Cultural Landscapes

This week started out a little differently than Jeff and I had planned. We would have liked to get right into our cardboard constructions, but it seemed as though it would be better to spend some time working on our lino-cuts after talking to Natalia. I am glad that she brought that idea up, though, because it seemed like the students appreciated the extra work time. It would not have been fair to cut them off from their work from last week that they had grown attached to.

After spending the first half hour on printmaking, we moved on to the main lesson of the day. The project for this week was a great idea and I think the students were really interested in it. The PowerPoint that Jeff put together with the cardboard artists really caught the students’ attention and got them involved in the idea of using cardboard as a medium. Once again, the students actively participated in the group discussion. Though their ideas for “cultural monuments and landscapes” were not exactly what we had had in mind, their ideas were thoughtful and creative. Some students stuck to the idea of monuments, while others chose features from video games or more personal settings.

Although Jeff was concerned about giving a demonstration that the students would understand, I thought he did a great job instructing everyone on the proper way to use the exact-o knives and how to construct their pieces. Some of the students had a hard time cutting through the cardboard with the knives, so we provided scissors instead. Other students just had a hard time listening to instructions. Jazelle, for instance was having a difficult time using the knife. Once Jeff gave her an individual demonstration, she caught on and did great! Gracie, on the other hand, decided that “stabbing” the cardboard was easier. Jeff and I approached Gracie at separate times asking her to try the correct way of cutting, but she seemed a bit stuck in her ways. After class, Natalia suggested that next time we explain the correct way to use the tool and wait to see her try it herself.

Aside from the actual lesson, we came away from Saturday having learned some other lessons ourselves. I think we realized that, especially for this age group, we have to stop worrying about the lessons being completed in one week. It has yet to happen, but the students do not seem to mind. We have decided that this coming Saturday will be a day to “catch-up” on the two projects we have begun. I also ran into some issues with name-calling and, what I believe is, unintentional bullying. One of the students made a comment calling someone a “Jew” and called another student’s glasses “nerdy”. At the end of class, we discussed some ways to handle these situations. In regards to the “Jew” comment, I responded by saying “you mean he is Jewish?” and to the “nerdy glasses” comment with “I love her glasses! I used to have similar ones.” We discussed subtly ignoring the comments not to fuel a fire and/or pulling a Billy Madison: “it’s cool to pee your pants” approach were the best ways to handle this particular situation.