#teacher
“Bees do have a smell, you know, and if they don’t, they should, for their feet are dusted with spices from a million flowers” -Dandelion Wine
In the eyes of adults, Most 16-year old students haven’t collected a lot of memories yet, but every student comes into my class with a set of experiences that is unique and often unknown to those around them. The content that teachers teach is delivered, for the most part, based on our own set of experiences. Because I model the learning process in my classroom, it is imperative that my students recognize that the words that I say in class and the lessons that I teach come from who I am as an individual. What is true is always relative. I teach from my own heart, my own aesthetic, and my own beliefs. Students have to check their sources I have feet that have dusted a million blooms…I have taught hundreds and hundreds of students and I am often having to remind myself that I see only a fraction of who my students are. To extend the metaphor, I am only one flower that my student bees are visiting and it is important to smell the rest of the flowers. Recently I have been using Instagram to try and grasp my students as whole…to see them as people and to recognize the importance of their lives out side of their classroom. Instagram is a beloved tool for me in the classroom. By looking at student pictures, I can see when there is a big basketball game or marching band band competition that students are participating in. This helps me bring up events in my students’ lives in the classroom which begins conversations about themselves. Instagram builds visual culture and enhances my curriculum . It makes my students into watchers and noticers and image-makers. They are practicing art skills in real time. They think about composition and meaning when they fiddle around with filters and cropping. They see something in the world around them and decide that it needs to be recorded. They are witnesses. They choose the photos that create their own narrative. They are essentially showing the world what they think is visually important. How awesome is that? There is a record of their decision-making processes. Lets hope they visit only flowers and make beautiful decisions…
