PRTR 80E - Final Paper

Darlene McCoy

Tandy Beal

PRTR 80E

16 March 2011

My Experience with Arts Education in the Community

            Last year, a good friend of mine, Mr. Ryan Ventura, told me about a class where I could dance with children for college credit – but I had already had my schedule set, and it just simply wouldn’t work out. This year, I found myself in the need of an additional class, so I asked him about it again. I asked him about the workload, the time commitment, and how the class ran overall. He told me that, “Aw, man, it’s nothin’. There’s not any hard work. It’s a good class to fill in that ‘I need to take a less-hard class so I don’t die this quarter’ spot in your schedule.” Well, my friend Ryan is either a liar, or has the worst memory ever. Whichever it is – I took this class because he told me it was awesome, and I’d have an easy time doing it. And while this class was indeed, awesome, the amount of work I ended up putting into it was much more than I had originally anticipated – not exactly my idea of “easy.” I’m not complaining, though. Taking Arts Education in the Community was one of the greatest things I’ve ever done, and I’ve learned so much by putting everything I had into it.

            I remember walking in on the first day: it was cold, and I was late because I didn’t know where I was going. (I’m a Lit Major, how am I supposed to know the Theater Department?!) I didn’t know exactly what to expect – but I found myself rather surprised when I ventured in. There was a group of people standing in a circle around an older woman (who I figured, of course, was the instructor) paying attention and whatnot. The woman suddenly yelled, “GO!” and these college students – scholars – just started running around like crazy. They ran to one wall, then another, and clapped and yelled out their full names. I had taken off my boots and jacket by then, and attempted to participate, but I was too shocked to think coherently. Finally, when everyone had finished what they were doing, the group reformed a circle. I was allowed to introduce myself, and I joined the class in doing more zany activities. From that day on, class was always fun. Always interesting. Always a joy, especially after two hours of Lit Theory.

But the point of Arts Education in the Community wasn’t to dance around all day – it was to teach children how to expand their minds. There was also a performance, to show off all their hard work, at the end of the program. We had only been dancing around to experience what we were going to teach our kids later.

We spent a month learning lesson plans, taking notes, and doing readings about teaching. We’d discuss teaching strategies and elements of teaching each class. We were eventually given our team members, our teacher, and our country. At that time, I became Team Ireland. I remember being incredibly excited to learn more about the country. In my eyes, Ireland is just simply fantastic. My two team members, Raquel and Fabian, seemed quite nice, and after we chatted a little, I became excited to work with them, too.

Our first teaching experience came upon us at the end of the first month. A class of second graders came to our classroom for a lesson. This first experience really wasn’t the greatest for me. It was hard. It was frustrating. There were a few fiascos that honestly, freaked me out. The first thing that ruffled my feathers was the team before us had planned to do the same thing with the kids as we had, even though they were a group that was supposed to do warm ups and focus activities, and we were supposed to do “Big Movement” activities. We more or less had to trash our plan – which was awful – because I had found music to go with our plan, and we had already worked out what we were doing with the team after us prior to that day. Luckily, we came up with another plan, and I could use my music with it, too. All was supposedly well, because I thought my teammates knew what they were doing. When our turn to teach came up, I went over to do the music, as we had planned, but my teammate forgot what he was supposed to do. I felt helpless, and incredibly frustrated, but I couldn’t blame him, because we had just come up with a new plan. I was aware how quickly children bore, and I didn’t want to see any expressions of boredom on their faces. I remember having to sort of yell things out to him – suggestions, ideas, anything – to keep the ball rolling. Luckily, because of this not-so-awesome experience, I learned that lesson plans must be made thoughtfully and carefully, and that improv lesson plans more or less just don’t cut it. I also learned that a back up plan is a fantastic thing – and that leaving home without one is just a bad idea for everyone.

The first time my team went to work with the kids is a time I’m not going to forget anytime soon. I was incredibly nervous. I’d never taught anyone anything before. I remember walking into the classroom, to all their smiling faces. They were so excited to meet us, and that helped my nerves quite a bit. After some short banter about Ireland and ourselves, we went with them to the school’s stage. Fabian did warm ups with them, and everything progressed smoothly until I had to run over to do the music for our next activity. For some reason, the CD player wasn’t working. The teacher, and Paula, another fantastic instructor for the class, ran over to help me figure out what was wrong. Fabian, out of a stroke of genius, distracted the kids long enough for us to figure out that the power plug was faulty. I learned, from that experience, that making sure all materials function before class is a good idea. After that, things went well during Raquel’s turn to teach. The kids enjoyed moving to the music, and they had quite a bit of fun. We had an activity that required a partner, so we asked the kids to find one. One of them, Julio, did not get picked right away, and instantly decided that he no longer wanted to participate at all. I ran over to our teacher, Ms. Peggy Jenkins, and asked for her aid. She somehow convinced him to participate again, but he was more or less not interested in what we were doing for the rest of the class. From that, I learned that sometimes, things just happen, and it’s okay to ask for help. I also learned that our team might have issues with Julio in the future, and that we should make sure he always got a partner! Overall, our first class was a success. We got through all the material we had planned for the day and they kids became more comfortable with us.

The second time we visited Ms. Jenkins’ class at Del Mar Elementary, Ms. Jenkins was not present. She had to be at a meeting, so we had a substitute. After we walked in and explained what we were doing, it was apparent that this guy did not care for our program in the least. It was quite distracting, and rather infuriating. After we taught the kids a little bit about Gaelic, we returned to the lovely stage! Our lesson plan for that day more or less ran very smoothly. The biggest hinge we had that day was the substitute himself. He was incredibly negative, and did not allow the kids to express themselves as much as they wanted. It was alright with us if the kids got a little wacky, but he tried to limit them too much for our comfort. Luckily, because the kids disliked the substitute so much, they paid incredible attention to us. They were very interested in doing what we had planned, and we got everything we needed to done that day. I had only a small problem with controlling the boys, because I’m sort of meek, and children do not know the meaning of mercy.

To our dismay, our substitute friend was back when we walked into the classroom for the third time. We skipped extra information on Ireland this time – we had work to do! I believe this class was our best class. The kids had become very comfortable with us, and they would get really excited when we walked into the room. Once again, the children’s dislike of the sub played to our advantage. We finished teaching the kids the components of their dance, and had a really good time doing so. I honestly can’t think of one thing that went wrong with this class – it was just so good. The sub did interfere, but he did so a lot less than the previous time, and the kids were blowing his negativity off. After that class, I had the feeling of “Wow, this project is actually shaping up to be even better than I thought.” It was an awesome one, and it gave me more confidence in myself and my team.

Peggy Jenkins made a comeback for our last lesson with the kids. We were all so glad to have her back. The fourth lesson was incredibly important to the program. We had to perform a dance the next morning, and we had 45 minutes to put everything we had learned during the quarter together! We worked the kids hard. They got a little frustrated at times, but they pulled through. At the end of the class, we got to show Paula all of our hard work – and honestly, it wasn’t going as well as I’d have liked it to at that time, but we were out of time, and there wasn’t exactly anything I could do about it.

The next morning, the kids put my nerves about the dance to rest. At our assembly, they performed amazingly. They were incredibly excited, and had so much energy! I loved pumping them up. It was so much fun! While we were performing, the audience started clapping in time with the music, and the experience was just extraordinary. We came off of the space denoted as the stage beaming, and after that morning, I had no worries about the following day’s performance. My kids were golden.

I had no worries, that is, until I developed an intense fever Friday night. I took medicine, and relaxed as much as possible, but I feared being sick the next day immensely. It’s not that I wouldn’t be able to attend the performance if I was sick – it’s that my energy level would not compare to that of the kids’, which would be hard on everybody. Luckily, I woke up the next morning, bright and early at 7 AM with the mindset of “I don’t even care if I’m sick. Today is going to be awesome.” I then cleaned my entire apartment, got dressed, and headed over to the Porter dining hall.

I remember looking for my kids as other team’s kids arrived. For a bit, I was a little nervous, but their faces sure cleared that up when I saw them! I took a group back to our homeroom for the day, and we talked a bit about the performance, and the green ribbons my team had brought for their hair. Someone then ran in to tell me that we were needed on stage, so we all headed over there. I had about seven or eight kids with me at the time, and I think only one of them was male, which was sort of an issue, because our dance encompassed a part that divided the kids up into two groups of girls, and one group of boys. I had to ask Paula to look for my other team members, because I couldn’t leave my kids, but man oh man, it was stressful. When Fabian came in, with a line of our boys behind him, my mind settled again. Our kids performed like champions during our practice run, even though Fabian spelled Ireland wrong!

After practice, we ate lunch, because all of the kids were starving for some reason. Then we began our tour of Porter College! We started at the Koi pond, because one of the kids, Miguel, had been to Porter before, and he got everyone else excited to see it. The kids had so much fun watching the fish. They were so amazed by how big some of them were. We headed over to face painting next, since for some reason, it was completely empty! The kids had so much fun getting Irish flags and Shamrocks painted on their faces. We even had enough time for them to get each cheek painted. I got an Irish flag for myself, because Team Ireland has intense spirit. After that, we started to head over to my apartment at Porter. While we were walking, it started snowing. Some of the kids had never seen snow before, and to be able to experience that with them was just magical. The snow also excited the kids to a rather crazy degree, and some of them ran ahead, down the Porter apartments alley, past my house. I will never forget trying to keep up with them, yelling “Teaaaaaaaam Irelaaaaaaaaand! What did we say about running ahead and how not to do it?!” Once I had caught their attention again, we walked back to my apartment. We were there for only a brief period of time, but they were amazed by the place. My roommate gave some of them oranges, which they were very grateful to receive. After the short but sweet tour of my house, we took the kids up toward the Porter Squiggle. They played on it, and with the snow, for a while. Then we all took a picture next to the Squiggle. Fabian then got their attention, and we played an intense game of Simon Says. My kids were so clever. They got Fabian and I a few times! After that, we had about fifteen minutes until performance time, so we headed back to the homeroom for a snack and bathroom break.

Ireland was fourth on the set list, so we did not have a whole lot of time to wait before our turn to perform. The kids kept asking me when we were going, because they were dying of anticipation. When our turn finally came, I feel like Team Ireland exploded onto the stage. Our music was so upbeat, so fun, and so lively. The kids performed brilliantly, as I expected they would. After we finished, I remember thinking to myself, “Wow, I just put an entire day’s worth of energy into a few minutes.” After our turn, I moved to the back of the line, and they watched the other performances.  Besides our performance, I feel like my favorite part of the event was when the masked man from Bali came on stage and started scaring the kids. They were so horrified – it was incredibly amusing. After the event, the kids were still ecstatic, and they went home as happy as they could be!

Our final visit with the kids was one of the best thirty minutes of my life. I got to talk with them, eat cookies, and tell them all how awesome they were. I received so many hugs, so many smiles, and such gratitude for my work, and it was one of the most amazing feelings I’ve ever felt. They even made a booklet, with pictures and letters from the entire class for each member of my team. It was honestly difficult to not cry fat tears of joy when they handed me mine. I will cherish it, forever. On our way out, we got the kids to gather in a circle and do a final “TEAM IRELAND” cheer. It was so hard to leave, knowing that I will probably never see them again, but all good things must come to an end.

This experience taught me so much about life, myself, and everything ever. It taught me that I am, actually, a leader, when I take charge of a situation and trust in myself enough to do it right. I learned that good team work can create amazing things. I learned a staggering amount about teaching, and working with kids. It’s one thing to read or think about teaching, but actually experiencing teaching is by far the greatest tool to learn by. I learned so many little quirks, so many little details, that I feel would differentiate between a good teacher, and a great teacher.

I was present at every class meeting and every lesson at the school. I did not even think about missing a single day of this class, or anything associated with it. Rain or shine, sickness or health, I was planning on being where I needed to be.

I worked my butt off for my team. I gave them my all, and I feel like they gave their all right back. We did not once have any issues, except for Fabian being a little grouchy due to lack of sleep and stress. Our team meetings were very simple: show up, get down to business, practice a bit, and then leave. I’d send in the lesson plan every Tuesday, because that was the day I sent in the first one, and I wanted to be consistent. We all participated in the meetings, wrote down the lesson plan, and bounced ideas off of each other. I specifically game my team our music, every ounce of energy in me, a third of our lesson plans and all the information on Ireland that we used (Fabian did the videos). Raquel specifically got the beads for the kids, and Fabian handled communication with Peggy. They both also contributed their fair share to the lesson plans.

Other members in the class inspired me. Namely: Ryan, Josh, and Bradley. Ryan inspired me by being awesome. During that first teaching experience, with the second graders, I remember watching him, as he taught, and thinking to myself “Wow, look at him go. He’s so good!” Seeing his ability and charm with the kids made me want to better myself. Josh was the first friend I made in class. He was my partner for the first teaching exercise in which we had to teach other members of the class a part of a lesson. I always felt like he looked up to me, in a way, I’m not exactly sure how, but because of it, I always felt the need to improve myself. Bradley was the first person in our class to make me feel completely comfortable. He is just so sweet and so bubbly and it made me feel so good to be around him. I felt that if I made a mistake, it would be alright, and not the end of the world. He gave me more confidence in myself, which, at the beginning of the quarter, was quite lacking! Tandy and Paula both inspired me so much. They are such amazing women who do such amazing things with their lives. They are champions of art education, and it makes me so happy to know that people like them exist. I feel like most of all, the kids inspired me. Their happiness made me work like a mad woman. Every time I’d return from class, I’d talk about them for hours and hours on end. They are just so amazing, so genuine, so sweet, and I was so happy to work with and for them.

Going into this class, I knew I would have trouble with finding confidence in myself to do well in it, but I had also always figured that I would come around eventually, and I did. While I knew that everything was going to be alright in the long run, I never knew how strong I could be. The kids inspired my strength. After I felt confident around them, that confidence leaked into other aspects of the class. I began to ask more assertive questions, take charge, and not be so quiet and in the corner!

The greatest obstacle in the class was myself, and I knew that was going to happen, but I didn’t expect to be so frustrated at the beginning of the class. I had tried my best, been prepared, and done all the work, yet something wasn’t happening, something wasn’t clicking in my brain, and I just found myself utterly frustrated at a lot of things in class. After I dealt with the confidence demon inside me, though, those frustrations went away, and everything was okay!

My biggest surprise in this course was how attached the kids became to me, and how much I became attached to them. Toward the end of our time together, they were my life. I honestly did not care about a whole lot else, and my ability to give that kind of commitment to anything surprised me, because I had not committed myself so much since when I was with my orchestra in high school.

Einstein once said that, “Imagination is more important than knowledge,” and I couldn’t agree more, for a simple logical reason. The human species would have never progressed further than the cave man without imagination. Nothing we have today would have been invented if great men of the past had not thought, “Well, what if I could do this? Is this possible? How can I do this?”

For this class, we were given a short pamphlet called, “We Can Work it Out,” which was about conflict resolution. While my team had no conflicts, because everyone was on top of their game, the book helped me after the class, because I had to mediate a rather sticky situation between two of my friends. I used some techniques presented in the book to resolve their conflict, so I am grateful that I took the time to read and digest it.

I will forever use this experience because I want to be a teacher one day. I don’t know if I want to teach children, but this experience solidified my love of teaching. I will present my notebook for this class to future potential employers. This experience taught me so much – I might even use some of the activities we did in class to entertain cousins! The uses for an experience such as this are boundless, and I cannot possibly think of all the different ways I will use the things I learned from this class. I can only be greatful for it.

Finally, my opinion on art education is that it is severely underrated. I played the viola for nine years, from the fourth grade to the end of high school. If I had not been in music, I would not be the person I am today. Music helped me learn how to express myself, how to work together with other people, how to communicate; it taught me everything. My music teachers, especially my high school orchestra teacher, Mr. Sims, inspired me so much to do great things with my life. Music pushed me to always continue to better myself – because a musician who thinks he’s good enough is not a musician at all. There’s always more to learn, more to see, more to experience in life, and music taught me that. Music, and being associated with art, has done so much for my life. It would be hard to express how important it is to me; because I wrote an eleven page paper on that last year, and I’m afraid I have to wrap this one up.

To close my thoughts on this class, I would just like to say that this class has been one of the greatest things I’ve ever done, and one of the best experiences of my life. I will forever remember it, my kids, my classmates, my teammates, my teachers – hell; I’ll even remember how awful that sub was. I feel like there will not be many other experiences in my life that will compare to this one, and I am forever grateful that I got to participate in a program that I believe is so important to education. Thank you, Tandy, so much, for being the person you are and organizing this amazing experience. Everyone involved gains so much from it, and I hope that Dance Around the World has many more fantastic performances to put on in the coming years, because I will be looking forward to seeing them!