Artistic Vision

Art Education. Straight Up.

Beyond motivation

October 11, 2008 at 6:32 am · Filed under Art, Art Education, Education, Random and tagged: , , , ,

This week was particularly troubling for me. Emotionally, I was drained by my students’ constant complaints:

  • This is too hard
  • This is meaningless
  • This is so dumb
  • I’m never going to use this
  • Blah, blah, blah.

Albeit none of these complaints is new or surprised me. I’ll be reflecting this weekend on my personal responses as I do my lesson planning.

My painting class, in particular, has been quite distressing. They don’t understand why we’re learning drawing basics. My attempts at explaining it fell on deaf ears.

What do you do with students who position themselves beyond motivation?

I met with my media specialist yesterday. I wanted to discuss with her the possibility of taking 3-4 students out of my painting class and giving them writing assignments. One of the kids has been asking for this from the beginning of the year because he hates art. (He failed art last year.) We came up with a couple of ideas. We’re going to meet again next week.

4 Comments »

  Kungfu Komiks wrote @ October 11, 2008 at 6:50 am

Ignore them. Students are always that way.

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  alethakuschan wrote @ February 2, 2009 at 6:45 pm

I’m trying to figure out how someone fails art? Did he just not do assignments? Given the breadth of things in history, certainly there ought to be something that the student can find appealing. As to writing, why couldn’t writing be combined with an art project. I’m thinking of the innumerable ways that images and words appear together historically — illuminated manuscripts, illustrations in books (e.g. William Blake), text that appears prominently in paintings, illusionistically or otherwise (e.g. as in a Holbein portrait or David’s Death of Murat) — what about Delacroix’s Moroccan sketchbook which matches images with the artist’s travel commentary.

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  JWP wrote @ February 2, 2009 at 11:19 pm

First, I think it SHOULD be possible to fail art just like any other class. Second, yes, he chose not to do most of the assignments. The ones he did were either incomplete or, when done, rushed to the point they were laughable. That student ended up leaving the school. The other two students interested ended up not completing a pre-research assignment I gave them which helped them focus on a particular period in art history AND select an artist that appealed to them. So, they were re-integrated into my painting class.

In answer to the other writing-related comments you make — all of which, you would THINK would be reasonable talking points between myself and my students — I’ll just say this. My particular urban kids have little to no background or interest in art. I’ve tried to delude myself that I just needed to find the right approach but it comes down to this simple fact. They want to come into my classroom and do as little as possible because my class has no bearing on their life; they’re not going to draw again after they graduate. Some would do a little craft but they really want to talk to their friends and simply be given an “A.” I’ve tried bringing in the concepts of art as everyday living because it IS everywhere (e.g., their clothes, jewelry, technology, music, etc.). The things I bring up to them are things they can consume; they aren’t being asked to think about them, comment on them or make them. It’s simply a tough gig.

Your writing ideas certainly sound interesting … TO ME. : ) I particularly love the idea of a travel sketchbook, but I have a hard enough time getting them to hand in a simple sketchbook assignment on a Friday that I give them on Monday.

I’ve been thinking how I can aggressively address and weave into all of my lessons the “So what?” and “Who cares?” components of my role as an (art) educator to this generation of students.

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  alethakuschan wrote @ February 3, 2009 at 9:12 am

I think that teaching high school students has got to be exceedingly challenging! So, kudos, for the fact that you’re there!

As an artist I don’t really quite understand the idea of grades being attached to art because they just don’t really mean anything. But I understand that school is about grades generally. Historically artists that are ignored in their generation sometimes are later recognized as masters, and some who are touted in their time are felt to be conventional by succeeding generations. That’s kind of a cliche, but it does demonstrate something about the difficulty that society has determining what makes art significant. Thus it seems to me that putting emphasis on grades in school only confounds a deeper fundamental uncertainty that already exists about how art is defined.

But you didn’t invent grading, I realize.

I’m not sure what is meant by “urban”? Sometimes the term has been used as a synonym for African-American. You’re reference to a “so what” attitude happens coincidentally to remind me of a Miles Davis piece from his album “Kind of Blue.” A certain kind of “so what” could be described as intrinsic to one strand of African-American culture. I wonder if making “so what” the subject might address what the kids are feeling.

I completely believe you when you say you’ve got a tough gig. Some of their reluctance, however, might be simply a fear of failing. People never like to acknowledge fear so they may put up a tough front or affect not to care, but I suspect that deep down they’re afraid of exposing themselves to ridicule.

That’s the other thing about art — which the high school classroom and adolescent behavior in general can mask — it’s very personal. Kids can have very strong feelings about the things they make and similarly strong reasons to fear exposure.

I would try to praise everything you can think of to praise. Part of the problem of the beginner — in general — is that the only thing the beginner sees IS the mistake. Teaching a beginner to see the beauty in his or her idea and in their first gestures is an important first step in learning to see. Teenagers are big, but their still kids inside and have many child-like fears.

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