Tag Archives: CFE

06/24/16

Bill Reid Gallery of Northwest Coast Art – Week 3

“My (Re)conciliation is… a public art dialogue” was opened on the eve of National Aboriginal Day. It’s on the boarding of the church on West Georgia st. (between Burrard and Hornby). It is a very courageous and great idea to have a public dialogue about this sensitive subject. Reconciliation needs to happen on both sides. Great design and people do generally write genuine thoughts about reconciliation and dialogue on there. Every day we go outside and monitor the writings to make sure nothing inappropriate gets written (which it always does). However, the majority seem to be genuine comments and remarks.

On National Aboriginal Day itself, the Gallery was the backdrop for a special Canadian Citizenship Ceremony. 30 new Canadians took the oath in this beautiful location. It made this special ceremony even more special in my opinion. I was so happy to be a part of this during my CFE. For me, having the Canadian Citizenship ceremony at the Gallery in the midst of the Northwest Coast artwork raised questions about the difficult relationship between First Nations and European settlers that is part of our mutual history and reconciliation. I think it shows that both parties are ready to work on improving the relationship while not denying the difficult past.

Since the Gallery was free to the public because of National Aboriginal Day, I didn’t write on my program, but helped out in the Gallery instead. I had a great discussion with one of the people working in the shop about their personal history, reconciliation and how it is such a long and difficult process to come to terms with. She also said it is such a personal process and that it is still taboo for some people, which makes it harder for the younger generation to get their parents or grandparents to talk about it. (This reminded me of the topic of WW II in Europe; my grandfather never spoke a word about what happened to him while he was forced to work in Germany during that time).

We had another school group come in on Thursday morning; a Grade 6 Late French Immersion. They participated in the Cedar Education Program. I was assisting as the group came in and put away their jackets and backpacks and had the chance to facilitate an activity. We had decided to try the Know-Wonder-Learn strategy in the Gallery. Before exploring the artwork, students were asked to think about what they already knew about Northwest Coast art and Bill Reid. Since the group consisted of 30 students, we had them talk to a partner first and raise their hand to provide ideas in the group after. They had some great ideas. Then, I asked them to think about some questions: what did they wonder? What would they like to know? Again, they had a minute to talk to a friend first before providing questions to be written down. They tried really hard to speak French despite the difficult vocabulary; by repeating what they said and correcting the French, we managed to write down the questions together. For me, the best part was when they came back to the list after the tour and were able to answer their questions and give many more details of what they had learned in this short time. It was great to see them realize how much they had learned during this Program. I think it might be a useful activity to include in the Program. I have included it as a possible pre-visit activity and as a possible activity to start off the Program in the Gallery.

On Thursday and Friday, I finished writing my Program. I’ve written it in English, which is kind of funny, because so far all my units have been in French. However, I’ve added handouts and references in French to provide resources for French Immersion teachers. This way, even if the facilitator at the Gallery doesn’t speak French, students can still use the handouts and the graphic organizers in French. I hope my activities will come in useful during school visits to the Gallery.

My Program is designed in such a way that teachers can use it as an as-is unit to use in the classroom and make the visit to the Gallery part of their unit, and that facilitators at the Gallery can select appropriate activities depending on how much prior knowledge the group has. It allows for a lot of flexibility and choice on the part of the educator and even the students. Several activities can be used at different stages of the unit and can even be added to over the course of the unit, so it allows students to monitor their learning. I have provided three possible performance tasks to check for understanding and transfer at the end of the unit. Being in the Gallery has allowed me to design authentic tasks, such as developing a new logo for the Gallery based on one of the pieces of art. Students would have to make mock-ups of the logo, a poster and/ or a postcard using the new logo, and have to include a letter to the Board explaining their choice of artifact and provide convincing arguments and examples to sway the Board to decide in favour of their proposal.

06/19/16

Bill Reid Gallery of Northwest Coast Art – Week 2

Some difficulties and doubts arose in me about my role in writing an Education Program on the expression of identity in Northwest Coast art at the gallery: who am I to do this? I felt uncomfortable speaking for First Nations and writing a program from this position of (non-existent) authority. I have included Aboriginal Education in many of my lessons during my extended practicum, but didn’t feel this much pressure ‘to get it right’. Fortunately, while rereading my notes from EDUC 440, I found Brad Baker’s phrase and it really resonates with me: “Go forward with courage”. I decided that I will do my best to write this program and respect Aboriginal identities as best as I can. I am also very fortunate to have great Community Partners that encourage asking questions and exploring the subject.

I’m continuing to enjoy the luxury of time to explore and work with Understanding by Design, Making Thinking Visible, and Barrie Bennett (Beyond Monet & Graphic Intelligence) to create meaningful and engaging program. The goal of my Program is to allow the intermediate grades to explore the Bill Reid Gallery in alignment with the Big Ideas of the B.C. Arts Education curriculum.  I’d like to create a unit that allows students’ interests and questions to guide the learning activities while exploring the concept of identity in artwork. It allows for inclusion of some Core Competencies as well: Positive Personal and Cultural Identity, Communication, and Creative Thinking.

Ideally, I would have a unit with multiple entry points, depending on where the visit to the BRG takes place within the unit. The field trip could be the hook for the unit, it could take place in the middle after some scaffolding and before the culminating performance task, and it could even be a closing activity for the unit. The field trip as hook is the most likely, as this happens to be the case more than 50% of the time. Different activities will be planned to be presented during the visit, depending on the size and energy of the group and the preference of the teacher.

On Wednesday morning, I was able to help with a group of Grade 3 students visiting the BRG. Since there were 2 classes coming, we split the group in 2 and while one group toured the gallery, I read a story (The flight of the hummingbird by Michael Nicoll Yahgulanaas) to the other group. I was able to read from my own copy in French because the group was from a francophone school. Teachers and students were (pleasantly) surprised. I couldn’t have asked for a better setting. The author’s work happens to be the temporary exhibit in the BRG, so it was great to read “Le vol du colibri” in the gallery while pointing at other works of the artist.

This school visit allowed me to work on my questioning before, during, and after reading and asking “What makes you say that?” to get students to elaborate and explain predictions and ideas. The tour of the first group ran a bit longer, so I used an improvised extension activity of drawing the ending/ resolution of the problem since students seemed a bit ruffled by the fact that the story wasn’t neatly wrapped-up and finished. There is some inherent difficulty in having school groups in at the same time as general audience, but it seemed to work this morning. I’m thinking of ways to include movement in my activities while being respectful of other visitors. In any case, I think it is important to go over expectations at the start of the visit: what can’t we do, but what can we do?; what does that look like, and what does that sound like?

06/14/16

The Royal BC Museum as a Generator of Knowledge

            The first week of my CFE has been quite a pleasant surprise. I have witnessed firsthand the role of the Royal BC Museum as an institution that embraces the spirit and aim of the new curriculum. It does so by providing its visitors, staff and volunteers with the opportunity of being the ones who actively engage with knowledge and formulate their own inquiry questions, making them generators rather than passive receptors of their own learning. I have also been greatly impressed by how the Museum reaches out to the community and does not simply wait to be visited by it.

            On the very first day at the Museum we took part in one of the “Interpretive Sessions” done with the Museum volunteers. The purpose of this session was to have us, the UBC students, and the volunteers look critically at the Mammoth exhibition and select the facts that were most interesting to each one of us so the Learning Department could reflect on how to improve the experience of all the people who visit the exhibition. Emphasis was placed on the fact that any suggestions should come from our own interest; in my case, I was very much surprised by the fact that mammoths originated in Africa and later spread to those regions where one commonly associates them with, such as Siberia.

            The next day we helped in facilitating two field trips. The first was of a Grade 1-2 group from Victoria, and the second a Grade 4-5 group from Burnaby. It may seem obvious, but the fact that a school is coming to Victoria all the way from Burnaby showed me how the Museum is a focal point, a magnet if you wish, of the greater learning community that is the whole of BC. I say this because for the last ten weeks I was very much aware of mostly one learning community- the one of the school in which I was doing my practicum. It took only two days to notice how the Museum goes beyond its nearest sphere of influence, Victoria, to schools in the mainland and even further beyond if one considers the many foreign tourists who visit it.

            The school sessions were also centered on the students as the generators of the knowledge, of the inquiry questions. The children were divided into groups, and each group was given a First Nations artifact without being told what it was. The students were encouraged to infer the use of the object, but first they had to describe it. They could also ask “wonder questions”, that is, question the artifact as if it could give them an answer. I chose a mat creaser for the two groups I worked with. This approach was very interesting, particularly with the grade 4-5 group, because the students were able to pose questions that came from their analysis of the weight, shape and features of the object. The students thought it could be a food grinder, a toy or decorating object, and were genuinely surprised by its actual use when they found the creaser in the First Nations Gallery.

            But the event that definitely caught my attention the most was the screening of a live dive at the IMAX Theatre in the Museum. This is an initiative of the Fish Eye project, an environmental organization whose main goal is to innovate the way in which students learn about the oceans. In partnership with the Museum and as part of World Oceans Day, they held a live, interactive transmission of a dive from Ogden Point. I had the opportunity of witnessing this special event, together with 4,000 students in the province, who also got to ask questions to the naturalist “guiding” us through the underwater world that was being filmed. This live screening was part of a “World Oceans Day Expo” the Museum put together for this day, and in which several other institutions and organizations were present, such as UVIC, the David Suzuki Foundation, Ocean Networks Canada and the Shaw Centre for the Salish Sea, just to mention a few. This event and the live screening have given me a new understanding of the Museum as a generator and not a mere repository of knowledge, of the work that is being done here and, equally important, of how it is being done: in partnership with the visitors, the students and the greater BC community.