I am continually impressed and influenced by the resources that are provided by Edutopia and encourage you to check out the recent articles that they’ve provided.
Takeaways From Distance Learning – An instructional coach makes the case that “business as usual” will not be the right path once students return to traditional classrooms.
Emma Campbell, dance teacher at Thornton Academy has shared the amazing virtual performances created by her students. One choreographer student said: “I wanted to create a dance that would help lift everyone’s spirits”. I’d say, her goal was achieved! Emma says: “My students are desperately craving performances.” As I viewed the video I could feel the students emotions, their commitment to dance and their skills are evident. I invite you to support these students by viewing the video that includes a variety of dances. I promise you won’t be disappointed.
My favorite dance is called Never Grow Up. From the dancers: “Our piece is about going through different stages to where we are now. To achieve this for the project, we each embodied the mindset of a different phase in our life to show the growth we have each gone through.”
It’s simple to ‘buy’ your FREE ticket – CLICK HERE – it will take you to the streaming site. You will be asked to add your email address (so you can get the streaming link) and phone number but don’t worry, NO credit card. If you’re wondering what the Thornton dance studio classroom looks like, you’ll see a peek of that also. This is only available until February 21 so don’t hesitate!
Maine Arts Commission appoints David Greenham as Interim Executive Director
AUGUSTA, MAINE–At its meeting on January 26, the Maine Arts Commission voted to appoint David Greenham of Gardiner as the interim Executive Director of the Maine Arts Commission for a term of at least two years.
Greenham, 60, replaces Julie Richard, who served as Executive Director for eight years before accepting a new position in Arizona in December.
“I’m honored and surprised at this turn of events,” said Greenham, who had served two years as the Commission’s chair. “I know the Maine Arts Commission well and am excited to work with the wonderful staff at the Commission and with the field of so many creative individuals and organizations.”
David Greenham
Greenham has spent the past decade working for the Holocaust and Human Rights Center of Maine, and for the past two years as the Associate Director. He led the HHRC’s award-winning educational programs, and also created numerous exhibits and events. Since 2009 Greenham has also been a lecturer in Drama at the University of Maine at Augusta. Prior to his work for the HHRC, Greenham led The Theater At Monmouth for 14 years and has been active in the arts community of Maine since coming to the state in 1985.
“For the past two years, David has led with a commitment to process, transparency and inclusion,” said Cynthia Orcutt, the Vice Chair of the Maine Arts Commission. “His love for the arts, for artists, creatives and makers throughout the state of Maine drives his passion. The Board is thrilled David will now focus his efforts on directing the work of Commission staff and partners as they strengthen and support arts, artisans and culture.”
Greenham assumes the leadership role as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to hit arts organizations and individual artists particularly hard. Arts venues were among the first to shutter last March and will likely be among the last to open in the aftermath of the public health crisis. During the leadership transition, Julie Horn, the Arts Commission’s Director of Visual Arts, was appointed to serve as the Assistant Director of the agency.
“We are elated that David will play a major role in our agency’s development over the next two years,” Horn said. “His commitment to the arts in Maine is unquestionable, and as Chair he always inspired us to find imaginative ways to meet the needs of the arts and culture community.”
The Maine Arts Commission staff will first focus on COVID relief and helping the field recover for this long and challenging pandemic. While the loss of life and the loss of livelihood have been the central detriment, Greenham said he still finds hope in the way that so many artists and organizations have found creative ways to share their work. “I know we’ll use these experiences to emerge with new strength and determination to celebrate,” Greenham said. “The arts will lead the emotional recovery from COVID.”
Virtual dance concert from Thornton Academy. The link below will take you to the streaming site, you have to ‘buy’ a ticket but they are FREE and does not require a credit card, it will just ask for your email to send you a unique streaming link. It also gives a peek into the Thornton Academy dance class set up and combines pieces filmed in person and at home. http://our.show/thornton-academy/59055
Virtual (Winter) Maine Fiddle Camp – Feb 19-20The cast and crew at Fiddle Camp have organized another weekend of workshops, concerts, special surprise guests and more Virtual MFC replicates the offerings of “real” Maine Fiddle Camp in a pandemic-friendly virtual format. Recognize music teacher Steve Muise in the video below?
Solve a mystery with Jazzy Ash! Viva Durant and the Secret of the Silver Buttons, audible book for kids with original jazz music from the creator, Ashli St. Armant
Learn the basics of partner acrobatics with teaching artist Marisol Soledad, then throw on some costumes and put on a show with your new skills! Sponsored by Shakespeare in Clark Park.
Biodiversity Heritage Library – Digital archive dedicated to life on Earth. Comprised of animal sketches, historical diagrams, botanical studies, and various scientific research collected from hundreds of thousands of journals and libraries around the globe. Collection of more than 55 million pages of literature, some of which dates back to the 15th century. At least 150,000 illustrations are available for free download in high-resolution files.
pedagogy://virtual – A teacher support program that connects a teacher to a virtual pedagogy mentor who helps the teacher find ways to boost student engagement in their virtual classroom.
From a Maine music teacher: Thankful for YouTube, Google Classroom, Smartmusic, Sight Reading Factory, Sibelius, Band in the Box, Laptops, Facebook Groups, and Zoom.
Over the past two weeks I’ve been considering what to include on the blog to recognize Black History Month. I don’t want what I offer to be just for this month but something that can be for every month. Like excellent arts education should be fostered every day in every classroom, black history should be part of our everyday education. One of the questions I’ve asked myself: how do I, a white woman living in a predominantly white state, avoid common errors that white people make when attempting to provide educational resources that support and recognize black and brown people? I’ve been reading many books and articles, checking websites and listening to podcasts to help open my mind, help me better understand, and move out of my comfort zone. I’ve stopped bashing myself over the head about ‘getting it’ and moved to realizing that I need to be patient with myself because the unlearning necessary will take time and its most likely not a place I’ll reach – my learning will be ongoing.
So, what can I offer you at this time and share with you, the Maine Arts Ed blog readers? Some of the educational resources that I access regularly and some of what I’ve read recently. Places I turn to that pushes on my thinking, sometimes making me uncomfortable. I invite you to share what you’ve been learning by commenting at the bottom of this blog post or by emailing me at meartsed@gmail.com.
Credit: Black History-Shenandoah University
PODCASTS
Leading Equity – Sheldon L. Eakins, Ph.D. is an accomplished K-12 educator and administrator and provides the podcast. He has taught at the elementary, middle, and high school levels during his career in the states of Florida, Louisiana and in St. Croix, US Virgin Islands. Dr. Eakins also served several years as a school principal in the states of Louisiana and Oregon. His most recent podcast was an interview with Stephanie Gates and is called How to Combat Colorism in the Classroom with Ms. Stephanie Gates. Dr. Eakins faces challenging topics head on and helps us move to a helicopter view as well as down in the weeds.
The Cult of Pedagogy – Jennifer Gonzalez is the Editor in Chief and works with a group of thoughtful and knowledgeable individuals to provide the podcast. Jennifer taught middle school language arts in the D.C. area and in Kentucky. She provides the podcast to support teachers through a community approach. The Cult of Pedagogy website includes an overview of podcasts by category. I suggest that you go to the category called ‘Hot Topics’. Jennifer interviewed Dr. Sheldon Eakins for one called Why White Students Need Multicultural and Social Justice Education. You’ll see a variety of ‘hot topics’ there including one called Talking about Race in School: An Interview with Jose Vilson.
RESOURCES ONLINE
Americans Who Tell the Truth – Maine artist, Rob Shetterly’s portraits and narratives highlight citizens who courageously address issues of social, environmental, and economic fairness. Paintings of ‘truth tellers’, their stories, and what they stood and still stand for. The paintings communicate all by themselves.
Natasha Mayers – Activist artist from Maine and one of Rob Shetterly’s portraits. See film trailer, an Un-Still Life created by Maine film makers Anita Clearfield and Geoffrey Leighton. Website will include many resources in the near future. (blog post later this week with film premiere info)
Edutopia – Teaching Black History in Culturally Responsive Wayswritten by Rann Miller. In this article Rann discusses how Black History is American history, and it should be taught throughout the year across the curriculum—not confined to a single month.
Learning for Justice recently changed their name from Teaching Tolerance. Learning for Justice seeks to uphold the mission of the Southern Poverty Law Center: to be a catalyst for racial justice in the South and beyond, working in partnership with communities to dismantle white supremacy, strengthen intersectional movements and advance the human rights of all people. Visit their site to sign up for their weekly emails and access many free resources for K-high school including downloadable posters that will inspire teachers and learners. They also publish a magazine, this springs edition White Supremacy in Education.
Anti-Racism Daily – Since June 3, the Anti-Racism Daily has been sending one email a day pairing current events with historical context and personal reflections on how racism persists in the U.S. (and around the world). You can subscribe and receive an email daily or the weekly archive. The daily information is provided at no cost and was created by Nicole Cardoza. You can subscribe on the website.
Teaching for Change – Their website helps connect to real world issues and encourage students and teachers to question and re-think the world inside and outside their classrooms, build a more equitable, multicultural society, and become active global citizens.
Inspired Teaching – They provide innovative professional learning programs and help teachers build their practice to engage their students as empathetic, critical thinkers. They have several programs and resources that you can access on their website.
Indigo Arts Alliance – Portland, ME and cultivating the artistic development of people of African descent. Mission: to build global connections by bringing together Black and Brown artists from diverse backgrounds to engage in their creative process with an opportunity to serve as both mentors and mentees. An integral aspect of the Indigo vision is to provide Maine based artists of African descent access to a broader range of practicing artists of color from around the world.Website.
Holocaust and Human Rights Center – Augusta, ME. One of the educational resources that they have available on their website is called Decision Making in Times of Injustice. A presentation filled with facts to help support educators in their teaching of the injustices in the world.
Located in Montgomery, Alabama
BOOKS
Black Like Mewritten by John Howard Griffin was written over 60 years ago. Griffin embarked on an experiment. He darkened his white skin to become black and traveled through the south, from New Orleans to Atlanta. He wrote the book to share his stories traveling as a ‘black man’ which ended up selling ten million copies and became a modern classic. I was able to purchase a used copy and I was mesmerized. “Black Like Me disabused the idea that minorities were acting out of paranoia,” says Gerald Early, a black scholar at Washington University and editor of Lure and Loathing: Essays on Race, Identity, and the Ambivalence of Assimilation. There was this idea that black people said certain things about racism, and one rather expected them to say these things. Griffin revealed that what they were saying was true. It took someone from outside coming in to do that. And what he went through gave the book a remarkable sincerity.”READ MORE about the book in a Smithsonian Magazine article from 2011.
Waking Up White: and Finding Myself in the Story of Race written by Debby Irving. The author tells her true story growing up in a somewhat sheltered upper middle class suburban childhood in Winchester, Massachusetts. Her career focuses on working in nearby Boston in performance art and community based non-profits where she learned that her best efforts were actually doing more harm than good. Her persistence provided lessons along the way and a racial understanding and her white privilege revealed her past.
Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption written by Bryan Stevenson. A true story (made into a movie) about the inequities in the justice system. Just out of law school Mr. Stevenson moved to Alabama and established the Equal Justice Initiative. He represented the poorest and most marginalized people in the country: those suffering from excessive or unfair sentences, or facing the death penalty. The stories of the people he represented provides a clear picture of the inequities. In addition to writing this book Bryan Stevenson and a small group of lawyers spent years immersing themselves in archives and county libraries to document thousands of lynchings. From their research a sculpture was created called the National Memorial for Peace and Justice and installed in Montgomery, Alabama. It is the nation’s first memorial dedicated to the legacy of enslaved Black people, people terrorized by lynching, African Americans humiliated by racial segregation and Jim Crow, and people of color burdened with contemporary presumptions of guilt and police violence.
In addition to the resources included above on June 8, 2020 I created a blog post called Social Justice Resources that includes nearly 50 links to a plethora of resources. Included are books for young children, middle school, and young adults along with many other resources.
We’ve all heard Amanda Gorman’s name at this point. Her performance of her original poem “The Hill We Climb” endeared her to many. Amanda has been making a splash and sharing her voice for some time. On July 4, 2019 Amanda accompanied Boston Pops conductor Keith Lockhart with the “Believer’s Hymn for the Republic”. She was 21 years old at the time and recently named the nation’s first ever Youth Poet Laureate. At the request of CBS This Morning, she wrote this poem honoring Independence Day. Gorman states that she was inspired by the “Battle Hymn of the Republic” and for her performance she “wanted a musical and poetic composition that felt anthemic, which also spoke to the higher ideals of America — of belonging, of diversity… of equality.”
YOU’RE INVITED (and your students are as well) to submit artwork with the them “HOPE” for the virtual community art exhibit being provided by the Bangor Public Library.
Application is due February 15th Exhibit dates are March 1-April 30, 2021
Artists are encouraged to submit one piece of artwork for the first virtual exhibit of 2021, using the theme “Hope.” The artwork should be submitted as a digital image, either in its original format or as a photograph or scan of your physical piece. An application should be submitted at the same time.
Formats are .jpeg or .png with a 50 MB maximum size
Limited image editing may be available through the library
3D art will not be accepted as it will not display well in our virtual gallery
The Bangor Public Library Art Committee will review applications and select 18 pieces of artwork to be displayed in our virtual exhibit gallery. If more than 18 submissions are accepted, another exhibit will be scheduled after April 30.
For more information, obtain an application to submit artwork, or if you have other questions, please contact Candis Joyce by calling 207-947-8336 ext. 127 or by emailing candis.joyce@bangorpubliclibrary.org OR go to the Bangor Public Library site at https://www.bangorpubliclibrary.org/art-exhibits-information. You will need to submit your application and the image of your artwork through a file-sharing service, ie. Dropbox.
The Union of Maine Visual Artists (UMVA) represents visual artists statewide in all fields of endeavor and welcomes those who support contemporary artists in Maine. The UMVA is dedicated to upholding the dignity of artists, while creating positive social change through the arts. By collaborating with other cultural and progressive organizations, we raise awareness for significant issues while promoting an inclusive arts community in Maine.
The winter edition of the Union of Maine Visual Artists journal includes a piece on the Open Art Teachers Studio. The article was written by Bronwyn Sale, Martha Piscuskas, Iva Damon, and Melanie Crowe and describes the opportunity for art teachers to come together for five sessions and create art together for an hour each time. One participant said: “It was good to see people’s faces and to feel connected.” We know how difficult it can be to feel connected to others and during the pandemic that has been highlighted even more. It was wonderful that Open Art Teachers Studio provided a chance to come together, make and share art, and know that the community is there. READthe entire article.
Sponsored by the Maine Alliance for Arts Education and the Arts are Basic Coalition, and supported by the Maine Department of Education, this 90-minute plenary session, featuring reports by Governor Janet T. Mills, Education Commissioner Pender Makin, and state arts education association leaders, will report on the impact of this year’s pandemic on arts education. The plenary will kick-off a week of meetings between high school arts advocacy student teams and their state legislators.
I’ve posted about the Global Oneness Project in the past. They continuous are providing amazing resources, food for thought, asking challenging questions, and pushing on educators thinking. Thank you to Executive Director Cleary Vaughan-Lee recently I received an email with the following information. I’m not re-wording the message that Cleary sent since it is ‘spot on’ (as Rob Westerberg would say)!
A good story has the potential to broaden a student’s worldview, providing a foundation to foster empathy and inquiry. I love this description of storytelling from Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Eudora Welty, who explored the American South. She said, “Long before I wrote stories, I listened for stories. Listening for them is something more acute than listening to them. I suppose it’s an early form of participation in what goes on. Listening children know stories are there. When their elders sit and begin, children are just waiting and hoping for one to come out, like a mouse from its hole.”
We’ve created a collection of our most viewed films of the year. From an ecologist in the church forests in Ethiopia to a Native teenage basketball player in a remote community in Alaska, these stories document the vulnerability and resiliency of life around the world.
I’ve been watching these films and they are thought provoking and they warm my heart – a good thing for the end of 2020!
Argy Nestor
Arts Educator, Blogger, Artist, Connector meartsed@gmail.com
https://sites.google.com/view/anestor/
Argy’s Blog
The purpose of this blog is to share stories about people and places; and to celebrate the amazing work (and play) that students, educators, and organizations are doing in and for arts education. In addition, the blog has a plethora of resources and innovative ideas. This forum gives blog readers the opportunity to learn from each other. It is essential that we listen, learn, and collaborate in order to build on teaching practices for the benefit of every learner in Maine and beyond.
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