My students need prints and other examples of different kinds of art to broaden their perceptions and stir their imaginations, including landscapes, seasons, still life, and portraits.
This project is part of the Black History Month celebration because it supports a Black teacher or a school where the majority of the students are Black.
My Students
We live in spaces that can sometimes hem in our perceptions and our spirits. In the city, that can mean cramped spaces, run-down buildings, lots of concrete and little green. My students have imaginations limited only by their limited exposure to a larger world. Art is a window into that world.
My students are special needs children, ranging from grades 1-4, in a high-poverty, high-needs urban community.
While they may struggle to acquire the reading and math skills many of us take for granted, each child in my class is bright, curious, hopeful, resilient and creative.
Like many children in a high-poverty urban community, my children fight an uphill battle to get their basic needs met every day. Beyond those formidable challenges, my students bring an additional set of academic and emotional hurdles to school. They don't learn easily. They don't learn like everyone else. Some of them have been unable to cope emotionally with the situations they find themselves in. And many of them are beginning to see themselves as "less than" their peers.
However, each and every one of them finds energy, joy and pride in creating, whether it is a small marker drawing, a construction paper sculpture or a paper snowflake. Art is engaging and instructive; I want them to have more!
My Project
My students already live with the awareness that they are "different." However, I want them to understand deeply that different can be beautiful, wonderful, exhilarating, fantastic and even essential to the world. Specifically, I want to sample the range of human experience, perspective and talent through an on-going exposure and hands-on experience with art.
Like many urban schools, there is no art or music program for our students. I create multi-disciplinary units during the year which incorporate different reading genres, science and social studies content, and culminate in an art project. While I can usually pull together different materials for the projects, I don't have examples of reference art to help stretch my children's imaginations. I want them to see how differently artists interpret and present a landscape, flower, seasons, animals and masks - to inspire and free them to create their own works of art.
There are fewer and fewer opportunities for self-expression that aren't graded or tested with a standardized multiple choice test.
I have found, for my students, that yet another multiple choice test doesn't even begin to let them demonstrate what they have learned. More often than not, art does. It allows them to use their unique multiple intelligences to experience and express learning, and it builds confidence and pride that gives them the courage that goes far beyond any test.
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As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Ms. Sturgeon and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.