The process of finding inspiration for a class project is fascinating and intriguing. In this article, the author describes a class project inspired by the gyre, a widespread circulating rotation or vortex of ocean currents, known as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. This particular gyre is the location of an enormous floating mass of garbage,…

Artists today draw on a range of sources--newspapers, magazines, photographs, film, audio, and of course the Internet--to create artworks that serve as visual "texts" of a specific place and moment in time. Using artworks as sources and understanding how to decode them in the service of "drilling down" into difficult topics can create powerful…

A visual and theatrical exercise anchored in the Grades 11 and 12 Ontario Curriculum for Media Arts and Interdisciplinary Studies was enacted and recorded as individual experiences of each participant. The event was re-mastered in a graphic representation that depicts the forces, pushes and pulls of curriculum and students' needs which educators…

In this article, the author shares a classroom project that she introduced to her students. The project involved decorating photographs with some metal materials. The project was inspired by "The Frame," a painting by the artist Frida Kahlo. This project aims to make students think critically and connect art to their lives.

Using 144 nine- and 10-year-old children from diverse communities with various ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds, this research project studied evaluation methods related to the development of visual awareness in the field of art education. Three types of visual studies--walking tours, classroom art work, study trips to an art museum--and a…

This is the first volume in a series that includes the syllabi for advanced elective courses in art education for grades 10, 11, and 12. The course objective is to provide a multiplicity of visual experiences in the drawing and painting areas of the graphic arts and photography that are broad in scope and that will challenge the student's ability…