Thank you to all who wrote congratulatory e-mails. I was honored to be
featured in USA Today. The article put a positive spin on art education, and, as
an active promoter of art education in our schools, I was happy to be one of
the 20 educators chosen across the country- a representative for art
education.
And about the other positve "spin": The reporter happened to visit right on
"Pinwheels for Peace" day so was there for our ceremony as well as spending
time with me observing my teaching in the classroom. She was in my school a
long time, saw lots and lots, and took pages and pages of notes. I did tell
her that I was joining other art teachers around the US and that two art
teachers in Florida began the project. I would have liked that to have been
included in the article, but everything gets edited for the space they have.
My school does have its own "Peace" theme this year and the ceremony we had
was actually a dedication of a "Character Garden" with "Character in Bloom"
as the theme. We planted the pinwheels as a pledge to coordinate my school's
theme of character education, with the idea that peace within ourselves can
only come through good character. In my classroom that day my students said
that painting to Beethoven in a Kandinsky mode made them feel free, calm, and
peaceful (their own words). Creating art is so wonderfully expressive that
I hope the readers (of USA Today) are convinced that our children can not grow
into complete individuals without it!
Happy New Year to All! Stay tuned for details (coming in a few weeks) of
our Annual Artsednet Breakfast at the National Conference in New York.
Susan On Long Island
