CHOICE BASED ART EDUCATION Media-Specific Choice process, but more often it is cyclical, with artists in a loop of constant art-making, sometimes bouncing between stages. Ceramics 1 In Ceramics 1, students learn basic techniques—pinch, coil, slab, and sculpting—in teacher-led projects. I know what you’re thinking: TAB is all about choice, so why are you giv-ing a teacher-led project? TAB follows a choice continuum, meaning that it doesn’t have to be “all choice, all the time.” There are times when teacher-led lessons are appropriate, and times when full student choice is appropriate. How much choice and when depends on several factors, and one of those fac-tors is learning basic techniques. Once students have learned the basic hand-building techniques, we dive into using the ATP. Students learn about ways to develop their ideas through sketching, research, experi-menting, and creating mock-ups. They bring their development to life in the creation stage while learning that reflection isn’t just something they do at the end of the process, it’s an ongo-ing exercise. Students practice the ATP through categories such as nature, animals, portraiture, and architecture. They choose how they interpret the topic and the best way to build it. This is a low-stakes way of beginning the path-way to understanding both working with clay and utilizing the ATP. The year allows for the understanding that failure is part of the process and that we learn from risk-taking and when things go “wrong.” Ceramics 2 In Ceramics 2, there are still a few teacher-led explorations, such as the Nerikomi technique, or colored clay, but the focus is for students to go deeper with their work. This is the year when we move onto more com-plex themes and add more context Skylar P. W Jean Freer Barnett hen people think about Teaching for Artistic Behavior (TAB), they generally think of a studio that allows for free choice in any media. But what about the classes that are media-specific? How does a teacher address TAB in that setting? Doesn’t limiting the media to just one or two materials go against TAB? (The answer is no, it doesn’t.) When referencing the TAB philosophy, one of the main tenets is the question, “What do artists do?” Artists often spend their career working in just one or two media. I run a ceramics program that consists of a three-level pathway: Ceramics 1, Ceramics 2, and Ceram-ics 3. The goal of the first two levels is for students to become more familiar with the material (clay) and the Artistic Thinking Process (ATP), ending with them being independent artists by senior year in Ceramics 3. The Artistic Thinking Process Most artists use the ATP when creat-ing a new piece of art, regardless of the medium. The ATP has four stages: inspiration (gathering ideas), develop-ment (research, sketching, creating mock-ups, practicing techniques, planning), creation (the making of the artwork), and reflection (making revisions throughout the creation pro-cess, looking at the finished product and reflecting on what worked and what didn’t). The ATP can be a linear 12 APRIL SchoolArts
School Arts Magazine April 2023: Page 12
