The Community Arts Network promotes information exchange, research and critical dialogue within the field of community-based art. Their website is so useful it beggars all description, but I will try:
I am over there now, skimming this mostly terrific essay by doctor Stephani Etheridge Woodson phd called Models for Working with Youth in Community Arts. She discusses the importance of using "educative models" in our work with young people and also proposes a list of basic areas of competency for professional Teaching Artists:
• Ability to parse information, build progressive skill sets and establish learning goals;
• Understanding the audience/learner/student both as an individual and as a member of diverse cultures;
• Basic familiarity with the strengths and weaknesses of different teaching modalities;
• Classroom management, leadership behavioral strategies;
• Assessment and evaluation of learning outcomes.
If I hold any of these skills and understandings, and I better, then I learned much of it from master Teaching Artists in professional development workshops provided by my employer. I also learned it by working on the job, reading in the public library, surfing online and sitting in the aisles of the Barnes and Noble on Court Street in Brooklyn because they have a pretty good selection and there's a Trader Joes down the block now. Did you know?
I think on the job peer-to-peer training and paid professional development are the models for getting emerging TAs to meet high standards. I know I couldn't have afforded tuition and expenses to learn how to evaluate learning outcomes or to learn how to plan with a classroom teacher. My employer pays me to show up for training and that is swell, because otherwise I would probably be tempted to just stay at home and watch Battlestar Galactica on Hulu.
I can't help wondering why basic TA training isn't included as a part of conservatory training when the reality is that it is rather difficult for most artists to make a living solely on their art.
I wonder.
Then, I start to get sleepy.
Plus: Alice in Wonderland
Cecil M. Hepworth & Percy Stow, 1903
This 1903 short is the first version ever put on celluloid of the Lewis Carroll classic.
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