Teachers learn to inject arts into classes

Jeff Benson

There was no Fountain of Youth involved, but there was another reason

first-grade teachers at Sonora Elementary School and St. John the

Baptist Catholic School skipped class Wednesday and became students

once again.

Principals and teachers at those schools and three others in

Orange County gathered at the Orange County Performing Arts Center to

kick off the area’s first ArtsConnect program, a series of classes

that train teachers to integrate the arts into their classroom

teachings.

Teachers gathered in groups and made trees out of construction

paper, pipe cleaners, magazine photos, glue -- pretty much anything

they could get their hands on.

St. John’s teachers designed a tree out of magazine ads and

construction paper. Sonora’s teachers took a different approach,

designing a palm tree with pictures of babies at the bottom and

pictures of an elderly couple at the top to represent all ages in the

Newport-Mesa area.

The point of the exercise was sheer creativity -- the same kind of

creativity the teachers will begin conveying to their students next

year.

The school staffs met with Mitchell Korn, president and founder of

Artsvision, who will work with the teachers on a monthly basis

through May and show them ways they can use illustrated books,

musical instruments, craft supplies and other arts-related

instructional tools into the curriculum. The same five schools will

take advantage of the program for five years.

Artsvision is a national program that connects schools, arts

programs, government agencies and foundations with arts resources

that they can use in their everyday classes.

The teachers who attended Wednesday’s orientation will work with

storytellers, painters, singers, actors, mimes, puppeteers and other

artists next year.

“We took the very best artists from our roster,” Korn said. “They

show the teachers how to take art and art interpretation as a way of

learning concepts. The artists love it and the schools are getting

the best of the best.”

First-grade teachers at the five Orange County schools will learn

the lessons this year and implement them next year, Korn said. Next

year, the second-grade teachers will meet with Korn while the

first-grade teachers are busy building, drawing and singing with

their students. The process will continue until teachers in grades

one through five are utilizing the arts in lessons on math, science

and geography, he said.

The grant was awarded to Sonora, St. John the Baptist, Taft

Elementary in Santa Ana, Santiago Elementary School in Lake Forest

and Stanford Elementary School in Garden Grove. The five schools were

selected from 18 that applied.

The unusual thing about the grant is that there’s no dollar value

attached. Korn said he plans to work with the center and the teachers

to get them what they need, regardless of cost.

The teachers will also provide Korn with a better understanding of

supplies they’ll need to ease the process when they incorporate the

lessons in their classrooms beginning in September.

Each teacher will receive a free tub of supplies before next year,

depending on which supplies they pick.

Sonora Principal Christine Anderson said she was excited about the

opportunity to participate in the program. She attended the

orientation with three Sonora first-grade teachers and a parent who

serves on the school’s PTA.

“I’d been to similar workshops before we were chosen for the

grant,” Anderson said. “What we’re most excited about is that our

teachers get a better picture of what this grant is all about.”

St. John the Baptist Principal Mary Vianney said her school is

looking forward to enriching its programs with the arts, and

specifically music and drama.

“I love learning the listening skills and doing things to music,”

Vianney said. “We’re planning on bringing music to the different ways

we teach.”

Korn said that if the students were involved in the same

tree-making project the teachers attempted, it could’ve preempted

another art activity. The exploration of musical sounds, for example,

shows that more than one art form can be used to represent an idea.

He showed the teachers and principals a percussion instrument

called a flexatone, made of tempered steel, that produces higher and

lower pitches depending on how tightly the thumb is pressed against

it.

Most children have heard this twangy sound before, he said, in

cartoons and scary movies.

“I love these as teaching tools because you can put one in front

of a six-year-old or a 60-year-old and get the same reaction -- ‘Can

I touch it?’” he said. “It teaches about pitch, but also about

communication in music. You can give it to a first-grader and have a

musical conversation.”