Read Yelland’s Young Children as Multimodal Learners in the Information Age and Laverick’s chapter Teaching with Technology and Interactive Media to Promote Creativity and Art-based Learning in Young Children. Explore 3 -5 of the sites recommended by the author. Make your learning public by describing, in detail 3 different (and new – for you) approaches to using visual arts, music, movement , dance and drama in your classroom.
cmachadolearns 
1. edu.glogster.com – This website is an excellent way to incorporate visual art into a lesson or everyday activity. The website allows you to create a virtual poster with interactive sections on the poster. The student can add pictures, videos, and sound to the page. This would be very useful in classes such as science and history/geography because it provides a fun way to present factual information.
2. dance-kids.org – Dance, for me, is a hard thing to incorporate into my classroom. This website provides a great introduction to dance in a very non-threatening way. Some students do not like to get up in front of the class and move around. The website provides many dance related activities which the students could do in order to “warm up” to movement. I would use dance and movement to help when remembering information such as a new word for the week. Adding some type of movement would increase the retention for the students.
3. kids.tate.org.uk/ – This website is an excellent combination of technology and visual art. the website allow students to create their own drawings online with images they have hand drawn. it provides step by step instructions along with pictures to help the students throughout the process. This would be an excellent way for students to add their own touch to their work. It could be used in math to create a really cool and interactive story problem for the students.
1. I think that a way to incorporate music into the classroom would be to make up songs to help students remember the material you are teaching. Songs are catchy, fun, and students remember them. You could also have your students make up their own song to remember the material. I can remember learning and creating songs to help me remember numerous subjects in school and would definitely use song in my future classroom.
2. A great way to incorporate drama into the classroom is by acting out the book you are reading in class. It could be a novel, short story, play, or any other type of book you want. Getting kids to get up and move around is fun for them and gives them something to be excited about. In addition to being fun and motivating, it helps them remember what is going on. Instead of just reading the book, they can hear the words, see the story, and be the story.
3. To incorporate dance into the classroom, I think having a dance break is a great idea. I was a teacher’s aid in high school and helped teach first grade. A few times in the year, I would be in the room for their dance break. Whenever the kids seemed to be restless and not focusing, the teacher would play them a YouTube video of a cartoon singing a silly song with dance moves for them to do along. The kids loved the break and were ready to learn once the break was over.
1. http://www.mackiev.com – KidPix is an excellent website for kids to be creative and make a story at the same time. This would be a great way to incorporate visual arts in the classroom, especially for an English lesson. Students have the opportunity to create a story with pictures, music, and sound. It is a great way to share your thoughts and ideas in a story for everyone to see.
2. edu.glogster.com – This was a neat website that allows students to create educational content such as Glogs and posters online using images, pictures, and sounds. It is also readily available for IPads. This creates a new benefit if your school provides classrooms with IPads and other technology. This website would be a great way to incorporate the use of technology and visual arts in the classroom.
3. http://kids.tate.org.uk – This website is a great way to incorporate art into the classroom if technology is available. This website allows students to create virtual paintings. Once they are done with their paintings, they can also be animated, framed, and sent to friends over e-mail. This website is a great way to see how students can be creative with art and would be great to do an art lesson with.
1. I believe a great way to involve dance into your classroom is incorporating it into one of your lessons. For example, if you are teaching your students about the Indian culture you could share with the students different dances they partake in. You could then have your students pair off into groups and create their own dances. You could have them record themselves so they can show their dances to the classroom. Another way, is by having a dance break. This could be used in your classroom at any time.
2. I think a great way to involve visual arts is by examining different paintings of famous painters. For example, you could have your students examine Vincent Van Gogh’s self portraits. In this way, you could learn about his life story and personality through the paintings. You could then have the students create their own portraits based off of Van Gogh’s. At the end, you could even have the students write a letter that reveals their ‘true self.’
3. One way to involve drama into your classroom, is having your students act out a part in a novel, short story, passage or even a poem. http://www.thebestclass.org/rtscripts.html – This website includes all different readers theatre scripts that you could have your students use as well. One script used from this website is called the fifty-cent piece. It involves eight different voices. If you have a group of eight students, you could have them practice their lines and involve acting into their script.
1. I don’t remember ever having music incorporated into any of my middle school classrooms. I was just discussing this topic with one of my friends, and I was telling her how important it is to give your students time each day to express themselves. When my students come into the classroom, I want them to come into that environment with music playing. I want them to have a little jump in their steps as they complete the Bell Ringer for that class period. I think it is important to make their transitions fun and enjoyable. I want them to WANT to be in my classroom.
2. Dancing is something I struggle with… I am an awful dancer and I feel like the real art of dancing has been replaced with vulgar, weird ways to dance. I think it would be great to be able to teach/ learn how to dance throughout different time periods. Then, students could decide which style they liked best and could write an essay telling why they chose that dance style. This would be fun not only for my students, but also for me! Also, you could always have your students stand up and “Shake it off”. I practice this method with the students that I tutor. If I see them struggling, or if they make the same mistake multiple times, I simply have them put their pencils down and shake it off. Thankfully, I now have a song to go along with that… Thank you Taylor Swift!
3. Theatre or dramas would be another interesting thing to bring into my classroom. I never did theatre, or had any desire to go in front of my peers and put on a performance. However, I am realizing that if I would have been given that opportunity in class, then maybe I would feel more confident to speak in front of my peers. I want to give my students this opportunity. They could read a story and give a summary of the story in play form, for their classmates. I think role playing is also important because it gives students the chance to know what it would be like to be in someone else’s shoes.
There were a few creative ideas, websites, and apps discussed in this reading that were new to me or caught my attention.
1) “123D Catch” is app that allows you to make “3D scans” of photographed objects. The text mentioned that students could use this by taking pictures of field trip artifacts. The idea is certainly an interesting one, and I am sure that students would be quite engaged in the activity. After looking into the app, I read some reviews that praised its concept, but expressed that glitches in its basic functions cause it to be somewhat of a hassle. For a teacher to get the most out of an app like “123D Catch,” he/she would have to spend time making sure that quality learning time won’t be compromised.
2) One idea that I particularly liked was using audio recording software for students to tell and share stories. The text discussed how many students might find it easy to tell stories, but more difficult to write them. Therefore, a teacher could use technology like this for students to first tell a story aloud, and then listen to their recording to assist in the writing process. I think that this is a neat idea!
3) “Tableau” activities sound very interesting to me. This is when students make still images with their bodies (“human statues”) to depict a scene of as story. These could then be captured with a digital camera. By compiling the still images, a wordless story can be created. Students could then write a story of their own to go along with the images. I think a fun project would be to have groups of students create their own gallery of scenes, and then write a story to other groups’ photos. Aside from tableaus, photography can be incorporated in so many ways across the curriculum!
4) The “Let’s Create! Pottery” app is another creative resource that teachers could implement in the classroom. With this app, students can become artist and design their own pottery. Perhaps this could be used in a social studies class, when discussing certain cultures in which pottery was/is a popular aspect. In English, students could practice descriptive writing when viewing such an object. In math, students may be able to discuss volume, surface area, etc. Science teachers could approach the designs when stressing the importance of careful observation (size, shape, color, texture, etc.).
1) Incorporating dance into a lesson is not necessarily something I would feel super comfortable with but I do see how children would enjoy it and even benefit from it. If you were exploring a certain culture, say Spanish, you could teach the students how to perform some of their cultural dances. It’s a more hands-on experience that would get them up and moving while exploring ways of life that they had not experienced before.
Also, dance or movement could be used during a regular lesson. If the students are becoming restless, the teacher can tell them to stand up and stretch, spin in a circle, jump up and down, or wiggle a bit to let them get out of their seat for a few moments.
2) I really like the concept of using drama in the classroom. Again, all of these learning approaches are great ways to differentiate instruction and provide a more fun way of learning. Drama could be used in many ways. If you are teaching a reading class on a science fiction novel, you could have the students write their own short piece of science fiction and act it out for the class.
3) Music is a great tool for the classroom. I recall using it to make up jingles for memorization of facts. It could also be played as soft background noise while students are taking a test or writing, or while working together, so that they don’t get too loud while talking. If students are working in groups at stations, music can signal the time to switch to the next table. It’s very versatile and I can see myself using music in my classroom fairly often.
1. Music in the class room is a very interesting concept. In the 7th grade while taking test in my english class my teacher always played claming music. She had said that she read a study done that if you play music for students while doing tasks or taking tests there was an improvment of scores.
2. When i went to the kids.tate.org.uk/ website I was very excited about all the different ideas that it had for teachers to use in their class room so that they can incorperate the visual arts in the classroom. I also liked all the games on the website. Most had a great learning experience behind them.
3. Dance is an interesting thing to include in a classroom. Dance it self is a very expresive act of what ever the dancer is trying to convey. I have not seen this in middle school but i did see some forms of drama in my history class. Drama alllows the students to throw themselves into a subject, book, or topic. Doing differrent activities where the students have to act out what happened or a story is a fun way to teach the information to students.
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