My grade 11 students spent a week in December designing model toys using TinkerCAD software and the 3D printer. Some students took to the process fluidly and created much more complex sculptures than I dreamed possible for a first time project in the new medium. Each toy took about an hour to print, and then students painted them in acrylic to complete their designs.
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Yesterday grade 12 students programmed this capacitive touch circuit into their Saskcode Arduinos. Then students created graphite drawings and connected their Arduinos to those (instead of the penny in the video). Voila! Interactive drawings.
Today we had our global warming paper circuit painting critique. We would turn off all the classroom lights and see the painting light up when the button was pressed and the LEDs were activated, and then we would turn the lights on and see it in daylight, and there were lots of ooohs and ahhhs. I was really impressed with my art students' willingness to problem solve and engineer different circuits and designs in order to pull of their artworks. Some students had to try upwards of 3 different wires and redo their circuits, but the overall feeling was that it was worth it in the end. Here are some of their paintings by daylight in contrast with their paintings glowing in the dark. I've also included a few shots of the various circuits that back their paintings.
Ideas keep coming to me about how art intersects with science, technology, engineering, and math. It's as though I opened up Pandora's box when I started exploring STEAM. Last week my daughters accompanied me on a mission to get some colour changing markers. I had to have them for a project. I had never thought of the chemistry behind the magic of colour changing markers, but a few YouTube videos later, and there my daughter, Georgia, and I were conducting tests on what caused markers to change colours. The next day I tracked down Mr. Bardall and Ms. Lebiszczak and peppered them with questions about the chemistry behind it. Because items like vinegar and baking soda did have an impact on the markers, while other items did not, Ms. Lebiszczak said she thought the markers had some kind of a colour changing pH chemistry in them, and showed me a cool titration experiment on the spot. I still can't quite get my mind around it. I just barely broadened my mind to understand how light mixes (which is the reversal of how paint pigments mix), and now I have to entertain the notion that chemistry is linked to colour as well.
The Art 30 students will soon be coding Arduinos and creating interactive canvases - which means I am doing some homework and learning about Arduinos myself. Saskcode has a great website with tutorials for teachers who want to include programming in their K-12 courses. Today I tried a mixture of their 1H "Create Any Colour with RGB LEDs" and had success experimenting with taking the RGB light off the breadboard and still having it hooked up and their "Blinking an RGB light with a Lilypad." I am still not sure which one - an Arduino Uno or Lilypad - will work best with the canvas for this project. I am still struggling to understand resistors, and how electricity travels around the breadboard and connects to various pins. I tried Saskcode's 2c "Sound" activity, as I also want students to be able to create sound with their canvases, but I had no luck. The Arduino did not play any music. I ordered my own personal kit to experiment with, so I'm hoping that my kit is to blame more than my wiring capabilities. Thank goodness Warman High's resident expert, Ms. Bitner, is going to teach me a few things this week. Saskcode is shipping us an Arduino Uno and Lilypad kit to experiment with our students. Mrs. Fishley and Ms. Moe are also going to help out in period 4, and together with students we will learn a bit more about coding than we knew starting out. We may have to adjust our expectations to meet reality - my vision was a touch sensitive canvas that reacts to viewers - only time will tell (you can see the possibilities for someone who knows what they are doing below).
One of the things that drew me to a STEAM approach is that I believed it offered a way to Indigenize (which is herein defined as reflecting and valuing Indigenous knowledge in both educational content and pedagogical approaches) and decolonize curricula, since a STEAM approach is culturally responsive and inclusive. I also happen to think it's very My Prairie Spirit Classroom (MPSC).
Here is an excerpt from a paper titled, "The Train Has Left the Station: STEM Should Become STEAM", which I wrote for an Educational Administration university class earlier this year. **** The Government of Canada has acknowledged the racism its educational system has historically inflicted on Indigenous peoples, herein defined as First Nations, Métis, and Inuit peoples. It has begun the much-needed process of seeking to Indigenize its educational system; STEAM education would positively contribute to this process. One way to Indigenize curricula is by “developing culturally appropriate curricula” (“Honouring the Truth, Reconciling for the Future”, 2015, p. 321), which the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada suggested the government do. For the following reasons a STEAM approach would be a much more culturally responsive approach than the traditional Eurocentric one that is so often reflected in today’s classrooms. The current educational system often treats various subjects as separate entities which, from an Indigenous worldview, is not conducive to learning. Aikenhead and Elliot (2010) wrote that while their worldviews vary, both Indigenous and European knowledge offer valid ways to “understand the physical world” (p. 329). An Indigenous perspective does not view knowledge as “linear but generational and interconnected, therefore, education for Indigenous children must be holistic and inclusive” (Smith, 2016, p. 54). One way to decolonize one’s pedagogical approach is to “Consider arts based and non-dominant forms of demonstrating understanding including re-storying, photo essay, performance, reflective writing” (Pete, n.d., p. 6). STEAM challenges the current Eurocentric view of how STEM subjects are often taught, since an integrative Arts approach is less compartmentalized and more holistic. Saskatchewan’s most recent science curriculum has been praised for successfully including Indigenous knowledge by integrating it into “each of the four units of study at each grade in an attempt to avoid tokenism” (Aikenhead & Elliot, 2010, pp. 329-330). Arguably, a STEAM approach would additionally Indigenize curricula because of its interdisciplinary, creative, nature. In addition, the STEAM approach is a student-centered one. Student-centered learning contrasts with “the traditional classroom where the culture of the teacher is given central focus and has the power to deem what constitutes appropriate and acceptable knowledge, approaches to learning, understandings and sense-making process” (Bishop, 1998, p. 741). Smith (2016) explained that, “Using culturally responsive pedagogy like co-constructed learning helps to decolonize education. Co-construction is powerful because it places the student at the center of the learning and makes the learning relevant to them” (p. 55). The “Joint task force on improving education and employment outcomes for First Nations and Metis People” report says that what is needed in our educational system is “an ethical space that promotes dialogue, a cooperative spirit and respectful relationships among First Nations, Metis and non-Aboriginal people” (p. 70). STEAM education helps to Indigenize education because it facilitates a more collaborative, equitable, relationship between students and their teachers. **** References: Aikenhead, G. S., & Elliott, D. (2010). An emerging decolonizing science education in Canada. Canadian Journal of Science, Mathematics and Technology Education, 10(4), 321–338. Bishop, R. (1998). Freeing ourselves from neo-colonial domination in research: A Maori approach to creating knowledge. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 11(2), 199-219. Ge, X., Ifenthaler, D., & Spector, M. J. (2015). Moving forward with STEAM education research. In X. Ge, D. Ifenthaler, & M.J. Spector (Eds.), Emerging technologies for STEAM education, (pp. 383-395). Switzerland: Springer International Publishing. Honouring the truth, reconciling for the future. (2015). Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada. Retrieved from http://www.trc.ca/websites/trcinstitution/File/2015/Honouring_ the_Truth_Reconciling_for_the_Future_July_23_2015.pdf Pete, S. (n.d.). 100 ways to Indigenize and decolonize academic programs and courses. Retrieved from https://www.uregina.ca/president/assets/docs/president- docs/indigenization/indigenize-decolonize-university-courses.pdf Smith, T. (2016). Make space for Indigeneity: Decolonizing the curriculum. Saskatchewan Education Leadership Unit Research Review Journal, 1(2) 49-59. Retrieved from https://selu.usask.ca/documents/research-and-publications/srrj/SRRJ-1-2-Smith.pdf
I wanted a place to collect interesting articles about STEAM so am making a post about it. Lots of people who hear that I'm trying STEAM projects are curious what that means.
Colour Changing Markers
The science behind it (academic report) Chromatography: Be a Color Detective YouTube video about the science of colour change Engineering Sculptures Jix straw buildings Genetics Banana DNA - this would be neat with an art project about DNA Magnetism Where does magnetism come from? (article) Magna Doodle toy and how it works (wikipedia) Air Bonsai Levitation How to build a magnetic levitating top Levitating artworks Dipolar Soft matter video Magnetic Art (cool links for educators too) Goobi magnets (here's the instruction booklet) Electronics Electronic cheat sheet with formulas Kahoot - an Interactive quiz game RBC's Report: Human's Wanted: How Canadian Youth can Thrive in the Age of Disruption There's nothing like infusing STEAM into my art lessons to illustrate Prairie Spirit School Division's "My Prairie Spirit Classroom" (MPSC) at work. Teachers tend to like to be masters of their subjects' content, but the STEAM perspective that I'm teaching from this year means that I am nowhere close to master; instead, I often find myself planted squarely in the learner camp. Sometimes my ideas can be pulled off (the UV light paintings were pretty cool by all accounts), and sometimes they can't (I wondered if levitating a sculpture with certain magnets was possible - it is - but Mr. Bardall confirmed that the magnets I had in mind were not safe for students).
This weekend I was watching YouTube videos and reading website posts to try and understand the difference between series circuits and a parallel circuits. I was researching this for an Art 20 project where students are going to create artworks that convey messages about global warming and then wire LEDs into their paintings - the idea being that LEDs will light up via paper circuits when a button is pressed. Ms. Bitner's Science 9 students are going to help them with creating the paper circuits. There are all kinds of tutorials online that show a person how to create specific paper circuits, but almost none that explain the math in simpleton terms so that yours truly knows how many LEDs can be powered by one 3 volt battery. Today a few students who finished their global warming sketches early were helping me create various paper circuits so we could experiment with powering the LEDs - it was definitely side-by-side learning and I'm pretty sure that students were teaching me more than I was teaching them. In the end we managed to make both a series circuit and parallel circuit each light up ONE lonely LED from a 3 volt battery, but we could not get more LEDs to light up. Today I will experiment with replacing the copper foil with aluminum foil and wire in the hopes that I can make more LEDs light up. Perseverance and problem-solving are the name of the STEAM game. **** Several hours later **** I am pleased to report that I have had success with my paper circuits! Mr. Perry pointed out that wire conducts electricity much more efficiently than copper foil tape, and we successfully lit up 2 LEDs from the 3 volt battery using wire. One visit each with Ms. Lebiszczak, Mr. Bardal, and Ms. Sadoway, and I was equipped with alligator clips and aluminum foil to see if they would conduct electricity better tahn copper foil. This morning I lit up 5 LEDs from one 3 volt battery using parallel circuits. Phewf! Success feels good. I have a little more experimenting to do, but I feel much more ready for Tuesday's Science 9/Art 20 collaboration since I feel we will be able to problem solve a bit better together. Ms. Lebiszczak shared her "The Benefit of Plants" weebly assignment with me (you can access her blog here). Some of her students will be researching the positive impact of plants in public spaces and Art 30 students will help to create some prototypes. Eventually Ms. Lebiszczak's students will be pitching the idea of creating a green space in Warman High School to Mr. Broughton.
In other plant news, I started germinating some chia seeds last night because I want to see if they can grow on clay (or on recycled kitchen cabinets). Here are some pictures of the process. #1 chia seeds before I added water, #2 a couple hours after I added water, and #3 12 hours after I added water. I plan to try mixing the chia into the moss mixture in addition to just applying the chia alone to various surfaces, to see how it does. I touched it this morning, and it feels a bit like gelatin.
After seeing a few online tutorials (like this one), I realized that I could turn my smartphone into a digital microscope for the small cost of $1. I ordered 30 for $30 from Aixiz (you can get them here) and attached the lens over my phone's camera lens with blue sticky tack. Here are some of the results of zooming in on moss (from the moss project) and biology slides. I'm currently reading the book The Hidden Life of Trees (you can view the trailer below) and plan to craft an art assignment that meshes information from the book with the technology of the microscope...
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AuthorSarah Gerrard teaches Visual Arts 9-12 at Warman High School. She recently received a grant from the Prairie Spirit Schools Foundation to infuse her courses with STEAM. Archives
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