Pandemic Isolation and Homestay, Online Learning and Reflection: Part 2 of 3 . . .

Online Learning, Written March 1st

For the past 4 weeks, I have been teaching PYP art classes online to our students in nursery through Grade 5/6 classes. In order to keep the number of texts down for the parents, I have chosen to create PowerPoints for each of my classes. Each PowerPoint includes one slide of instructions and vocabulary, multiple slides of images and relatable videos, one or two video tutorials, and specific instructions for turning in work. The PowerPoints are kept on my desktop in different colored folders. Each class is color-coordinated according to the day that I teach them which helps me keep track of incoming student work.

What’s important to me is not so much what the students might be reading in my PowerPoint, but the images and videos that they are looking at. I have been very careful to conduct lessons with materials that are readily available in the students’ homes: markers, paper, glue, tape, pencils, etc. I’ve also told both the students and the parents that they can use whatever materials they might have at home to create their artwork. This helps to lessen the stress potentially placed on the parents to go out and purchase a bunch of art supplies.

My lessons have been a mix of holiday projects (Valentine’s Day), important observations (Black History), and UOI projects. I have been very pleased with the lessons I have created and the bulk of information I have been able to find online. For the week of Black History, I created a different lesson for each class featuring new artists that I had never heard of. This was very exciting for me, allowing for further research in my field, and helping me to transfer my enthusiasm for my subject into my lessons for the students. I also collaborated with Ms. Karla from Kindergarten 2 on a water experiment that I called Monet’s Garden. The students studied Monet’s artworks before decorating simple flowers, folding in the petals, placing them in bowls of water, and watching as they “bloomed” right before our eyes. It was magic!

The feedback I have been able to share with my students is incredibly thorough, analytical, and individualized. I have more time with online teaching to give specific and personalized feedback to my students, whereas in a normal classroom situation there are time constraints. But I have really enjoyed giving thoughtful written feedback to my students during our online lessons. And having a connection to the parents has also been wonderful. As a specialist, we never get to speak to the parents or hear from them. With online learning, I have a direct line to each of the parents and it is awesome! They are a huge support to online learning and I am so thankful for their participation!

Please find below several artworks from each grade. And you can find a link to all of my PowerPoints and resources here. Enjoy!

      

      

      

      

      

      

     

      

Reflection, Written April 16th 

My friend Jason Brown has been organizing and hosting mail art gallery events in Nashville, Tennessee for the past 10 years. Mail art, a movement that dates back to the 1950s and 60s, often involves collage, rubber stamps and a tradition of challenging the postal system by mailing irregularly shaped objects or ones with addresses that have to be picked out of elaborate designs (Tennessean, 2014). Mail art is super fun to create, navigate through the postal system, and receive!

Mr. Brown’s most recent project is called, My View From Home, and encourages participants to find joy in their surroundings whilst living through a pandemic. Originally from London, he encourages everyone, worldwide, to participate in his mail art events. So, I thought this would be the perfect opportunity for Stalford students to reflect on their Covid-19 homestay/isolation experience. (I mentioned this project at the bottom of my last post, here.)

I created an A4-sized postcard for the students to use as the postcard where they made their artwork. Each class has been tasked with thinking about a different aspect of their experience to refer to in their mail artwork. On one side of their postcard, the students draw or collage a piece of artwork relating to the subject matter on which they are reflecting. For some classes, the students thought about their online learning experience and teachers. For other classes, the students focused on what they did while they were in their house (study, read, play with their pets, video games, etc.). One of my classes looked at the shape of the virus, another class thanked their parents for caring for them during this outbreak, and another class looked at the jobs of the many health care employees working tirelessly around the clock.

      

The second side of the postcard includes the address box, the postage stamp, and a place for writing a note. In the note section of their postcards, the students were asked to provide advice to other children their age of how best to deal with and protect oneself during an isolation and homestay period. In this section, some students provided practical advice, such as washing hands and wearing masks, while other students talked about how best to use one’s time and which video games they would recommend.

      

We are still working very hard on our postcards but look forward to sending close to 125 postcards to Nashville, Tennessee before May 31st. Once in Tennessee, the postcards will be photographed and catalogued by the Special Collections department at Vanderbilt University Library. Vanderbilt is a top school in the United States with many distinguished alumni and affiliates. It is an absolute honor that our students are getting the opportunity to participate in this creative and reflective project and have really enjoyed the process.

→ → → Next up: Part 3, March Roars Like a Lion

PS: If you have the opportunity to join in on a Zoom dance party: DO IT! I had so much fun, a few weekends back, disco dancing with my friends out of Alaska! We danced solid for 2 hours and it was like we were really all together! SO. MUCH. FUN. 👇👇👇