Spotlight on Schools

Rocky Ridge Elementary

Rocky Ridge Elementary welcomes Arts Impact Artist Mentors Jo Petroff, dance, Maria Grade, visual arts, and Dave Quicksall, theater into their classrooms for 2007-08 school year mentorships. Each teacher will complete a eight-hour mentorship in their classroom with one of the Artist Mentors. In 2008-09, teachers will have a second Artist Mentor in their classroom and focus on a different discipline.

The Artist Mentors first model a lesson in the classroom then co-teach 2 lessons. This is followed by an intensive lesson writing session in which the teacher and Artist Mentor collaborate to create a new lesson for their classroom. This is followed by two more class sessions in which the teachers more independently teach the lesson they wrote with the Artist Mentor supporting and coaching. The final hour of the Mentorship is spend analyzing assessment data and lesson-editing.

Teachers and students are enjoying the time with the Artist Mentors. Here are some teacher quotes about the impact on their classes, some reports about what arts concepts are being explored and some examples of student work in visual art.

Dance

I have really enjoyed having the opportunity to see those students who struggle in other areas of school, i.e - math, reading, etc - really excel at movement. They have the opportunity to be very creative and show that side of them!
– Miss Young 4th grade

Things are going great!!  We practice dance daily and meet with other classes 1 - 2 times a week.  I believe that my students are more aware as a result of dance.  They seem brighter and more willing to learn and try new things.
  - Mr. Arrisi 1st grade

My students are really coming out of their "cool" shells with dance.  Ryan P. even did a solo with Jo and it was amazing!  I was proud of the way he moved and danced!
 - Miss Marquardt 5th grade

My students get so excited to see Jo.  They treat her like she is famous.  In our class we will be incorporating dance into our written language by writing haiku poetry, illustrating it, and putting it to movement (dance).
- Mrs. Piper 3rd grade

Theater

The theater group has completed our first set of lessons with our students and they want to do more!  We have made super expressive bodies showing; our emotions, character attributes, and a state of being in order to tell a story.  We've made big voices learning to use the center of our bodies and to speak clearly.  The theater group has almost finished up working with Dave on lesson plans for upcoming observations in late January.
- Mrs. Carrell 6th grade

Visual Arts

Students are learning to link language with line quality and describing shape and detail of objects. The visual arts team have finished up their model and co-teach lessons with Maria. They are now planning lessons to be taught by the visual arts team:
Mrs. Case will be teaching Sumie with ink and brush on rice paper, Miss Miller with oil pastel gecho. Hrs. Hoffman will be creating variety using value in circular designs, Mrs. Thornburg will be using Kente cloth to explore color mixing and make pattern block designs. Miss Warner will be teaching stenciling like an Egyptian.