me arts ed

Time well spent on a Saturday morning

Yesterday I traveled to Maple Hill Inn in Hallowell for the gathering of teachers who are presently working on one of two Open Educational Resource (OER) projects in Maine. This Spring, the Maine Alliance for Arts Education (MAAE) was awarded funding to facilitate the project that is identifying OER resources to be used in Maine arts classrooms.

For those of you who may not be familiar with the term Open Educational Resource here is the definition that is being used for this work from Wikipedia: Open educational resources are educational materials and resources offered freely and openly for anyone to use and under some licenses to re-mix, improve and redistribute. Open educational resources include:

• Learning content: full courses, course materials, content modules, learning objects, collections, and journals.
• Tools: Software to support the creation, delivery, use and improvement of open learning content including searching and organization of content, content and learning management systems, content development tools, and on-line learning communities.
• Implementation resources: Intellectual property licenses to promote open publishing of materials, design-principles, and localization of content.

The first step in the project was to select from the many applicants a group of teachers who represent dance, music, theater and visual art. Teachers were needed from all levels; elementary, middle, high school, and higher education. Adobe Connect was used to bring the group together to discuss the work and yesterday (yes, a Saturday) provided them the opportunity to meet face to face and share their early findings. The group is experienced, enthusiastic and open to learning and sharing!

Susan Picinich representing Theater and Jim Horwich representing Music share ideas

Most of their time together was spent sharing the OER’s they have discovered or have used in their classrooms. This information will be put together so that all arts educators will have easy access to them. I was so impressed with what they shared and thought about how I would use them if I were in the classroom. I wanted to select a couple of resources they shared to pass on to you in this post. It was not easy to pick since they were all outstanding.

I did narrow it down and here are two:

1. Jennifer Holmes shared this website Arts Alive that is a performing arts educational website produced by the National Arts Centre in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It has tons of free resources for teachers and parents to use with students of any age. If you go to the site I suggest you have lots of time to explore.
2. Kristen Anderson shared a You Tube she uses with her middle school students. The Responsive Eye is video with a Mike Wallace report. He interviews visitors to the Optical Illusion exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art.  Watching the video from 1965 has much to offer for historical learning as well. There are three You Tubes in the series.

The teachers who are participating in this work are:

• Kristen Anderson, Visual Art: 5-8, Camden-Rockport Middle School, MSAD#28
• Beth Nowers, Visual Art: 9-12, York High School
• Bethany Hansen, Visual Art: 7-12, Reeds Brook Middle School and Hampden Academy, SAD#22
• Jennifer Holmes, Music: K-8, Woodland School and New Sweden Consolidated School, Union#122
• Jim Horwich, Music: 9-12, Falmouth High School
• Emmy Paquette, Visual Art: K-8, Cherryfield, Millbridge, Harrington, Addison, MSAD#37
• Jim Perkins, Music, Mt. Blue Middle School, Farmington
• Susan Picinich, Theater, University of Southern Maine
• Kate Smith, Music: PK-3, Central Elementary School, South Berwick, MSAD#35
• Sarah Sutter, Visual Art, Wiscasset High School
• Jennifer Trowbridge, Dance, George Stevens Academy, Blue Hill

Thank you to Carol Trimble, Executive Direct of MAAE for her work on the project. Coodinating the project for MAAE is Sara Hougan and also assisting in the work is Jan Kolenda.