NAEA Conference Contemplations

Me and my colleagues at 'the bean'

It's been a while since I have blogged. I have been working a lot, and sorting out things. Mainly, watching too many TikToks, and probably need to change something about that. So, I have been trying to make things, going to more art-y places, and trying to listen to podcasts that are a little more inspiring. So, that out of the way, let's dig in on what I have been up to.

My last week of school before break, I was able to go to the National Art Educator Association convention in Chicago. I grabbed a lot of great ideas that I am trying to process here. 

As Art teaching is a different animal than other areas of the school, I appreciate that my administration allowed myself and my colleague art educators to travel to Chicago for professional development. I work with great teachers at the middle school, but no one really understands what my job is, as I don't really know what it is like to teach 50+ band students all at once.

I appreciate the time to be professional with other like minded, similar job, teachers. 

First session

I attended a fantastic session by Mollie Ayers, who makes badges for her classroom activities. Mollie runs her art classroom using art centers, where students have choice in using varied techniques on artworks. Students have to have their artwork assessed every 6 weeks, after they fill in a reflection that nominates areas and resources that they feel that they have used in their artwork. Students then take that reflection to conference with their teacher. During which they receive their badges, which are just color printed squares that she prints out. These badges get placed in their sketchbook. Her work is based on Brad Flickinger's "Reward Learning with Badges"

Badges ranged from targets, applied to different art materials and stations. Some included badges for artist statements. Badges could be for Materials, Techniques, Content, Elements & Principles of Design, and Artist Behaviours.

I think I can take it in another direction that might be more meaningful for them and myself. My school wants me to unpack targets in rubrics using AI. Which, I have complied. but I do not see this as a way that students will comfortably use this information. I think that I can adapt the badge model as a way to get kids to buy into understanding the multi-modal use of targets in my room.

I am not fully sure how I will go about this, but I think I may need to go more towards a choose your own adventure style concept for part of a project. I could put out certain materials for an add-on to a project or just for sketchbook. More thinking needed. 

Keynote

From here, I went to see a keynote by Artist Liz Flores.

Liz Flores is a painter and muralist based in Chicago. She is deeply influenced by the everyday human experience, storytelling, and the female body. Working primarily with acrylic paint on canvas, her work is a representation of the human condition through lines, shapes, and abstract figures. It’s a reaction to life, an emotion, or a memory and is driven by her interests in community, womanhood, and Latinidad. Flores made the leap from corporate America into the art world ten years ago and in this time, has shared her story on the TEDx stage, CreativeMornings Chicago, and collaborated with major brands like United Airlines, Lululemon, and the Chicago Bulls.  

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Second Session

My next session I found wracking my brain afterwards was presented by Jackie Jablecki. She discussed Art Journalling with her Middle School students. She had a tips about these books. 

1. Never rip out pages. This book is a time capsule.
2. Design your pages over spreads, work across the binding where appropriate. Use duelling pages, ie Geometric vs Organic, Colors, etc.
3. Communicate without words. Hide a theme. Choose if you want to reveal it.
4. Get past the blank page. Add color, a scribble, a sticker or two. Don't let the page scare you into not making.
5. Layer. Draw & Collage over with mixed media.
6. Create interactive pop-up style pages. Consider making an interactive page. I found this resource that I might try to use.
7. Use prompt guides like Inktober and other drawing competitions, such as artfight.net

Gif animation of one of Jackie's student works.

This is an area where I would like my classes to grow next year. I saw some small books on Amazon that I thought might consider using next year, or just maybe make them out of cardboard and copy paper. I am currently trying to adopt this method in one of my sketchbooks to see if I can grow in this approach.

Third Session

As an art teacher, I work hard to try to engage with all of my students. Some of my students are harder to include. Christopher Hall presented a session entitled "Feeling alone on an Island: Bridging the Theory to Practice Divide in the Inclusive Art Room"

We discussed some areas where students may have issues in the art room.

Image screenshot of Dr. Hall's presentation.

He discussed using Visual Schedules to help all students not just your students with an identified need. Adapted Materials are for everyone.  Some of these could be for:

• Warm up
• Studio Set up
• Art Making
• Extension Activity
• Clean up

One item I found interesting was 'Hand under hand' instead of 'Hand over Hand'. When helping a student that may have a motor issue, try to help with the least amount of teacher control of the student's artwork. Help by lifting from the elbow, allowing the student to have more control. Work out what works best to help students, without taking over.

We discussed that Canva.com can create the cartoon images Dr. Hall used in his presentation.

For some of our artists they may need to have an Individualised Artist Success Plan.

Fourth Session 

For this session, I went a little techie, heading down to the Digital Playground where Illustrator Christopher Diego discussed digital illustration techniques.

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He discussed some tools that might be useful in schools

Clip Studio Paint  which doesn't work on a Chromebook.

Magma which allows for collaborative drawing online. (Not 100% sure this would be COPPA compliant for School, but might be fun for students to explore at home.)

Sumo Paint which can work on a chromebook, but saving may be an issue for some users.

Krita which is an open source app that works on a computer.

Kleki works on a Chromebook.

Sketch.io which can be used with Google Classroom, but may need some tech support to set up on your domain. 

Procreate which is an iPad app. I already use it and love it...

We were discussing certain layer settings for different parts of drawings. For instance,

• Shadow layers -> Multiply
• Highlights -> Screen
• Light source -> Overlay

He made a cartoon game card of a photo taking frog in his quick illustration tutorial.

He streams illustration on Twitch here

Session 4

The next morning, I headed down to a PACKED session on Ceramics with Julie Shelton.

She discussed her journey of transforming her school's ceramics studio from a dusty, silica laden disaster into a healthy functioning space. As I am working to rebuild the art room's ceramic area to be safer, this session had a lot of food for thought.

Two videos she shared about Silica Safety:

With this she discussed some recommendations for teachers to mitigate clay dust and other do's in the ceramics studio.

1. It's OUR Studio, not mine. Get students to take ownership in keeping the studio clean.
2. Classrooms get dirty due to a lack of procedures. Explain, Model, Demonstrate, Practice.
3. Keep things Task oriented and Predictable.
4. No Sponges. Only use Microfiber cloth and water to clean clay surfaces. 
5. Use canvas cloth on table tops that you wash regularly. 
6. Wash out clay storage bags to avoid clay dust.
7. Weigh your clay. Teach students to know how much clay they are using, as professional potters do.
8. Store clay bats vertically to avoid warping.

My colleague was able to sit with the presenter to discuss things after her session, as everyone was heading to the day's keynote address. I need more time to discuss with her about this time.

Second Keynote

Our second Keynote was by artist Jeffrey Gibson. He is an interdisciplinary artist known for his bold synthesis of Indigenous and Western traditions across painting, installation, video, and performance. A citizen of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians and of Cherokee descent, he represented the United States at the 2024 Venice Biennale with his solo exhibition the space in which to place me, later shown at The Broad in Los Angeles. Gibson’s work is in the permanent collections of MoMA, the Whitney, and the National Gallery of Art.

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A post shared by Anastasiya Shelest 🇺🇦 (@shelestanastasiya)

Time at the Chicago Art Institute 

Looking at art brings inspiration. Time to reflect on practice, time to absorb new learning. 

I had a great time looking at the art, and learning about artists that I did not know. There is always something new at the gallery. 

I did not know Bruce Goff when I walked in, but they had a large gallery put together as a retrospective of his and his mentor Frank Lloyd Wright. It was artwork that, although architectural in nature, often pushed into science fiction and futurism. The work was colorful and precise, using themes that you see in your favorite movies and tv.

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As for all of the time I had in Chicago, I wish I had more opportunity to work with my Art colleagues. I rarely get time to work with them and the conversation in the van was amazing too.  I look forward to further conversations!

I have more processing to do, but at least here I have published a few thoughts. Heck this is probably my longest blog post I have ever made. 

So, less watching TikTok and more reflecting here. I have other things I have done over break, and maybe another post tomorrow. 

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