ART EDUCATION
since 2014
MEQ teacher certification
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TEACHING PHILOSOPHY
&
ONLINE RESUME
TeachingPhilosophy
I love to rouse every new academic year of an art class with an open-ended question, “What is Art?” Invariably, the query stirs up an entire classroom of pupil reactions. Most often students mull it over quietly or will answer with juvenile jeer. Back in the 80s, my high school art teacher asked something similar. I don’t recall my initial response, but do recall how it had been a catalyst that led to a raison-d'être unto limitless possibilities.
Today, as an art educator I often begin a module or lesson by listening to students' concerns and queries to prompt self-awareness. Thus enabling me to gain insight and feed discussions when making art alongside students. Exchanges often hover around otherness, relationship, belonging, community, equality, justice, current affairs, and imagined futures to name a few. So, with carefully directed stimuli the art process will become an impetus for communicative expressiveness beyond that of mere aesthetics.
Learning objectives are designed with the intention of prompting youth to broaden their perspectives. As such, modules are carefully developed to meet academic criteria in a manner that considers divergent learning alternatives for all type-learners. Through scaffolded guidance and motivational ploys, I foster conditions to meet overarching learning objectives. Subsequently, gifted, challenged, anxious and disengaged learners are encouraged exploratory options that challenge and support authentic self-expression.
When assessing intention over technique and genuineness over fakery, I weigh a range of assessment markers to set an objective evaluative portrait. Valuation targets may include a combination of oral explanations, gestural acknowledgments, and individual art journal entries. These can then be amalgamated into an assessment that both student and myself validate jointly.
My teaching approach is one that seeks to provoke and deepen original thinking. When addressing contemporary issues, social conventions, community awareness, and inclusiveness, art-making then becomes the foundational structures that are built with and for students to construct and create personal concepts. Subsequently, when youth express themselves artistically on an issue, an event or a topic they activate deeper responses. Through art education there is the potential to nourish the human experience by engaging all five senses. This then incites self awareness, empowers a healthier ego, promotes self-esteem, reveals possibilities and provides fresh outlook.
My rationale incorporates formative pedagogy, coupled with thirty plus years of real world multidisciplinary and media arts experience. My cosmopolitan perspective is sourced from four decades of extensive world travels, international journalistic investigations and a wealth of cultural exchanges and experiences. Today, as a qualified art educator that also teaches History, as well as French and English Language Arts, I’ve found that teaching Visual and Media Arts are ideal programs of study to promote self-awareness and self-esteem. It is then that Art becomes an exploratory processes that stimulates independent thinking and idea making beyond the proverbial box.
Resume
TeachingExperience
Click .PDF to download a printable resume
2020-23 (Aug-Jun)
CREE SCHOOL BOARD (CSB)
JAMES BAY EEYOU SCHOOL (JBES)
FULL-TIME (Secondary II-V) Chisasibi, QC
(206 students-12 groups)
Multimedia Arts (Eng.) / Arts multimédias (Fr.), Sec. IV and V
History Sec. III, (Canadian Indigenous History)
Visual Arts, Sec. II & III (drawing, painting & art appreciation)
Click button to access Multimedia course site
Examples of student website projects with permission to distribute
Tyler's website
Amy-Lee's website
Angie's website
link: https://spencerangie1.wixsite.com/angiespencerotter511
Anthony's website
2019 (Sep-Dec)
ENGLISH MONTREAL SCHOOL BOARD (EMSB)
MACKAY CENTRE ELEMENTARY
(Grade 3 - Special Education), Montreal, QC
(9 students with physical and/or cognitive special needs)
English, Math, Social Studies and Art
Click .PDF to download STORYBOOK animation unit plan
Grade 3 collaborative animation project
SUPER HERO DANCE PARTY (1-minute), 2-D animation short video
2018-19 (Nov-Apr)
RIVERSIDE SCHOOL BOARD (RSB)
SAINT-LAMBERT INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL (SLI)
(Sec. I thru V), Saint-Lambert, QC
International Baccalaureate (IB) Program
Animation Arts & Robotics
Click .PDF to download STORY unit plan
Secondary I-V, collaborative fictional and stop-motion animation projects
Video projects: Lupatek & Down River
Secondary I-V, short fictional film (5-min) & Stop-Motion Lego animation (20-sec)
2018 (Jan-Apr)
RIVERSIDE SCHOOL BOARD (RSB)
2017-18 (Nov-Apr)
RIVERSIDE SCHOOL BOARD (RSB)
SAINT-LAMBERT INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL (SLI)
(Sec. I thru V) Saint-Lambert, QC
International Baccalaureate (IB) Program
Visual Arts, Sec. IV & V
COURTLAND INTERNATIONAL ELEMENTARY
(Grades 2 thru 4, Visual Arts), St-Bruno, QC
An Elementary International Baccalaureate (IB) Program School
Click .PDF to download SPIRIT ANIMAL & LEGENDS LESSON plan
Student art projects
2015-18 (Aug-Jun) Summer School
CREE SCHOOL BOARD (CSB)
WOODLAND INSPIRED ART: (Grade 3, cycle 2)
INUIT INSPIRED ART: (Grade 2, cycle 1)
WEST COAST INSPIRED ART: (Grade 4, cycle 2)
JAMES BAY EEYOU SCHOOL (JBES)
PART-TIME (Summer & Winter) Chisasibi, QC
History Sec. IV (English & French)
Multimedia Arts, Sec. V (English & French)
English (First Language), Sec. V
French (Langue seconde), Sec. V
by Jennifer
by Mina
by Anjoline
by Jennifer
Art, Sec. IV and V, PHOTO HAIKU Projects,Photo by JMD
2014-17 (Aug-Jun)
CREE SCHOOL BOARD (CSB)
JAMES BAY EEYOU SCHOOL (JBES)
(Secondary II-V) Chisasibi, QC
150-175 students (8-11 groups)
Visual Arts, Multimedia (YouTube channel), Music, English, French, Geography, World History, ERC
Arts Concentration Program (MikW’ Chiyâm)
Member of the School Leadership Team
Stencils on lockers project, Photo by JMD
MikW' Chiyâm-Arts Program: music session. Video: JMD
JBES Media Arts / arts multimédias YouTube Channel
TEACHABLES
Digital Arts (Multimedia)
Video (production to post), photography (studio to editing),
web design, makerspace (fab lab), music creation.
Visual Arts
Drawing, painting (oil, watercolor & spray Paint), printing, sculpture & installation art.
History
Art, Canadian Indigenous, Renaissance, Roman & Geography.
French & English languages
First and Second language learners, Secondary school Cycle 1 & 2
Entrepreneurship
Secondary V
EDUCATION
2017-21 CONCORDIA UNIVERSITY
Montreal, QC
BFA, Specialization: Art Education
Graduate with Distinction
The Chadha Family Scholarship Excellence Award
1984-85, 1989-92 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA (UCLA)
Westwood, CA
BFA, Specialization: Cinematography
The Walt Disney Scholarship Award
1986-87 CONCORDIA UNIVERSITY
Montreal, QC
Major Fine Arts: Film Production
specialization cinematography
1982-84 CHAMPLAIN COLLEGE
St-Lambert, QC
D.E.C. Creative Arts, 1982-84: Champlain College
—All references and additional information available upon request—