Sixth grade students in Amy Dunaief’s art class created a collaborative story quilt.
The following story is the final piece in a three-part series about Teaching Art During a Pandemic and it focuses on middle school art instruction.
Teaching Art during a Pandemic, and with a hybrid model, has been both challenging and rewarding. It has forced teachers to modify plans and projects and re-think how the art rooms would function under CDC guidelines. Being the creative problem-solvers that ALL teachers are, the Art Department has persevered and students have flourished.
Goff Middle School
The Goff Middle School Art Department has developed a number of lessons and projects to help enrich creative young minds in the midst of the pandemic. The goals of art teachers Alison Hosier and Amy Dunaief have been to capitalize on found objects from home and using the sketchbooks provided by the District as essential resources for success. Additionally, health and safety have been and continue to be at the forefront of their planning and curriculum development. Not being able to physically share art materials has posed a challenge for all, but the teachers and students are persevering!
In the fall, Mrs. Hosier and Ms. Dunaief asked students to get outside and gather autumn leaves as a vehicle for learning more about observational drawing skills. Through this project, students were able to get better at drawing what they see and not what they know, as well as how to look at and render shadow and highlight through value development.
Identity, personal storytelling, examination of “big ideas,” virtual collaboration, and transforming stressors into something young people can have control over are centralized topics that Ms. Dunaief and Mrs. Hosier have built into art-making opportunities for Goff students. For centuries, humans have allowed art to be a method for exploring and coping with difficult times. This sentiment holds true in the art classrooms at Goff!
Additionally, the teachers have been fortunate to be joined by Ms. Karpel, who is a student teacher pursuing her graduate degree in art education.
“Classroom materials management is a vital component of the journey to becoming an art teacher, and she’s doing a great job offering watercolor painting experiences for seventh and eighth grade students!” said Mrs. Hosier.
The Art Department would like to invite all K-12 students, their families and the school community to the virtual Distrcit-wide Art Show on Thursday, May 13. The artwork will be shared on the school website that evening for all to enjoy!