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.”
All the latest on Orange County from Orange County.
Get our free TimesOC newsletter.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Daily Pilot.