Arts education refers to the teaching and learning of various forms of art, including music, theater, visual arts, and dance. It aims to develop creativity, self-expression, critical thinking, and cultural awareness among students.
Anti-racism refers to the practice of actively opposing and dismantling racism in all its forms, including systemic, institutional, and individual racism. It involves recognizing and challenging racist attitudes, beliefs, and practices, as well as promoting equity, diversity, and inclusion.
Arts Education Anti-Racism Symposium 2023
Art Education in Maryland Schools’ 3rd Annual Arts Education Symposium on Anti-Racism focused on exploring ways to incorporate anti-racism principles and practices in arts education.
I have taken the role of Equity Liaison at my school, and being apart of the NAEA CAN network, I am excited to bring my perspective into the conversation about how the Arts helps to heal and transform.
The symposium was a wonderful experience of self care, social emotional learning, and cultural proficiency discussions. One of the best parts was listening to Paula Liz from Anti-Racist Art Teacher!
Resources
Overall, the symposium aimed to provide a platform for educators, artists, researchers, and advocates to share insights, experiences, and strategies for creating more equitable and just education system through the arts. If you are interested in learning more ways to celebrate diversity and have a more inclusive space, please reach out.
Anti-Racism is really a matter of looking within at your own experiences and how we accept our paths, find gratitude in our experiences, and learn from our mistakes, all while knowing others are a valuable part of our growth… and we are in this together. That is what my ancestors mean by Respect, knowing we are all parts of the whole.
January 23rd – 29th, 2023 is Crayola Creativity Week! We are celebrating at Ridgely Middle School by doing creativity week activities in our STAG advisory groups. I am so excited about what the students will create today.
I am especially excited about today’s lesson, which is based around Native American Dancing! I recently completed a painting that shows my personal journey with Native American dancing. This painting is called Reign Fancy, and it shows a female native fancy dancer.
Author Ria Thundercloud and illustrator, Kalila Fuller, will share their book, Finding My Dance. As students hear Ria’s story, they’ll be moved to connect culture, identity, and self-expression. From pow wows to traditional regalia, Ria will captivate students with her remarkable journey. Then they can draw and illustrate nature-inspired patterns and dance poses, making their art dance on paper with Kalila J. Fuller!
Cultural Creations
After watching the video, students will create their own drawings of traditional regalia, or dancing from their own cultures. This is a great way to get to know your students and share the arts from other cultures.
Take pictures of what your students create and post them on social media with the hashtag #CrayolaCreativityWeek and you could win prize packs from Crayola!
Social emotional learning (SEL) is a relatively new area of study in education that focuses on teaching students the skills they need to understand and manage their own emotions, as well as to interact with others in a positive and effective way. Many believe that SEL is just as important as academic subjects like math, science, and reading, and that it is crucial for students to develop these skills in order to succeed in school and in life.
SEL is not just about teaching students how to be happy and well-adjusted – it is also about helping them to develop the skills they need to manage stress and difficult emotions, to communicate effectively with others, to make responsible decisions, and to solve problems. By teaching students these skills, we can help them to build strong, healthy relationships, and to align with and achieve their goals.
Relationships
One of the key components of SEL is the emphasis on building strong relationships. This means teaching students how to communicate effectively, how to listen to others, and how to work together in a positive and respectful way. This can be particularly important in today’s world, where students are increasingly isolated and disconnected from one another, and where they are often exposed to negative influences on social media and other online platforms. By teaching students how to build and maintain healthy relationships, we can help them to develop the resilience and support they need to overcome challenges and to thrive. Working with community to critically think and find solutions.
Emotions
Another important aspect of social emotional learning is the emphasis on helping students to understand and manage their own emotions. This means teaching them how to recognize their own feelings, how to understand the reasons behind those feelings, and how to manage them in a healthy and effective way. This can be particularly challenging for some students, who may struggle with anxiety, anger, or other difficult emotions. By teaching students how to recognize and manage their emotions, we can help them to develop the self-awareness and self-regulation they need to be successful in school and in life.
Social emotional learning (SEL) is an important aspect of education that focuses on helping students develop the skills they need to understand and manage their own emotions, as well as interact with others in a positive and healthy way. SEL has been shown to have a number of benefits for students, including improved academic performance, better mental health, and greater overall well-being.
Imagine what social emotional learning for adults would do to the world. This is such a powerful opportunity to help our children become aware of their power.
Benefits
One of the key benefits of SEL is that it helps students develop the skills they need to manage their own emotions and behaviors. This is important because students who are able to regulate their emotions and impulses are better able to focus on learning and achieve their academic goals. SEL also helps students develop empathy and understanding of others, which can foster positive relationships and a sense of community within the classroom.
Another benefit of social emotional learning is that it can improve students’ mental health and overall well-being. SEL programs can help students learn coping skills that can reduce stress and anxiety, and can also provide a safe and supportive environment for students to talk about their feelings and experiences. This can be especially important for students who may be struggling with mental health issues or other challenges.
Holistic Learning
Social emotional learning is increasingly being recognized as an important part of education, and many schools are incorporating SEL programs into their curriculum. If you’re a teacher or parent, there are many resources available to help you incorporate SEL into your classroom or home. And if you’re a student, remember that developing your social and emotional skills can have a big impact on your overall success and happiness.
Learning about your social emotional intelligence only enhances your ability to learn intellectually. Tapping into both sides of the brain for a true holistic living experience.
Practices
From mindfulness to meditation, creating and reflecting… Art really lends itself well to addressing our self awareness, social awareness, responsible decision making, self management and relationship skills.
My classroom is full of opportunities to practice social emotional learning. Keeping an eye on not only the artmaking process but also their self awareness and social awareness. How students are interacting with each other, and how they are presenting themselves in their work.
Students are able to reflect on their emotions through mood journals, and neurographic exercises. Students also have moments to come back to the present and focus on their breathing, during our mindfulness moments. We also reflect on our work together as a group, learning how to share and receive respectfully.
To me SEL is all about creating brave spaces. Really spending time experiencing life and figuring ourselves out.
To celebrate the 75th anniversary, 75 NAEA members were selected for the opportunity to be early adopters of the January 2023 Crayola Creativity Week while participating in special leadership team-building experiences in preparation of the nationwide Creativity Week celebration.
The National Art Education Association (NAEA) and Crayola Education partnered to offer the NAEA–Crayola Creativity Ambassadors Program, providing visual arts education professionals with professional learning, resources, and support to cultivate Creative Leadership Teams within their learning communities.
75 Educators from around the world were selected to participate in this program! We have been meeting virtually to learn new things about leading our communities in Creativity week in 2023!
Everyone who signs up will get FREE video activities and downloadable Thinking Sheets.* And the best part? It isn’t limited to just 7 days. Every educator will have free access to digital resources for cross-curricular creative learning fun all year long!
Giveaways!
With giveaways, challenges from celebrity creators, and virtual classroom visits, it’s a celebration the whole school will want to be a part of!
Create Connections!
Share students’ ideas, projects, and work in a secure online gallery, and connect with creative classrooms around the country during the live Celebration Assembly event.
Creativity Schedule
There is a fantastic lineup of creatives that will be sharing their stories, inspiring us to get creative!
Makwa Grizzly Bear. Public collection Canadian Native Centre of Toronto
Brave
… from the root work for bold, courageous, untamed, savage. It’s interesting we use the term BRAVO when we are cheering someone on.
To the Anishinaabe, bravery is one of the seven teachings of our grandfathers.
Zoongidi’ewin – Courage or Aakwa’ode’ewin – Bravery is represented as the bear. The Bear carries courage. We seek the strength and courage to face our greatest enemy-oneself. The bear will give us the understanding to seek resolutions through spiritual intervention: hence, spiritual healing to deal with anger, pain and ourselves.
To be brave means you seek to apply your spiritual truths to your life, in order to assist you in growth and transformation.
To face life with courage is to know bravery. Find your inner strength to face the difficulties of life and the courage to be yourself. Defend what you believe in and what is right for your community, family, and self. Face your fears to allow yourself to live your life.
Social Emotional Learning
Bravery plays a big part in social emotional learning. The five competencies of SEL are self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision-making.
Considering that courage and bravery play a big role in our own self-awareness. Cultivating a brave space makes complete sense to supporting our social emotional learning skills.
Brave space is also recognizing the wholeness of our experiences. That we have wounds and traumas that do not always feel good, comfortable or safe.
Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
A brave space is a space where participants feel comfortable learning, sharing, and growing. It is inclusive to all races, sexes, genders, abilities, immigration status, and lived experiences. This is something we should strive for in all our experiences where we interact with one another. Leading towards a more inclusive way to insure all voices are heard and everyone is seen.
Living a life where we are unafraid to be who we are and share our stories with one another, is the only way to true peace and harmony.
Consider using the term brave space over safe space, and comment to let me know what you think about the difference.
Observe means to look at carefully and attentively.
Mindfulness is the ability to be focused yet relaxed at the same time. The ability to be present comes from attentive focus on your breath. Focusing on your breathing takes your mind off of your mind, and allows your mind to rest as your breathing takes over for a little while.
To mindfully observe means you are in the state of mindfulness while you are looking at something.
Noticing
It is beneficial to “notice” as an activity to develop focus in mindfulness. One activity you can try is noticing the room around you.
Take a moment to center in with a few deep breaths. Set your intention for the activity to notice your environment. Notice the objects in the room, their colors, shapes, textures. Notice the tiniest details that you may have never noticed before. Spend about 5 minutes just noticing. Then come back to center with a few deep breaths.
This activity helps to train your brain to slow down and notice the present moment.
Observing
Another activity you can do to help strengthen your mind is to do mindful observing.
For this activity students were shown a video of multiple bubbles, different colors and sizes. Then students were prompted to only observe certain bubbles, all while all the bubbles were moving around the screen.
Spending time observing while other things are going on is a master skill that will have benefits way into the future. Being able to focus in even when there are distracts around is super important, especially in a world where digital realities consume our time, and attention.
Consider spending at least 5 mins a day doing some type of mindfulness activity, and share this with your children! We all benefit when we are mindful.
Web 3.0 (also known as web3) is the third iteration or version of the Internet that interconnects data in a decentralized way to deliver a faster and more personalized user experience. It offers a read/write/own version of the web, in which users have a financial stake in and more control over the web communities they belong to. Web3 promises to transform the experience of being online as dramatically as PCs and smartphones did.
What’s the difference?
Web 1.0is a read-only web where people can read information written on websites.
Web 2.0is a read-write web where people can read and write content on websites and applications.
Web 3.0is a read-write-interact web (powered by artificial intelligence) where people can read, write and interact with content, including 3D graphics, on websites and apps.
The key features of Web3 are:
Open – It’s ‘open’ in the sense that it’s made with open-source software developed by an open community of developers and in full view of the public.
Trustless – The network offers freedom to interact publicly and privately without an intermediary exposing them to risks.
Permissionless – Anyone, including users and providers, can engage without the need for permission from a controlling organization.
Ubiquitous – Web 3.0 will make the Internet available to all of us, at any time and from any location. At some point, Internet-connected devices will no longer be limited to computers and smartphones, as they are in web 2.0. Because of the IoT (Internet of Things), technology will enable the development of a multitude of new types of connected gadgets.
What is a DAO?
DAO, Decentralized Autonomous Organization, is formed when a group of people decide to abide by certain rules to meet common goals. These rules are written into codes of the organization on the blockchain. This gives the community voting rights for how the DAO is run.
What does this mean for Education?
Education system can use DAO’s in many ways. They would be able to vote on critical decisions like curriculum, assessments, and allocation of budget. Everyone would need to think equally about the success of the school and the happiness of it’s population in order to continue operating.
ED3 DAO
Ed3 DAO is a global community reimagining education, with web3. The first DAO for educators, by educators.
I am excited to know a few other awesome connected educators, and excited that I will be attending the ED3 DAO UnConference in November!
The Ed3 Unconference is a virtual, gamified, learning & networking experience focused on web3, & contextualized for education.
Discussions between innovators in web3 & experts in education about the utility (& risks) of blockchain, metaverse, NFTs, & cryptocurrency in education
Practical sessions on how the web3 ecosystem is impacting the workforce
Ideation & collaboration on the future of education
There is so much happening in our society, so many changes and this is just the beginning of a transformation in education. I am so excited to be on this journey and learn more!
Choice-Based Art Education is student centered and based around teaching through the use of the Studio Habits of Mind.
The Studio Habits of Mind are ways in which we process our experiences, here is a great project example. They are very similar to the Scientific Method, or the Mathematical Practices.
TAB CAMP
Teachers in the Mid-Atlantic area came together the first weekend in August for a retreat, to reignite the flame before school begins. When Pam Ehrenreich asked if I knew of a place to host a retreat for teachers in our area I was THRILLED to offer my studio space.
TASK Party
When everyone arrived we started the weekend with appetizers and a TASK party! It was a nice way to get into the weekend… start to make art and open ourselves up new ideas.
Silk Screening TAB SHIRTS
Tracy Skeels shared her method of silk screening. We created stencils from paper and worked together to print our designs.
We shared different projects and resources with each other, creating examples for our students. Julie Dimino shared all of her amazing resources with us!
There were presentations on Cold Finishes on Clay, Gelli Printing, Weaving, and Cyanotypes. Each presentation was so insightful and inspiring.
Cold Finishes for Fired Clay
Jen Byrne shared a few awesome tips for cold finishing clay! Mixing metallic acrylic paint with water in buckets for a quick dip in the shimmer bath!
Gelli Printing
Tracy Skeels presented on gelli printing, and we were able to explore and create to our hearts content.
Cyanotype
Kate Heuston presented on cyanotype, and her experimentation with the process as an artist. We tried new techniques like drawing on acetate, and using transparencies to create different layers of prints.
Weaving
April Pink presented weaving, and we learned quick and easy ways for our students to be able to weave on cardboard looms.
We also shared the many resource for how we structure our classrooms. The reflection and discussion time were super valuable.
Aside from all the learning, it was great to meet like minded individuals and also have time to create art of our own.
Painting Flow and Glow Party
On Saturday evening we had an intuitive painting party. Each teacher created their own work of art, and then we discussed how we could use this in our classrooms.
The weekend was so amazing. 10 art educators coming together to share and create!
If you missed out on this years, keep an eye out for next! It will be the first weekend in August 2023.
In February I hosted a Crypto Art Series webinar that discussed what NFT’s are. We had a great turn out, and there were still more people who couldn’t make it that wanted to learn more!
Since there is a lot of hype around the NFT scene, and a lot of people are still unsure what it’s all about I am going to share a few slides from our webinar.
NFT stands for Non-Fungible Token.
Non Fungible
A dollar is FUNGIBLE. A piece of art is NOT.
NFT
They do not have to be solely digital, and can represent ownership of physical property as well, such as real estate.
SMART CONTRACTS
Smart contracts are a way to verify that the transaction has been completed as written.
KEY CHARACTERISTICS
UTILITY
There are MANY utilities for NFT’s. Collecting artwork is just one of them.
Look out for the next blog that will discuss how NFT’s fit into the art world.
I first heard about crypto with Bitcoin in 2013, when it was $40. It wasn’t until 2017 that I really got into studying it and developing an awareness of the totality of the blockchain technology.
The first step, as is for learning any new thing, was to do research.
Since then I have written 14 blogs about the crypto space and blockchain technology. In December 2017 I wrote about how cryptos were being seen by the IRS and reminding everyone to view this new technology at the early stages…
This is important information… this is about being aware of what is going on, and be open to learning the new way now rather than later. Being at the beginning of the bell curve and taking advantage of this opportunity to stand in our own power and be self sovereign.
I began writing blogs about setting up cryptocurrency wallets, backing them up and keeping your information safe. I’ve touched on ICO’s, learning on Coinbase, stablecoins, Blockstack, and NFT’s.
With all of that said, I am definitely in a better place now financially than in 2017. Cryptocurrency has shifted the way I see money, and the way I interact with currency.
There is no doubt the market has grown exponentially, and will continue to grow as we are still in the adoption stage.
I did a survey once and asked people 4 questions about cryptocurrency.
One question was, “How important is blockchain education?” 15 out of 16 people who answered the survey questions said it was important!
Another question was “Do you hold cryptocurrency?” 13 out of 16 said no.
So people think it’s important to learn about, and can see it has promise, but they do not understand it enough to invest in it.
That is why doing the research is the first step. Understanding information is always key to doing new things.
Blockchain technology is here to stay, its already implemented in so many ways, and cryptocurrency doesn’t seem to be going any where anytime soon. The market cap went from 900 million in 2013 to its current value at 2.6 trillion. That is a 288,789% increase in 8 years.
Get off Zero
The amount of money I invested in the past 5 years has grown exponentially, (and it was not a massive amount of money). Some of that investment went into fees, creating NFT’s, and business transactions. It has also went into things for my family such as a new puppy, tractor, and home improvements. I can say without a doubt, getting into cryptocurrency has been the best investment I have made.
Even the astrology speaks of how there is a huge financial transformation happening. There are even TikTok users who are using astrology to read whats happening with the crypto market.
Lately there has been so much talk about how our world is adopting cryptocurrency! From other countries using bitcoin, to President Biden writing an executive order for our government to research into creating our own US central bank digital currency!
This is the time to get off zero… if you are interested in taking the first step we would like to talk to you. We want to assist those who are interested in learning and actually investing in their future.
I truly believe that others should get off zero and begin to invest in this new technology and the financial shift that is currently taking place. I would love to use what I have learned and my journey to help others thrive!
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