This week's material centered around observation and reading and taking the time to delve into this whole subject of Arts-centered Integrated Learning. The reading by Anne Thulson and Julia Marshall was really impactful to me because it addressed several questions or cautions I was thinking about while considering how to develop my future curriculum in the form of TAB or mores student-led learning and exploration. 

I loved loved the analogy of an emergent Art curriculum as being a jungle-gym: a flexible yet strong base that learners can grab onto and spring off of, with beams to hang on and play on, and yet still a sort of boundary to bump up against. As a future educator, this can seem overwhelming...letting the students have more freedom in the process and still keeping a hold of them. Where do I even begin? How do I transform classical teacher-led structure to letting students lead their own learning while still meeting standards and technicalities? How do I keep it practical?

While moving away from a sole authority in classrooms to each student having self-practice may seem unconventional or simply unfeasible, this whole process hinges on the curriculum being emergent; meaning it develops as it goes. We don't have to get it right the first time! I have to just continually be flexible, attentive, open, and communicative as I learn about each student and how they learns and what they care about to be able to help them take control of their learning. 

The three stages of development towards understanding and mastering student-led exploration are free play, guided instruction, and independent practice; with the final being the hardest and also the goal. It will be a long road where many of us have to work and learn from each other but I love the idea of teaching not being a stagnant or fixed process. It is as much a learning process for us as it is for the students we teach. This whole change in perspective for me is exciting and overwhelming, and I can't wait to put it into practice and learn more. 

My art activity for this week is all about this exploration and the potential to create or inspire something unique. In an emergent Art-Centered learning classroom, the teacher is learning alongside the students. When you hit that sweet spot and their individual passion for learning and creating is ignited and stretched to outside the classroom, you have something beautiful and impactful. I started each square with random dots across parts of the paper to sorta represent each student's potential. Using folded up pieces of junk mail, I scraped each dot and stretched it across the sheet to show their learning and direction. I thought a few of them looked like people so I added faces :)