had! It was so relaxing and fun! It brought me to my happy place.

One thing that always interests me when I go to the state conference is the VASE winners’ gold seal artworks. I am fascinated to see what types of works are considered tops in my state from the previous year. Last year I wrote a post about my feelings on VASE that got me on the wrong side of some people. My feelings haven’t changed, but this year I am going to be a little nicer. While most of the 2-D winners were still very “portrait steeped in realism” heavy, I was happy to see that many were breaking away from the usual media I had grown accustomed to–prismacolor and pencil. I snapped some photos of ones that I really liked.

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I do always love the sculpture winners. They are always full of creativity, originality, and fabulousness.

In the end, I enjoyed this year’s conference. Was it as fun as a National Art conference? Hell no! I mean seriously, that’s when I get to see my tribe and my TAB mentors. But, for a state conference, it was one of my favorites. I am glad I went, and that I have decided to start going to them again. See y’all in Galveston next year, and look out for at least one TAB presentation from me.

Sep29

First Evaluation of Learning

Posted on September 29, 2016 by missjaybar

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Today marks the day when I asked my students to assess their learning and artistic growth and to give themselves the grade they think they earned over the past 3 weeks for the very first time. I was challenged to go gradeless this year. And, as much as I want to go completely gradeless, I can’t. Grading once a 3 weeks is the closest I can get at the high school level at this particular moment in history.

I had done a bunch of research on this subject, but found that the Facebook group Teachers Throwing Out Grades and the Starr Sackstein book Hacking Assessment really helped me to understand how to make going gradeless possible.

I came up with an assessment form for my students to fill out where they talked about what they are learning and/or how they have grown. It wasn’t an easy thing to do. I had to think about what I really wanted from them. Did I just want them to talk about their learning in general, or did I want them to be more specific. I chose the more specific route and asked them to reflect on their growth and understanding of the artistic behaviors. I think this helps to have them focus on their artistic journey and what I feel are important concepts I want them to learn in my class. It also helped to make a “general” assessment form, but still be able to individualize the assessment form. They can choose to talk about the areas where they grew. And, as a bonus, it helps me to know how to better help the students as we move forward.

Let me tell you how scared I was this morning. I was nervous that I was making a huge mistake; that maybe I just needed to go back to traditional grading in art…maybe use my standards based rubric again. But, as I sat down and listened to the keyboard noise in the quiet room, and answered questions for clarification, and began to read the responses, I knew I was doing the right thing. Is it perfect yet? No. Is every student going to take it 100% seriously? No. Will the students be better off by the end of the year having assessed like this? I think so. Are their answers as deep as they could be? Not yet, but that will come in time. Remember, I am asking them to do something they have probably never been asked to do before…and that’s a big deal.

I wanted to end this post with some screen shots from the students answers that wowed me today. It’s more than I hoped for this time around.

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Jul27

The “No-Grade Challenge”

Posted on July 27, 2016 by missjaybar

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Sounds interesting, right? Well, my good friend Ian Sands nominated me earlier this summer to go “no-grades” this year. And, after much consideration, I have accepted his challenge…well, mostly. There is no way at the high school level, with the GPA reward system we have going in America right now, that I can not grade. My kids need to have some numerical grade…for UIL purposes (pass to play), for college applications, and for the “ever important” class rank–which if you live in the great state of Texas like me, it is important to those kids in the top 10% (or for some colleges like UT–Hook “Em!!–it’s the top 7 or 8%) for automatic admission to state schools.

Anyway, I have accepted his challenge and plan on grading as little as possible this year. I know I am pushing it, and it my admin gets wiff of it, I may be up sh*ts creek. But, if I am going to start a change and get people talking and thinking about change in the grading arena and the education realm, I need to start somewhere.

Now, don’t confuse what I am doing in so far as grading with what I am doing in terms of assessment. THEY ARE NOT THE SAME THING!! And, you better believe that I am going to assess the hell out of my students. In fact, together we, my students and I, will asses their learning and growth like there is no tomorrow. It will mostly be informal and occur through dialogue between us–the students and myself. And, that is what an ideal classroom, at least in my opinion, should be like. It should be about growth and understanding how to think and move forward in the thinking. And, in order to do that, things need to be assessed. Grades have no part in that.

Now comes the part where you say, but how will you do that? You have to grade. Why not put numbers to your assessment levels? Then you can be in compliance and all that jazz. I answer you with, I’ve done that. And it works well, but I feel it is truly not a good showing of what a student in my studio has learned or how they have grown artistically–either in skill or thinking or both. It doesn’t really show growth over time.

Last year I read the book “Hacking Assessment” and I have taken a few things from the book about assessment, like having conferences with the kids and letting them be part of the conversation. I also went to a fabulous session at NAEA-Chicago with Justin Clumpner who at one point talked about grades and what they mean to each individual student. I think at one point he even said, I ask the kids what grade they want. Those things really resonate with me right now. Students need to be involved in their assessment of their learning. It is a 2-way street.

Now, if you know anything about the program I run, I like to have my kids reflect on their learning and their journey. We have done that through blogs and, more recently, BlendSpace. So, it occurred to me, why not combine all these things and thus my answer to the “no-grade challenge” was formed.

I do have to have at least a grade every 3 weeks…one a progress report time and one at report card time. (Technically I am supposed to have more, but don’t tell my admin, okay?) My plan is to have my students reflect on their learning and art making processes to help them determine their grade for that time frame. Of course, I have final say if I feel they have either graded too high or way too low. But, I think this will help shift the focus away from grading and back onto their learning, which is what it’s about….or should be. (Do I say that a lot, because I feel I do.)

Here are some screen shot of the google form they will fill out for this reflection process.

Will this work? I don’t know. Will it need to be tweaked? I am sure. What document is perfect from the get go? I am confident in what I am about to embark on. I think that it will make a difference; a difference even bigger than when I stopped grading artwork and focused on the processes only. Keep your eyes out for updates as the year progresses. And who know, maybe soon you too will also be up for the challenge.

Jun5

Top 9: 2015-16 Year in Review

Posted on June 5, 2016 by missjaybar

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It’s been a week since the 2015-16 school year ended. I have taken a week off from doing any work, but it is now time to take a moment to reflect on the year. And, what better way to do that than to do a top 10, well, a top 9…close enough. Normally, a top 10 would only be the best things, but I thought I would add some of the not-so-good as well. I mean, we all like things to be puppies and rainbows all the time, but let’s get real folks…it ain’t.

9. New Ceramics Curriculum…or should I say lack there of. I decided to go balls to the wall and go full-on TAB with my ceramics students. This is the last year I will have had any students that were part of my sculpture program–from before I made the switch to “all clay, all day”. And, if you were to walk into that intermediate/advanced class, you could tell which kids those were. But, I digress. For the most part, for my intermediate and my advanced students, they were given complete freedom. They were allowed to work on what they wanted, in the time frame they needed. I did have some themes with guiding questions to help them if they were stumped, but they were in no way “forced” to follow those themes. If you are wondering how to do a single-media TAB class….read this!

The Ceramics Graveyard and Senior Totems Sculpture Garden at THS

I think this was a great decision. It allowed the students to move at their pace and do what interested them. Are there some kinks to work out concerning the structure of the class? Of course. I plan on doing a “Technique Tuesday” type of thing. I will have a demo day once a week to show different things they could use in their work, like sprigs and molds and glazing techniques. I also am revamping their technical reader and going to incorporate that more into the class.

8. Braeden, The Beginning Ceramics Student Who Learned More Than Me. I was fortunate enough to have that student this year that many teachers dream of having. That student who falls in love with your subject matter so much, that he or she just becomes a sponge and soaks up everything. Who during their free time spends it watching videos and reading about the subject. Who is in your room working and learning and creating at all times of the day. I had that student this year, and his name is Braeden. I had Braeden in art 1 his freshman year, but for some reason, he decided to stop taking art for 2 years and finally returned to me his senior year for art 2: beginning ceramics. I often wonder where he would be if he hadn’t taken that time off. He started off as a normal ceramics student, doing the required beginning projects. Then all of the sudden, he changed. He found a passion. He found what he wanted to do with his life. He would come in whenever he could to practice throwing. He learned to make his own clay. He learned about glazes and different types of firing and their temperatures. He attempted to make his own wood ash glaze. It was amazing to watch his lust for learning about all things clay. I eventually had to tell him to stop learning because he knew more than I did. Of course this became a running joke, and I love it when he teaches me new things. I loved being able to have those conversations about ceramics with him. I will miss that next year.

7. Starting Over, again, and again… Sometimes you think you have a great plan. And sometimes that plan, no matter how awesome YOU think it is, sucks. This was the case with my art 2: painting/drawing class this year. I won’t go into too much detail, as I wrote about having to start over with this class here. But, I will say I learned a lot from that class. It is okay to stop and rewind. You HAVE to do what is best for your students, and if that means if what you are doing isn’t working, then try something else. However, if you are going to “start again”, you have to keep your students informed about what you are doing and why. I had that tough conversation with them. I told them I wasn’t feeling it, and that I thought they weren’t where I had thought they should be. That we needed a new direction, and this is what we were going to try. They looked at me with puzzled looks, but they were willing to try. I think in the end we started over twice. But, they say third time’s a charm for a reason. By the third start, we figured it out. We figured what worked for them, what they needed to grow and be successful.

Like my ceramics classes, I do have some things to tweak, like the timeline for the artistic behavior units, the digging deeper sections, and how we get to full choice by the second semester. I wish I could open the studio to full choice sooner, but seeing as my co-worker isn’t TAB, and my art 2 classes are a combo of his and my students…I have to do a little work to make sure all students understand the TAB studio. It’s all good though….my kids could probably use a refresher anyway.

6. Two Wonderful Opportunities. I work hard, both at my job and as an advocate for TAB. So, it is nice when someone else recognizes what I am doing. This year, not one, but two different people recognized this. First I was asked by my friend, Betsy Murphy, to come and speak about TAB at the T(exas)AEA High School Division meeting at the 2015 conference. I was honored that Betsy, once my mentor, now my friend, thought of me in this way–that I had something important to share with my colleagues. Screen Shot 2016-06-05 at 10.37.47 AM

Second, I was asked to present at the AOE Winter 2016 Online Conference. I presented about the assessment model I was working on. It, again, was an honor to think that something I was doing would be of interest to other teachers. I hope that it helped people make a connection between assessment and grades.

5. Speaking of AOE…Blog Finalist Here. That’s right, Me, Jean Barnett, author of Art
Class by Mrs B, was a finalist in RisingStarFinalistHI the Art of Education, Blog of the Year, Rising Start category. I didn’t win, but I think it is pretty cool that I made the list. I even got a nifty badge to display on the blog. Oh yeah! I write my blog with the hopes of not only documenting my journey, but also of helping another art teacher by sharing with I have learned along the way.

4. Art Club I have been at my school for 9 years. For 8 of those years, my co-worker “ran” the art club. Well, I wouldn’t really call it running an art club. I’m not really sure what it was. This year I took over art club. I can’t remember the exact reason why he was willing to give it up, but he did, and finally it was mine. When we started, the club had no money (in fact the account had been closed due to inactivity), and they hadn’t done anything in years. I advertised the club. We met every Friday morning during tutorials. We elected a president, a vice-president, a secretary, and a treasurer. We sold popcorn, made Duck Art t-shirts and sold them, and even held a painting party. Was it the best art club? No. Did we do a whole lot? No. But we did paint a mural in our computer lab, and I am glad to say that we did have a few hundred dollars in the art club account by the end of the year. Furthermore, we still had members returning to meetings at the end of the year. So, I call it a win! Small steps people! I am so proud of the kids. Next year will be even better. I know it.

3. I am Not Invincible, But At Least My Admin Believes in Me. I like to think that I am invincible. That nothing is going to bring me down, except for maybe myself. And, that was definitely the case this year. I won’t go into details, but I did have an incident this year that caused me to pause. I can’t change what happened, but I can say that students can be unpredictable and retaliate in damaging ways. Luckily for me, I have some students that know who I am, what I stand for, and what my students mean to me. They were honest and I commend them for that. I also learned that I have an administration that believes in me and what I do in my classroom. My principal understands the climate of the art room, and how it differs from an academic class. We had a long talk about it, and when I left his office, I knew that finally, I had an administrator that finally understood.

2. School Art vs. Authentic School Art vs. What the Student Really Wants to Make Art This was something that I had not had a ton of thoughts about until I attended a session by Justin Clumpner at NAEA16 in Chicago. He was talking about an AP student he had who wasn’t making the work or getting anything done. Then one day he saw her sketchbook and asked her why she wasn’t creating works like her sketches. Her reply, “I didn’t think I could. I didn’t think this was ‘school art’.” I thought that was an interesting concept…school art. In TAB, we talk a lot about “authentic art”, and what our students are making is authentic art. And, I thought that I encouraged authentic art and that my kids were making what THEY wanted to make.

That was until the end of April this year. I happened to come across a tweet by one of my art 1 students of a painting she had just finished at her house. I tweeted back to her that I thought she should do that in class. When I talked with her about it the next school day, I asked her why she didn’t do this stuff in class. She said she couldn’t figure out how to work it into the themes we were doing. That’s when the lightbulb went off. As much as I thought I was empowering my students to bring their own life into their artwork, and as much as I encourage authentic art…maybe I wasn’t doing all that I could. I don’t have an answer yet as to how to really encourage it more, but I have an idea to work through over the summer.

The Twitter Painting

The Final Artwork

And, just as an aside, while this girl in particular worked hard all year, I never saw her work like the way she did on that final painting. She learned so much and was so proud, and I could tell she was a little sad (but still proud) when I said I wanted to keep it to display in August when we returned to school.

1. Knowing You’re on the Right Track Deep down in my heart, I know that TAB is what is best for my students. It keeps them engaged. It really helps them to grow artistically. And, it makes them think and reflect. My years of running a TAB studio have been my favorite years of teaching. But, sometimes, it is hard. Sometimes you feel like the kids just aren’t getting it. You feel like maybe the “others” are right, and you aren’t really teaching them anything. You doubt yourself and your program.

But, then something happens. You assign a completely open final artwork for your art 1 students. You see 90% engagement. You see growth at its peak. You see that they have been paying attention all year. You see the research and the planning, the trials and errors, the experimentation, and the pushing forward all come out of the students. Yes, I was physically exhausted for the last 2.5 weeks of school. Yes, my room was a constant mess, for which I apologized to Connie, my custodian, on a daily basis. But, I was happy. I was proud. I knew I didn’t need to doubt. I hope to remember this next year when I will more than likely doubt myself again. I can’t wait to display all this wonderful art in August. I did include a few pieces from my art 2 class’ final work, Artists Work in a Series, in the slide show.

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Hope your year was as good as mine. After I finish recharging over the summer, I will look forward to implementing what I learned from this year. And I do want to take this opportunity to say thanks to my tribe for helping me and encouraging me along the way.

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Apr21

TAB and the Single Media Art Class

Posted on April 21, 2016 by missjaybar

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From time to time, I come across the question of how to run a class that has a single focus such as painting, printmaking, or ceramics following a TAB pedagogy. It seems as if people think it isn’t possible to be fully TAB because the students don’t have 100% choice of everything. I mean, the medium is already chosen for them.

Well, I think it is possible, and I have been running my ceramic classes that way for the past couple of years. It has evolved into the almost fully student-led class it is today, but there is always room for improvement.

As we know, TAB isn’t just about giving the students free reign over things. It’s about a way of thinking and about the process of going from conception through to end product and all the steps in between. So, since it isn’t about a product so to speak, that leaves room for lots of exploration, skill building, and concept growth.

I have three levels of ceramics…beginning, intermediate, and advanced. My program is small, so intermediate and advanced meet at the same time. I think that is better anyway. Our classes run for a full year. I start off my beginners with a bunch of “have to” projects. Yes, I know, not very TAB, but I think this lays the ground work for moving to full student driven work. We spend the first semester learning basic hand-building techniques: a slab box with rolled in texture, a carved pinchpot sphere, a carved tile, and a coil built vessel with some kind of additive texture. We also spend some time on the wheel. The students do have some choice aesthetically, but in the end, I have picked the project for them and I know the outcome.

Once we get passed that, we move to themes. I came up with a bunch of themes and put them on the class’ website. Under each theme, I asked some questions to help them begin thinking about how they could interpret the theme. From there, they can pick a theme that speaks to them and begin the creative process. They decide how to build. They decide size. They decide clay type (we have low-fire, mid-fire for the wheel, and porcelain). They also decide their time schedule. They work at their pace. No longer is the class all together in the same place working on the same thing. My intermediate and advanced classes work in the same way, but without the have-to projects at the beginning of the year. We do start together with the same theme–just to get back into the flow and shake off the summer, but after that, they can move into their own groove. If a student wants to repeat a theme, they can. If a students doesn’t like any of the themes, they can come up with their own. Once pieces are bisqued, they also get to choose surface treatments. Not all students like to glaze, so I have tried to show and display many other non-glaze treatments. This really gives a lot of variety to the pieces my students create.

Another great thing about keeping the class student-led is that it really allows for mistakes and taking risks. Students don’t have the looming deadline over them of a piece they may not even want to be doing. If a piece blows up in the kiln because I rushed it or it falls apart because they didn’t score/slip properly, the kids have been okay with that. They move on to the next thing and figure out what went wrong so they don’t do it again. If something they are building isn’t coming out right, they are more willing to fix it or take it apart and try again because they know their project isn’t being graded and that I am instead looking at their artistic process, habits, and growth.

As for assessment, I do follow the same thing I do for all of my classes. Each student has a blog and has to write about artistic behaviors every other week to let me know what they are doing and how they are progressing and thinking like artists. However, for the past 6 or so weeks, we have been playing with a combination blendspace and the blog.

As my class evolves, I am working on changing up the ceramic reader I have created to be more helpful to the students. I am also going to implement what I plan on calling “Technique Tuesday”. I have created a list of things I think the students should know how to do and what they are, such as press molds, sprigs, 2 part molds, different tools, glazing techniques, etc.

I really enjoy running my ceramic classes under the TAB pedagogy. My students have really began to flourish. I can see them applying the techniques they have learned. They are creating pieces that are important to them. It allows them to be always working and not waiting on classmates to finish in order to move on. It allows them to stop a project for a while and come back to it later. One of my intermediate students, Julia, is working on a willow tree. She has been all year. But, she also has worked on other pieces when she tires of it. She comes back to it with more interest each time. It is a fabulous piece. Another student, Frank, has been able to work in a more “make it up as I go” type fashion…which is where his work flourishes and becomes fabulous. Having “projects” wouldn’t work for him. A beginning student, Braeden, has completely blown me away this year because the TAB atmosphere has allowed him to follow his path. He has learned how to make his own clay, how to create his own wood ash glaze, and he is close to surpassing me on the wheel. If I made him to projects, he wouldn’t have realized that working in ceramics is what he wants to do with his life after high school.

I am writing about my experience, but I think this can be done in any single-medium class. It’s all about giving them the reins to drive what interests them. They will learn the process as they go along. It’s about learning through exploration. Because it is single-media, they really get to know the ins and outs; therefore, since so much time isn’t spent learning multiple mediums, they can really focus more on message, process, and content. Which, in my opinion, leads to higher quality work.

Mar26

NAEA 2016: Chi-Town (part 2: the sessions)

Posted on March 26, 2016 by missjaybar

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What is the most important part of going to a National Art Ed Conference? If judging by my first post, Chi-Town (part 1: the intro), you would think it was hanging out with friends. And you would be right. But, just a small percentage point behind that is the sessions. I mean, I did pay to go to some relevant professional development so I can become an even better, more awesome teacher. I don’t want to go too awesome though, I don’t think my students could handle that. 😉

Since I am somewhat old school, I wasted a whole bunch of trees and printed out a copy of the sessions. Yes, I know that I would get a program once in Chicago, but that’s not very helpful to a planner like me. (Don’t be too mad, I did print them double-sided.) I sat down in my kitchen with my coffee, my stack of papers, my yellow marker, and my phone. As I read thru the sessions, I circled the ones that were interesting to me. Then I would fire up the conference app on my phone and add them to my agenda. Is this a little more work, maybe, but who wants to carry a quarter ream of paper around the McCormick? Not me.

It wasn’t an easy thing to do. In case you didn’t know, I teach all TABbish and my interest is finding better ways to run my TAB classroom so it is more meaningful for my students. However, there are a couple of problems that I come across at art ed conferences. I teach high school, and it seems the majority of sessions (especially TAB/choice) are aimed at elementary. Also, out of the TAB/Choice sessions, many are geared towards getting people interested in TAB/Choice. I am already interested, I don’t need to go to those. So, while I did attend one or two of those sessions (my fav being “Lead, Follow, or Get out of the Way”, presented by Julie Toole, Nan Hathaway, and Ian Sands),I opted against most because I would rather give up my seat to someone who needs to learn about TAB/choice and their awesomeness. And, I am glad I did because those sessions were packed. I mean, standing room only, out the door packed. This makes my heart happy, by the way. IMAG3327_1

So, powers that be at NAEA who deal with choosing sessions for NYC, we need more sessions on TAB…at all levels and areas of interest (getting to know vs. already am in love with) of TAB. Obviously it is a hot topic and people want to know. I, personally, am willing to present a session or two or three about TAB at the secondary level. I know some others too who would be as well. Hell, we would even do some joint presenting. Just sayin’….

Over the course of the 3 days, I attended 15 sessions. One was not all that, and only 1 did I walked out. I lucked out and found 13 good/great sessions. Don’t worry, I won’t go over each session, but I will give you some highlights.

10612715_10107362239544810_1343979125320880173_n I started off the conference with a great session called “Break the
Wheel”, presented by Chris Wills. His session was about brainstorming and ways to help students get over the creative block. It really got me fired up to go. He had us do a small version of his activity called “60“. I really enjoyed the activity.
I enjoyed it so much that I brought it back to my classroom and used it already. At first my kids were all, “what the…”, but after completing the activity, which we only did for 20 minutes, they were glad we did and I think they have some ideas to work from for the next artworks.
After that I was pumped and went to a couple of more sessions that day. One was a look at the way the AP portfolio was “graded”. While I don’t teach AP, I was able to take some things away from this. The presenter talked about looking into the creative process and being able to capture the day to day…which is something I am working on in my classroom. There is so much more to artwork than just the final product, and wouldn’t it be great to allow our students to showcase the process instead of just the end of it?

Rounding out the day was a presentation by Jeff Pridie that made me think about what my program goals were and why my program should be there. And a session by the Journal Fodder Junkies. I had seen them before in NOLA and was excited to see them again. Every year they encourage me to have my students develop visual journals. Maybe next year will be the year I incorporate them.

Friday started off big as well. “Art Without Authority” was standing room only. Presenter Justin Crumpner is an art teacher from Dallas, and he feels the same way about our state VASE competition as I do…so right then I knew I liked this guy. The more he talked, the more I realized that he believed in the TAB philosophy, but just didn’t know there were others out there like him. In the middle of the session I texted Liz asking why he was not part of our tribe. He talked about his realization of moving to student-centeredness when he had an AP student that wouldn’t finish her work. But, when he saw her sketchbook that was filled with fabulousness and asked her why she wasn’t doing that in class, she replied, “I didn’t think I could do this. I didn’t think this was “school art”.” WOW! Seriously, talk about a way to start reflecting on your teaching practice. Anyway, he said some things during his presentation that were right on: “Your (students) work is VALID”; “their voice (student) = your voice (teacher)”; and “create a climate; don’t create winners and losers”. Of course I paraphrased that last one, but still… If you missed his presentation, you can still see it. He posted it on his blog. As a final note, we (Liz, Hillary and I) did run into him later on in the conference, we talked over a beer, and he ended up coming to our TAB meet-up. He has since joined our tribe on the Midwest TAB teachers page. I look forward to meeting up with him again next year in Fort Worth/Dallas at the TAEA 2016 conference.

I know I am getting long winded and I still have more to say, so bear with me. I attended Joy Schultz‘ presentation where she talked about choice and her students use of Blendspace. She had the presenter’s nightmare where the technology was non-existent. But, being the rockstar she is, went on like it was no big deal. Again, standing room only.

I attended a session on authentic assessment in a choice classroom presented by 2 elementary teachers. While it was interesting, and it gave rise to a sudden interest in a badge system, it wasn’t anything really new to me. I am not sure I will use a badge system, but it is something worth looking at–extrinsic versus intrinsic rewards.

Ian dragged us to a session called “New Weird Ideas”. There were four presenters and they each talked about how they set the tone for the beginning of the year. And of course, they said the same thing that I kept hearing over and over through out the conference…”Focus on the process and how to make the process meaningful.” It is at this point I should mention that they presenters were giving away free e-zines and Ian drafted Andy to go get us some…you would think that a 6′-4″, lean guy would be able to leap his way up to the front and procure some, but noooooooo….smh. No e-zines for us.

Saturday was the last day of sessions. We got there in time to see “Lead, Follow, or Get Out of the Way” where Nan dropped this gem, “If there were no grades in art, how would that affect your work?” Just let that sink in. Yeah. Exactly.

I didn’t really have any sessions lined up for the day, so luckily, I was with Ian who did. We went to a session about Shepard Fairey. There is a lot more to him than I thought there was. I left with the idea of “post-museum art“, which is art of the people; it’s an interesting concept. Ian and I also went to a session on maker spaces. I am now considering trying to get a 3-D printer, some paper circuits, and conductive ink. For more info on maker spaces, check out the Makelab.

Our final stop of the day was one that Ian and I are very interested in. It was titled “Stop Grading Art!” It started off great with ideas like we should moved from being art focused (fixed mindset) to learning focused (growth mindset), and questions like what is the purpose of grading, what are my standards, and what are my learning objectives/goals? Next he talked about looking for evidence of learning. It was here that it became frustrating and where I wanted to just start arguing with the presenter. He wasn’t talking about getting rid of grading (which is what we had hoped the session was about), and he was basically using assessment and grading as interchangeable terms, which of course they are not. There was nothing new learned from this, and it seemed that he was pushing grading in art as we know it now, but with a different language. His example was very simple, and didn’t really seem to assess any learning. He said the learning objective (from either the state or national standards) was to provide multiple solutions to a problem. And the evidence of learning was based on how many thumbnails a student created. There was a cute rubric that went with it too. How is that really assessing the learning? That is just grading on how well a student jumped through a hoop. And, that is what I am trying to get away from. I walked out of the session frustrated, but with lots to think about; so #winning? I got stuck on what my learning objectives really are and how to see the evidence of that learning. So, while I walked out with a new conversation in my head, I’m not sure I needed a session to get me there…I have already been on that path. Maybe I will figure something out and present on this topic next year in NYC.

This post shows just a snippet into some of the notes I took. If you could see my notebook, your head would be swimming too. I took a lot away from this conference–things I want to bring to my program, things to stay away from, ways to enhance the process more and to bring the kids to “buy in” sooner. Overall, the sessions I went to and the buzz I heard about other “popular” sessions made me realize that I am on the right path in my teaching philosophy. I look forward to hopefully presenting next year at both the TAEA [Texas] conference and the NAEA17 conference. ::hint, hint:: I promise my sessions won’t disappoint.

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