Miss Art of Teaching

During period 6 today, my co-worker sat in my class to observe my lesson. It is a requirement that the head teacher sits in on one of our classes and that everyone in the faculty takes turn observing one another. Feedback is then documented on BlueSky and given to the teacher verbally. This helps us to reflect and improve on our pedagogy. The lesson observation was based on my period 6 Year 11 Visual Arts class.  The focus of the lesson is based on the short documentary: Jim Carrey: I Needed Colour.  Read up this blog post to understand the lesson's content:  Lesson idea: Jim Carrey I changed a few things in the lesson. I started off the lesson by showing students a few examples of Jim Carrey's artwork without revealing the artist. Students worked in groups to write down whether they liked the artwork. We then had a class discussion and they were required to explain their choices. I then showed them the YouTube video. Afterward, we talked about how the docum...

I love going on Facebook and Instagram for teaching ideas. A recent video that has received a lot of attention (1.5 million views) is Jim Carrey's 6-minute documentary based on his thought processes when painting. Jim Carrey: I Needed Colour The exciting part about this video is the different reactions received. Some have congratulated him on his new direction such as IndieWire's article  Jim Carrey is now an amazing painter and his art documentary is going viral  while others, including The Guardian   Jim Carrey's art is yet more proof that Hollywood stars should avoid the canvas  has criticised him, calling his art "shallow" and "pretentious". I plan to show this video to my Year 11 students on Thursday period 6. Being the last period of the day, a video should help spice things up and keep them awake. The majority of the students will know this Canadian star. He is famous for starring in movies such as Dumb and Dumber, The Mask and has e...

My Stage 5 (Year 9/10) class is starting their 'Street Art' unit. I have been getting ready for this unit by looking for new resources (Youtube videos, artist to study etc) and planning ways to distribute and keep track of who is using what. This is extremely important as a missing scalpel knife can lead to an accident. The same applies to a spray can. I have traced my 'birdie' paperweight to get the shape of the birds. They have been laminated and attached to the painting via the use of velcro. Each birdie has a yellow wing which is also attached by velcro. Each birdie has my student's name. If they use spray can 'number 4', they will need to attach the correct wing onto their birdie. This helps me keep track of everything. Videos that I plan to use to introduce the unit: The above video will be used to show the 'power' of Art. I want students to think about how Street Art can be used positively. The video does not address Street Ar...