.png)
I started teaching high school art in 2009, and if there’s one thing I can say with confidence, it’s this: my Beginning Art class has not stayed the same. Not even close.
It has been revised, rebuilt, tweaked, scrapped, resurrected, and occasionally held together with duct tape and vibes. Which, honestly, feels pretty accurate for teaching in general.
When I first started, I taught linear perspective one line at a time. On the whiteboard. With a yardstick. I’d draw a line, turn around, and half the class was already lost while the other half was painfully bored. Then I’d sprint around the room trying to catch mistakes before they became permanent. It took forever. And it was exhausting.
Then came the document camera. That felt revolutionary at the time. I could zoom in. I could use a ruler instead of a yardstick. I could demonstrate more clearly. But it was still setting the pace, and students were still stuck waiting if they didn’t get it the first time.
Later, I found YouTube videos, and that helped a lot. Students could pause and rewind, which was huge. But that also meant remembering to reserve the laptop cart, hoping all the devices worked, and praying the Wi-Fi behaved.
Now, finally, we’re 1:1 with devices. And instead of hunting for the right video, I make my own.
Not because I wanted to be on camera, but because after teaching this course for so long, I know exactly where students get stuck.
I know their ruler will slip halfway through a long line.
I know they’ll forget to line their windows up to the vanishing point.
So now I show them how to pivot the ruler with their pencil, how to line up vanishing points quickly, and how to work smarter instead of slower. The videos are short, targeted, and built around the mistakes I’ve watched students make for over a decade.
What’s interesting is that while how I teach has changed dramatically, the core structure of my class really hasn’t.
Everything is grounded in the elements of art and principles of design. Every unit connects back to those foundations. I intentionally include artists from different cultures, backgrounds, and time periods throughout the course, not as an add-on, but as part of the fabric of the learning.
At the very beginning of the year, I ask students to adopt a new mindset: art is a skill. Just like math. Just like writing. It can be taught, practiced, and improved.
.png)
We look at Lowenfeld’s stages of artistic development, and students identify where they think they are and where they're going. We talk about schemas, why we rely on them, and why we sometimes have to ditch the schema to draw what we actually see rather than what we think we see.
That conversation alone changes everything.
.jpeg)
When I first started teaching, a premade art curriculum was unheard of. In many districts, it still is. And in some ways, that freedom is one of the best parts of being an art teacher. We get to design our classes around our interests, our students, and our communities.
But the flip side of that freedom is how overwhelming it can be, especially at the beginning. Our standards are incredibly broad. There are countless valid ways to teach the same content, and when you’re new, that can feel paralyzing. I remember wishing I had something to start from - not a script or something rigid, just a solid foundation I could build on and revise as I figured things out.
I can’t even fathom where I might be now if something like this had existed when I was just getting started.
Over the years, through a lot of trial and error, I’ve developed a course I’m really proud of. And I continue to tweak it year after year as my students change and technology evolves.
So, Why Am I Sharing All of This?
Because I believe deeply in sharing with other teachers. Some of the best ideas I’ve ever had came from conversations in hallways, conference sessions, or late-night scrolling through what other art teachers were doing. Our profession is better when we learn from one another.
At the same time, I also believe that teachers’ work has value. This course didn’t come together overnight. It represents countless hours outside of the school day... planning, revising, filming, reworking rubrics, and adjusting lessons year after year based on what actually worked for students. Like many teachers, I built this mostly at home, on my own time.
And as a first-year teacher, I would have happily paid for something like this. Even though I shouldn’t have had to. Even though schools should provide this kind of support. Having a solid starting point would have saved me so much time, stress, and second-guessing.
My hope is that teachers who are interested have access to a professional budget they can use, or feel comfortable sharing this with their department or district so it can be purchased using instructional funds. This kind of resource is meant to support teachers, not add to their workload.
So I’ve packaged my entire Art 1 curriculum exactly as I use it in my own classroom, with an option that includes the full course already built in Canvas. Every unit. Every assignment. Every rubric. Organized, editable, and ready to use.
Not because I think everyone should teach exactly like I do, but because I know how powerful it is to start from something solid and make it your own.
Just something I wish I had when I was standing at a whiteboard in 2009, holding a yardstick, wondering why this felt so hard.
If you’re interested, you can find my course linked below:
.png)
No comments:
Post a Comment