The teacher understands individual differences and diverse cultures and communities, and applies this understanding in order to ensure inclusive learning environments that enable each learner to meet their fullest potential.
This standard is pivotal because cultures and home environments play a huge role in comprehension and understanding. For a teacher to overlook these individual differences in her students is a great disservice to both herself and her learners. Not every child comes from the same background, and so not every lesson will be understood in the same way.
The artifacts I collected showcase how I have accommodated for learning differences in the art classroom.
Preparedness for Students with Motor Disabilities
Art is a class where students are able to develop their fine motor skills. Because the goal is accessibility for all learners, I have to be prepared to teach students of varying motor control. With a little bit of planning, a teacher can be ready for any situation. Brushes with grips can change the entire experience of painting for a student that was struggling to hold a brush before. Additionally, left-handed scissors, double-sided tape (to keep paper from moving while drawing on it), and stencils are more examples of tools that can transform a student’s work once introduced. It is our job as educators to provide equitable access to all materials and assignments. When planning a lesson, I am cognizant of the issues that may arise, and plan accommodations accordingly.
Spanish (near-)Fluency
While some accommodations are planned, others have to happen
on the fly. My Spanish comprehension is fluent, and my speaking is nearly fluent. I am able to use this skill to reach learners on an individual level and grow their confidence as an artist. Many ELL students in my art classes speak Spanish as their first language. My ability to communicate in Spanish gives students of any ELL level the chance to talk about their work in a way that is more natural and comfortable to them. I can then bridge the gaps in their English vocabulary by reinforcing art terms in my response, if necessary. This specific artifact is an exchange between myself and a junior in my advanced art class who is an ELL student. We are discussing her finished project, and I am asking her to describe her strengths in the piece. Although my Spanish is not perfect, students always appreciate the effort and the opportunity to talk, ask questions, and reflect in a way that comes more naturally to them.
Resources Organized by Expertise
I am not an expert on every media I teach. I demonstrate my understanding of learning differences as well as ISTE standard 2.5a by using technology to provide multimodal resources for all students to gain a deeper understanding of the content at their own level of comfort. In my watercolor unit, I had students follow along with a tutorial of their choosing, so that they could practice their watercolor application and techniques on a small scale before starting the final. I posted the resources to Blackboard, and organized them based on skill level. Students that require simpler tutorials with less steps have a collection of different resources to choose from, whereas students that have more experience with watercolor or are a bit more ambitious can choose a tutorial from the advanced resource list. All students have access to both documents, so they can decide for themselves what interests them. Click here to see some of the results from tutorials.