First Placement, First Day

Today, Eddie and I visited Sail. We worked with Ms. Dorothy Jones and observed two of her classes, one 2nd and one 2nd-3rd grade. Sail is an awesome school. Many of the students have special needs and the school curriculum incorporates art based learning to support varied student learning styles. My favorite part of the school is that is colorful and full of student artwork. The art room is a small quiet space in the basement of the building. It is tucked at the meeting place of the stairwell, the elevator and the schools framing storage space. The teacher, Ms. Dorothy, is lively and creative. She talked openly about her teaching experience as a high school art teacher for Sail (before it closed) as well as her experiences at the elementary school. Her personal reflections were a useful and interesting part of the day. When the classes arrived, they were led through a power point of their next project. There were about 12-15? students per class. They were rather energetic, but participated in the discussion of Black History month, and were introduced to the work of Romare Bearden. Next week they are to bring in magazines and begin work on their collages.