Introducing The Artful Advocate!

Hello loyal blog readers!  I want to take a moment to introduce you to a brand-new blog, The Artful Advocate. 

I'm currently serving on an advocacy committee for my state art education association, and, as the only experienced blogger on the committee, I offered to develop a blog offering tips and ideas about advocacy, to help art educators!  The blog entered the blogosphere just yesterday.  I hope you'll be able to find lots of useful ideas and resources on this blog.  That doesn't mean you'll be seeing less of There's a Dragon in my Art Room; this blog will remain my favorite place to share lesson ideas, art projects, opinions on topics of art education, and my personal artistic pursuits with you, my readers.  The new blog is serving an entirely different, but equally important purpose. 

I hope you'll stop in and visit often, follow, and add the new blog to your reader!  Thanks!! 

Cartoons and clippings

pulled from a Reader's Digest magazine, years ago

  I was cleaning out an old box of 'stuff' today and found these items.  I thought I'd share them with you.

The two quotes above both remind me of very specific things.  The first, reminds me of the time, after carefully telling a 2nd class who had drawn cats in preparation for painting, that we were going to begin our paintings by painting the background.  In our next class we would paint the cats.  I circulated the room and found one student, on the autism spectrum, who had painted a whole side of his paper brown.  I asked where the cat was and he flipped his paper over and there it was!  I had told him to paint the background, and he took that literally and without knowing why, he painted the BACK of his paper.  It was a good lesson for me, reminding how I had to choose my words, demonstrate, and make sure my instructions were clear even to the most literal of my students. 

one of the cats from this project

The second quote above reminds me of the wonderful 'fauve fauves' that my 3rd graders painted when we were learning about Matisse.  They had learned that the word 'fauve' means wild beast. 

And now for a couple of cartoons....
Keep in mind that the two pieces below are just old cartoons and not meant to represent any particular point of view.  I'm sharing them with you just for fun!

 

One Voice United Education Rally, Albany, NY

 

Today I was in Albany, NY, first for a meeting of the NYSATA (NY State Art Teachers Association) Board of Trustees, where I serve as Rep for my region.  We took an extended lunch break to walk up the hill to the the One Voice Education Rally on the plaza of the State Capitol, sponsored by NYSUT (NY State United Teachers), where thousands of teachers, parents, students, and interested people gathered.  One news report said there were over 10,000 people, and another report said 20,000!  Either way, it was a huge crowd, all concerned about the future of education in NY state.  One of the biggest issues is the increase in high stakes testing, that has stressed both kids and teachers, and dramatically cut into teaching time.  People are making decisions about education who have never spent a day in the classroom and don't seem to care about the negative impact of these decisions.  Excessive testing does not improve learning!  Anyhow, posted here are a sampling of signs carried at the rally.  I was proud to be a part of this event.   The people carrying signs in the 2 photos directly above are members of our Board of Trustees.  The person below is a middle school art teacher from the town where I live, and was my son's art teacher when he was in middle school. 

 

Here's a view of the crowd.  The odd-shaped building to the left is 'the Egg'.  This unusual sculptural building holds a fabulous performing arts venue.

 

 The T-shirts above say 'Rage Against the Testing Machine', and were designed by an 11th grade student as part of a group project in an AP English class. The quote on the back is by Nelson Mandela.  Their group is called 40 Strong.  We spoke for a while with these impressive kids (they actually videotaped a little interview with some of us!) from a high school in Syracuse.  I'll keep my eyes open to see where their project takes them! 

 

The sign above was written and carried by a couple of high school students, particularly interested in protecting their school music program, endangered by the excessive testing.  I love that students participated so actively in this rally!