I began to look at my classroom projects as more than cross-curricular integrations through cross-referencing content materials; they were also opportunities for true collaboration. I wanted students to create a project, from concept to completion, that would allow them to collaborate in ways they had never done before. But how could we do this authentically without feeling forced and have it naturally align with the curriculum?
Left: Stella, ceramic sculpture grade nine. Right: Daisy, original drawing, grade one.Mila, original monster drawing, grade one, and Chloe, ceramic sculpture, grade nine.Clare, ceramic sculpture, grade nine, and Max, illustrated story, grade one.Escher, grade one, reads his illustrated story to his partnered artist, Simi, grade nine.
Being an art teacher can be lonely, especially if you’re the sole person teaching your subject in the entire building. One day at lunch, I was talking to a tech-ed teacher I worked with, and I realized how similar welding and woodworking concepts were to the concepts I was teaching in my art room. We discussed everything from craftsmanship to project management and grading. This lunch experience would open a new world for the rest of my teaching career.
An Answer in Ceramics
I began to look at my classroom projects as more than cross-curricular integrations through cross-referencing content materials; they were also opportunities for true collaboration. I wanted students to create a project, from concept to completion, that would allow them to collaborate in ways they had never done before. But how could we do this authentically without feeling forced and have it naturally align with our curriculum?
The ceramics studio was a natural place for this to happen. In class, students create utilitarian and nonobjective artwork, which can lead to various entry points for almost any subject. The key, of course, is to have a willing co-teacher. I decided it would be wise to start my collaboration with another teacher with one small project. It was kind of a trial run so we could both see if it would be a good fit to work together and expand our working relationship in the future.
Successful Collaborations
We are lucky to have two makerspaces in our school. One we lovingly call “Nerdvana,” and the other is the Lubar Center for Innovation and Exploration. Here, we worked with students and staff to problem-solve and create a signature stamp based on the history of the Chinese chop. The staff at the Lubar Center helped us explore using a laser cutter with wood and 3D-printing the stamps to see what would work best. They worked with us to take our drawings and create the signature stamps that students used on their clay projects for the rest of the semester.
We also collaborated with our outdoor education coordinator, middle-school environmental science teacher, and the middle-school ecological society. Students learned how to propagate plants, design planters for specific plants to thrive and grow, and transplant the plants in their completed planters.
The Monster Project
Our last collaboration of the year was with the elementary school. A first-grade teacher approached me about the viral Monster Project, where the first-graders created monsters and wrote stories about them. Our upper-school ceramics classes used this as an opportunity to learn about the Industrial Design process and created 3D ceramic sculptures based on the younger students’ drawings while the first-grade students learned about writing and story formats.
When first-graders met with their upper-school designers, they took time to read them their stories and the designers gifted the monster sculptures to the young authors.
We also animated the drawings using an AI software program. We exhibited the monster sculptures along with the animations, illustrated bound storybooks, framed ideations and the design brief at our Annual Gallery Night.
Reflection
We look forward to collaborating with the upper-school material sciences class to process and test different natural clay bodies from our outdoor education space, create a raku kiln, learn about the chemical makeup of glazes, and more.
Collaborative teaching has rejuvenated how I deliver lessons and work with my colleagues. It’s been great to exchange ideas, share questions, and explore our ideas together to fulfill our mission of sharing our individual expertise and innovative curricula that go beyond our assigned departments to develop higher-level critical thinking and creative expression.
Andrea Worthey is an upper-school art teacher at the University School of Milwaukee in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. AndreaWorthey@Gmail.com
National Standard
Connecting: Synthesize and relate knowledge and personal experiences to make art.
This issue highlights several ways in which art teachers have integrated collaboration into their teaching practice, such as providing students with opportunities to problem-solve and work together throughout the year, learning about the Sustainable Development Goals and creating a tile installation symbolizing them, inviting a local florist to teach an art lesson, collaborating with an artist to create an outdoor installation using materials reclaimed from the ocean, and more.
