Content objectives
This unit is written toward the curricular content area of secondary Visual Art yet addresses several Common Core Anchor Standards for Writing Literacy in Technical Subjects. I teach secondary visual art at four different proficiency levels as well as the International Baccalaureate Middle Years Program. This unit is appropriate for teaching in an Intermediate level (Art II) visual art course or year 5 of MYP Visual Arts. North Carolina defines visual art as an elective in a technical subject. As such, my visual art classes are comprised of students representing a variety of grades, motivations, skills, and maturities within each class. Of primary importance in working with urban youth is to know students and work with the capital they bring to the classroom. Through this unit teachers and students will grow their understandings of the lived cultures and journeys of the individuals in the learning environment.
Cities-visible and invisible, physical and virtual, lived in and longed for-are the metaphoric inspiration for motivating students' written and creative responses in this unit. As inhabitants of the city students are practitioners in the writing of an urban "text" through the patterns of their steps as walkers in the visible and invisible spaces of the city. Yet they write without being able to read it. 2 A learning objective of this unit is that students can learn to recognize and interpret the pathways that intertwine in networks of everyday places revealing poetic and mythical practices in the spaces of their lived experience. Discussion and reflective writing will be employed to probe student insights on the topic. Students will be prompted to write expressing or evoking feelings or emotions, supporting various levels of meaning or personal interpretation, connections to their own experience, or connections to past events. The class activities for this unit support learning goals for students that encourage them to consider how, in thinking of actual or inevitable life changes, one can creatively respond to place, people or situation and purposefully contribute to a re-visioning of community. The larger goal is that students will find meaning in artistically exploring personal stories themed to the rhythms of life that bring us all together and guide our destinies. This approach supports student learning through the North Carolina Essential Standards for Visual Arts that are inclusive of visual literacy, contextual relevancy and critical response.
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