Pre-service Possibilities: Reconsidering \u27\u27Art for the Elementary Educator

Art for the Elementary Educator courses are sites of possibility in the field of art education, particularly art education oriented toward curriculum integration and meaningful art experiences. Drawing on literature about Art for the Elementary Educator courses and our own teaching experiences we make recommendations for reconsidering possible futures for this course as related to the future of art education. We believe that this course, its students, instructors, and course materials are worthy of sustained attention by the art education community. Ultimately, we argue that art education appreciation and advocacy, concepts we define in our concluding remarks, should be primary objectives for such classes. Reconsidering Art for the Elementary Educator in light of these ideas requires renewed examination of course content, student dispositions, instructor preparation, and teaching and learning resources

Podcasting Possibilities for Art Education

Technological developments influence the way artists create works of art. Newer technologies associated with the Web, called Web 2.0, are changing and affecting the work of contemporary artists. One form of Web 2.0 is the development of podcasts, which are compressed files that can be shared through the Internet. Podcasts are mainstream and many art museums use them as a means to provide audio or video for visitors, virtual or real. Over the last few semesters, I worked with groups of undergraduate and graduate art education students to develop podcasts based on their interpretations of works of art. Through these experiences, the students and I learned a great deal about the creation and use of art-related podcasts. Numerous art educators encourage teachers to incorporate technology into their classrooms and many specifically call for the introduction of Web 2.0 tools (Buffington, 2008; Chung, 2007; Liao, 2008; Liu, 2008; Roland, 2006, 2007). The purpose of this article is to share practices from the contemporary art world relating to podcasts and Web 2.0, and to share observations about the strengths and weaknesses of art-related podcasts while considering their educational uses. The article concludes with suggestions for ways art teachers can use podcasts in their classrooms

Power Play: Rethinking Roles in the Art Classroom

Art teachers can work toward changing the power dynamics in their classrooms by using a student-centered approach, as demonstrated by an example lesson about contemporary painter Kehinde Wiley. Includes recommended resources for information on culturally relevant pedagog

Contemporary Approaches to Critical Thinking and the World Wide Web

This article begins with a review of the history of critical thinking and some current ideas on the topic. Then, I explain my working description of critical thinking and how critical thinking is currently articulated in discussions of the WWW in schools. I conclude with ideas for teachers related to developing critical thinking in art classrooms using the WWW

Developing Multicultural Intelligence through the Work of Kehinde Wiley

Through a review of current events, contemporary ideas on multicultural education, and the art of Kehinde Wiley, this article argues that using the work of contemporary artists is one way to introduce pre-service teachers to the complex issues of multiculturalism, race, and culture in contemporary society. By learning about contemporary artists whose work overtly relates to race and culture, pre-service teachers may become more comfortable with the realities of the multicultural schools they encounter throughout their careers. Additionally, the article introduces portraiture methodology as a means of understanding interactions in university classrooms, especially as they relate to pre-service teacher education. Thus, this article explores the roots of cultural violence through the lens of multicultural education and pre-service teacher education

Bursting the Grad School Bubble

Buffington writes about how she is trying to align the theories and ideas that she encountered and learned as a graduate student (at a renowned doctoral 1 university) with the reality of actually teaching pre-service teachers

Other(wise): The Myth of Wikipedia

This article explores the theme of Other(wise) as it relates to Web 2.0 and newer forms of creating knowledge. Through a discussion of Web 2.0, wikis, and Wikipedia, I explore newer ways of thinking about a text. Wikis represent modern texts and require different approaches than traditional texts. As a field, we need to become active on Wikipedia to develop our presence in ways that represent the complexities of our field