Sarah Needham

Introduction

At the beginning of every art unit that I teach, I plan one or two days for students to experiment with the specific materials that they will be using to complete each new project. This serves as an opportunity for the students to practice useful techniques without the pressure of starting a quality display piece from day one. It also allows students to reflect on what methods work best for them before they start on their larger project. In this paper, I analyze my own teaching methods as well as how they impact student learning.

After teaching an introductory watercolor lesson to two different sections of Intro to Art and assigning a reflection, I realized that their understanding and evaluation of their own work could improve. The next week, I assigned a very similar reflection, and gave a more detailed explanation of how to reflect on the success of their work. The following sections in this paper outline the goals of this lesson, assessment data, student feedback, subsequent instruction, and additional assessment and student growth.

Section 1: Learning Goals and State Standards

For the first day of a watercolor unit, I set up eight different stations. I walked with the class around the room and demonstrated a different watercolor technique at each table. The students then returned to their tables and completed a sample square of the technique at their own table. I gave the students about four minutes for each station and then had them move to the next table. The students were able to complete a sample technique at each table. During this time, I walked around the room, demonstrating some of the techniques again if students had forgotten or were confused. At the end of the class period, students left their watercolor samples to dry overnight in their bins.

The following day, I asked the students to take their samples out and reflect on their work from the previous day. We discussed what criteria might make one of their samples most successful or unexpected. I asked them to analyze their samples and decide which of them was the most successful, unexpected, and joyful to make. After they chose the three samples that they thought fit each category, they were asked to complete a sentence explaining why they chose each sample.

My goal with this assignment was to push students to reflect on their own work and to think about what made one technique more successful than another. This learning goal aligns with the MI state standard “ART.VA.I.8.4 Effectively use reflective thinking skills to observe, analyze, and critically evaluate works of art for the purpose of improving technical quality.” After they finished their reflection, I demonstrated several other useful watercolor techniques that they would need for their final project. They created five more samples, and I was able to review their first reflection that day after school.

Section 2: Assessment Data and Student Understanding

As I was reviewing the student reflections, I noticed that although we had discussed what makes one sample more successful or unexpected (things such as color, sharp edges, or texture), many of the students did not provide evidence, but rather reverted to simple phrases such as “I like it” or “it looks cool.” I was grading these reflections with a simple rubric that assigns two points for following the watercolor technique, two points for using complete sentences, and two points for including evidence in their answer of why they chose each technique (Figure 1). For the purpose of analysis, I randomly chose twelve students from both my second- and third-hour sections of Intro to Art to record their progress. None of the twelve students in second hour provided strong evidence for at least two of their samples, and all of them received either a 1 or 0 in the evidence section (seeTable 1). Of the twelve that I chose from my third hour section, two of them showed strong evidence for two or more of their samples, but the rest received either a 1 or 0 in this area (see Table 2). Because my stated learning goal was to have students reflect on their own work and think about what makes one technique more successful than another, the area of evidence was the most important to me in reviewing their reflections. I had hoped that they would be able to identify the visual characteristics in their work that make it successful,however, their reflections showed me that they needed further explanation of how to analyze their work.

Section 3: Student Feedback Informed by Assessment Data

As I was reviewing the students’ original reflections, I realized that many of their answers were vague or based on personal preference rather than on the actual visual characteristics of their work. I received answers such as “I loved how it turned out” (Figure 2), “it wasn’t my favorite. It looks a bit off” (Figure 4),and “the salt makes it look really cool” (Figure 6). After looking at their individual responses and noticing similar patterns across most of the students’work, I decided that I was going to assign another reflection with a few modifications. The first time that I gave this assignment, I asked them which was their most successful technique, which was the most joyful to make, and which was the most unexpected. For the second reflection, I decided to change the categories to “most useful” and “most unexpected.” I kept the “unexpected” category the same because I think that it leaves the possibility open for students to reflect on and learn from their failures as well as their successes. I also decided not to give them a sentence starter to see what they would come up with on their own. I also cut the reflection from three categories down to two. I wanted the students to take their time in reflection and not feel rushed to get it done.

Section 4: Subsequent Instruction Informed by Analysis

After deciding to reassign the reflection with the modifications mentioned above, I started both classes with an example of what a good reflection looks like. I once again, reminded the students of art terms that they could use as evidence for why they chose a specific sample. We talked about the difference between personal preference and quality visual characteristics. I also prohibited certain words such as “pretty,” “nice,” and “cool” in their responses. I asked the students to look at the samples that they had created on the second day and to choose the two that fit best in these new categories. I gave them about the same amount of work time as I had the day before, however, they only had to write about two of their samples and therefore did have slightly more time to answer each prompt.

Section 5: Additional Assessment and Student Growth

After I collected the second reflection worksheet, I used the same rubric that I had used for the first reflection to grade the students work. I was glad to see that not only were the overall class scores higher as noted in figures 8 and 9, but also both classes made great improvements in the area of evidence (Tables 1 and 2). On amore individual level, students showed much more awareness of the visual characteristics of their artwork. The student that had previously written “it looks the best out of all of mine” (Figure 6) as their reason for choosing their most successful sample now wrote “This one will be useful because it is super good for shading” (Figure 7). Also, the student that previously wrote “I thought it was going to come out differently. I also love how it turned out”(Figure 2), now answered “I found this the most unexpected because I didn’t expect the brush to erase the paint the way it did” (Figure 3). On the second reflection, the students’ answers were much more specific, and most included elements of art or process specific terminology in their responses. I think that the second reflection truly pushed my students to “use reflective thinking skills to observe, analyze, and critically evaluate works of art for the purpose of improving technical quality” (ART.VA.I.8.4). After I had finished assessing the second reflection worksheet, I discussed with my students their improvement in their observation and reflection skills. The scores from the second reflection replaced the scores from the first reflection in the gradebook.

Conclusion

This learning analysis was helpful as I reflect on my own teaching practices. Just as I want my students to reflect on both their successes and failures, it was helpful for me to think through what areas I can improve in so that my students actually achieve the learning goals that I set for them in the classroom. For this lesson, I set the learning goal that my students would observe and reflect on their work to notice what specific details make some techniques more successful than others. In conducting this analysis, I have found that students tended to base their reasoning on personal preference instead of noticing the visual qualities of their work more objectively. After reteaching this concept and giving students more specific examples of how to reflect on their work, students’overall awareness of the visual qualities of watercolor techniques was much improved.

Learning in the art classroom comes from observation, experimentation, and reflection. All three of these aspects are important for students to be able to make intentional aesthetic choices in their work. Reflection pushes students to think critically and evaluatetheir own work. This study has taught me that as an educator, my learning follows a similar path. I first must make the time to observe where my students are not reaching the learning goals that I set. Then, I must be willing to experiment or try new ways of explaining and demonstrating. And finally, I must reflect on where my efforts have been successful, and also where they can still improve. I plan to continue this pattern of observation, experimentation, and reflection throughout the rest of my student teaching and into my future career.