Art teachers develop lessons that encourage students to explore their emotions, develop empathy, and nurture positive relationships. Young students use paper shapes to create scenes that interpret their feelings about a special place, elementary students share personal stories through clay and shrink-film treasures, middle-school students express a chosen emotion through paper and cardboard masks, high-school students connect to the Indigenous histories of their community, and more.
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I think art teachers have always helped students manage their emotions and develop empathy for others. Considering the emotional trauma created by COVID-19 in our nation’s schools, SEL offers an approach that is much needed. It may be best implemented by art teachers because students may be more likely to express feelings and concerns through their art rather than through talking about it.
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“I want to become an emotion scientist,” says Marc Brackett, founder of the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence. How can we support our learners to become scientists of feelings, and explorers of both their own emotions and the emotions of others? The art room is a great place for such an investigation. One lesson I recently created to encourage learners’ social and emotional growth is based on the big idea Special Places. This lesson was successful because it incorporated many different personal connections with materials, kept learners engaged, and allowed them to create meaning.
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As a leave replacement art teacher, I taught at several public schools. During one lesson, I asked my kindergartners to draw rainbows. We talked about how a rainbow is a visual representation of the color spectrum and a powerful symbol of hope. I showed them an illustrated book, Nature’s Light Show: Rainbows by Kristen Rajczak, from the school library. It explains the nature and science of rainbows with photographs. Then we discussed the order of the colors in a rainbow from top to bottom.
When I think about all the art lessons I’ve taught, the ones that stand out have their basis in storytelling, memories, and the personal moments that students cherish. Whether life-changing, joyful, silly, small, or monumental, our memories define who we are. These memories we treasure can be represented by personal symbols. With this in mind, I created the following clay lesson for my elementary students.
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Years ago, I created a middle-school unit that I called Expressive Masks. The lesson was successful, but I have realized that the outcome of a final project is most personally meaningful to students when their work reflects themselves. Introspection and personal expression need to be included in art education. In this unit, students create paper masks and cardboard masks that show a chosen emotion.
It is challenging, with our shortened time frame, to create a clay experience that gives students a chance to be truly engaged in creating something personal. This lesson has given me the best of both worlds: a template-based structure (an envelope) for students to start with and the freedom to express themselves through embellished small-scale sculptures.
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You will be surprised at how invested students become when you make art a personal journey, as it is in your own artistic life. We encourage students to explore different media, but how often do we encourage them to explore their own personal thoughts on what matters most to them? A couple of years ago, I asked myself how I could make art more relevant to my students’ lives. That’s when I designed a printmaking unit I called Whom Do You Look Up To?
Adolescents are on a quest to discover themselves through their social relationships. For this lesson, we wanted to expand their quest to include a connection to place and community. Elements of Indigenous pedagogy provided a meaningful lens through which students can see how exploring and connecting to the history of place in their community can affirm one’s mind, body, and spirit. We asked students to explore the Native history of a place and to reflect on their relationship to this place and its community.
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Every aspect of who I am informs why I’m a HEART teacher, and you can become one, too. Being a HEART teacher means directing our energy, experience, and resources toward changing the terrain of art education. Years ago, I began to learn about the roots of injustice in our education system, and I’ve been pulling at these roots in the gardens that are our schools ever since. I want to share what a HEART teacher is, why it matters, and how to cultivate it in your classroom.
AKACORLEONE (Pedro Campiche) is best known for his lively, complex, and often humorous murals that combine figures, objects, and typography into eye-catching compositions. His works are categorized by his adept use of brilliant color and a strong sense of design. Campiche’s work also includes painting, installation, sculpture, printmaking, and clothing design.
