Newsletter 09EASEL Encouraging Artistic Sensibilities Enhances Learning
Volume 6, Issue 6
June 2009 By Yuna Lee (Fifth Grade)
Mr. Edwin Fion has been a teaching artist for six years. His focus of Latin American culture, tradition, music, and dance is unique to our arts-in- education program. He was born and raised in Latin America, so he can share authentic traditional dances
with students.
His classes were interactive with exercises, games, stories, and dances of Latin American culture. He used a boombox, iPod, CD’s, drums, sticks, and sombreros. His favorite part of the residency was getting to know more students and helping them appreciate
his culture.
One student in Ms. Rivera’s class, Claudia, thought that it was fun learn- ing and doing the dances from a differ-
ent culture. Mr. Fion made it a lot of fun and did a great job getting the class interested in his culture. Clau- dia would like to learn more dances. She said that learning the dances made her know what it felt like being a slave and how they felt trying to escape slavery. She now understands the
feelings of slaves back then.
In all, learning the Latin American dances excited everyone. They did the best they could and used a lot of en- ergy, so their final performance was
great!
Latin American Dances Live!
Dancing Using Art 2
4
7
(Eleventh Grade)
When a student walks towards the gymnasium in the Red Hook High
School, music can be heard coming from the music room next to the gym. During the weeks, however, when Red Hook had a guest artist in the physical education classes, the rhythmic, upbeat music heard throughout the hallways was coming from the gym itself, where students were learning the dance form of hip- hop. Mr. Edwin Fion, a renowned dancer and an excellent teacher, taught students how to use dance as a form of expression and led this physical and cultural experience. (Continued on page 5)
Expression Through Dance
glue, flibble flabble, and tissue paper. She said the kids get ex- cited about problem solving, messy work, and showing the puppets to classmates. Ms. Leavitt’s favorite part of this resi- dency was the final presentation.
Students said that this project made them want to try to create puppets at home. One of the students said that she thought of a queen from a fairy tale while she was making her puppet. An- other student said that Ms. Leavitt made this activity special and exciting by using exciting voices for the puppets and allow- ing them to work on this project frequently. Students enjoyed the coil pot making and creating the clothes. One boy said that he learned how to build a puppet, put decorations on a puppet, and memorize his lines for a puppet
By Jhared Vosburgh (Fifth Grade)
In January I went to visit the arts-in-education teacher Ms. Tracy Leavitt. The first graders were working on a puppet play about a queen getting kidnapped by an ogre.
Ms. Leavitt has been a teach- ing artist at Mill Road Elementary School for fifteen years. The focus of this residency was creativity. The materials she used for her puppet project were cardboard,
show during this residency.
In conclusion, students fin- ished their project and performed their role in the play. In my opin- ion, I thought the project looked complicated but fun. The stu- dents seemed to enjoy this resi- dency.
Photographer: Nicole Falero
By Nicole Marici (Fifth Grade)
I went to the pre-first grade arts-in-education program and interviewed Ms. Susan Griss and a student named Haydin Cam-
polong. The program took place
in November.
The arts-in-education teacher Ms. Griss was really nice and cheerful. She has been doing this project for twenty years. She said that she had little kids when she started and now they are in their twenties! Her program is unique because she works with teachers year after year and shows them how to bring dance into their own
classrooms even when she is not there. The focus of her residency was dance, feelings, and mood. She used a lot of very good mate- rials to teach the children. She used high quality children’s books and a variety of music. The residency helped children with their reading skills and de- veloped their vocabulary through dance. Her program let students express themselves and make creative choices about how they wanted to move. They even be- came characters in stories! That is one of Ms. Griss’s favorite parts of the residency. She also likes to see the shy students come out and express themselves
and the energetic ones learn how to move gently.
Haydin said the program was exciting and fun, and it looked really fun to me too. Haydin thought that the storms were the most exciting part. He wanted to do the scarves again, and I think everyone probably wanted to do the scarves again by the way they were acting and performing for their friends.
It was great to see the students run around and have a lot of fun. Haydin and the other students looked like they had a great time.
Photographer: Eric Brodbeck
By Jonathan Stupple (Tenth Grade)
During the months of Novem- ber and December, the construc- tion of a myriad of mysterious creatures took place in Mrs. Lar- son’s Studio One classes. The students involved in the assembly of this shadowy cast were in- structed in the ways of visiting puppeteer, Ms. Grian MacGregor.
During her first visit, Ms. Mac- Gregor instructed her fledgling puppeteers in the art of shadow puppetry by performing a child- hood event adapted to the “big” screen. The students were awe- struck. Ms. MacGregor then re- vealed her “behind the scenes” set-up and the assembly method of her puppets. Over the following weeks, students worked in small teams to create their own plays. Mrs. Larson helped students to develop their narratives, construct their puppets and sets, and gener-
ally challenged the teams to do their best work.
The teams began by creating storyboards summarizing their plays-to-be in several sketched images. Once the storyboards were approved, it was straight to work for the puppeteers. First, they had to design their charac- ters. They had to plan how the puppets would move (it is their movement that gives the shadow puppets the expressiveness needed to convey the story) and create patterns. After drawing the patterns, students cut the flat puppet pieces out of black tag board. The moveable puppet parts were then attached using paper fasteners, wire, and hot glue, and a variety of other media were added for texture. The same materials were used to construct props and scenery, which ended up looking quite spectacular. However, a play is never complete without some form of dialogue or music, and the students’ plays were no exception. The teams had to choose music or write dia- logue and choreograph the action in their plays to fit their sound tracks.
Over the following weeks, Ms. MacGregor visited three more times. Her fourth visit was, with- out a doubt, the most important. She helped the teams rehearse
their plays, coordinate the move- ments of the puppets to the mu- sic, and adjust the events of the stories to make them easier for the audience to understand. This proved to be an immeasurable help to most teams, as they had been absorbed in the building process and were not experienced enough to foresee what would happen during their perform- ances.
Eventually, the time came for teams to put their skills to the test. They performed their plays for their classmates in the privacy of the Studio One classroom. Classes rated each performance on the basis of craftsmanship, originality, and entertainment value. Whatever the fate of the shadow puppet plays, the valiant efforts of Mrs. Larson’s Studio One students will never be forgot- ten.
Photographers: Corey Davis,
(Ninth Grade)
Swing Dancing
type of activity than the usual ac- tivities like basketball or kickball. They seemed more attentive, and they enjoyed themselves as did the teachers.
In her interview, Ms. Arce shared her background and teaching experience. She has taught in the Hudson Valley for almost three years; however, she has been teaching around the world for eight years .
By Kelly Craft (Twelfth Grade)
Several teaching artists came to Red Hook High School to teach physical education students more about movement. Dance genres varied from hip-hop and break dancing to Zumba and swing dancing. Ms. Evita Arce and Mr. Nathan Bugh introduced students to swing dancing. Students seemed more responsive to this
She was a great teacher; as I looked on, she stressed the cor- rect moves to students and really wanted them to understand the dance routine as a whole. Ms. Arce said that it was a great pleasure to be asked to teach a few dance classes in school since it is unusual for a school to re- quest her help for instructing dance. (Continued on page 7)
EASEL Page 3
(Eighth Grade)
African dancers visited Linden Avenue Middle School from Janu- ary 20-22. Through dancing and drum playing, they taught stu- dents the culture of the Guinea tribe.
Mr. Mimo Camara and Ms. Pam Lord Camara have been teaching different dances and drum beats, along with a little bit of the language of some tribes like Guinea, to students in local schools since 2001. The Camaras both agree that our school’s arts- in-education program is really unique because kids have a lot of enthusiasm. Ms. Lord Camara said that the focus of their resi- dency is to help students learn by using different parts of the brain, and dancing helps accomplish this. Putting in dance to the pro- gram helps give students some exercise too.
In their residency, they used
dances and drums from Guinea,
Africa. Their program excited students because it gave them a sense of rhythm, and it showed them that they can express them- selves. The Camaras’s favorite part of teaching at our school was being around the enthusiastic physical education teachers and the great kids.
One student, Olivia Gordineer, said that she liked the project be- cause, “It allows us to connect to other cultures, and I think that’s really neat.” Olivia said that the
Camaras made the activity special and exciting because they gave students facts about the culture and how to say “Thank you” in Guinea, which is “Wona wali.” The activity also allowed students to experiment with the rhythm of the drums. Olivia’s favorite part of the residency was the dancing. She said, “The dancing taught us more about the culture, and I was more interactive and extremely interested to see how they dance so differently from us but still dance for the same reasons.” Olivia said that she learned some new things from this program as well: “One of the things I learned was what drums were made out of, which is cow and goat hide. The goat hide is a lot thinner than the cow hide, and you wouldn’t want to bonk it with sticks or it would break.” She said it was a great experience overall.
If you want to learn more Afri- can dances, the Camaras have a class in Kingston.
Pictures courtesy of Ms. Dabo
they are definitely not ordinary ones. Some of the puppets were things like a “message in a bottle finder” or a “man who dances with bears in the forest at night.” To give the kids a hint of what the puppets’ careers were, Ms. Mac- Gregor added little details such as a smudge of brown magic marker for “dirt” on a gardener’s jeans or a bandana in the dancing boiler man’s back pocket.
Ms. MacGregor really enjoys doing the arts-in-education pro- gram. She thinks it is amazing how the children can project themselves onto a stage via pup- pets, knowing that they have com- plete control over themselves and their imaginations. The kids en- joyed that part most of all. Hav- ing a chance to learn, make pup-
By Isabel Vazquez (Fifth Grade)
Former doll maker Ms. Grian MacGregor came to Mr. Schu- bert’s second grade class on April 22, 2009 as a part of the school’s arts-in-education program. She has been coming to Red Hook Schools for about a decade and was dubbed by Mr. Schubert’s class as “The Puppet Lady.”
Ms. MacGregor’s puppets all represent different careers, but
pets, watch puppet shows, and express their creativity instead of doing school work was a treat.
All in all, the kids really en- joyed Ms. MacGregor’s visit and the chance to immerse themselves in art. Being able to experience this program with the students was a treat for me too.
Photographer: Darren Coon
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process and watching it all come together in the end.
During the residency, students wrote a song about the immi- grants coming to America. Before they did that, the students had to interview their relatives. The stu- dents’ ancestors came in the 1500s, 1600s, 1800s, and 1900s. People came from Germany, Eng- land, Ireland, Romania, Russia, Poland, and many more. When they moved here, they lived all
By Michelle Locke (Fifth grade)
Ms. Laurie Mcintosh, also known as “Story Laurie,” visited Mrs. Clark’s class four times dur- ing the month of May. This was her first year as a teaching artist at Mill Road Elementary School.
The focus of her residency was immigration. Students learned about their ancestors, how to in- terview their ancestors, and how to write a song. The materials used for her residency were songs, stories, and everybody’s memo- ries. She said that her project excited students by having them ask questions and be investiga- tors. Students also wrote their own stories and songs. Story Laurie’s favorite part of the resi- dency was seeing how the class worked together in the creative
over the United States.
Henry Tynes, from Mrs. Clark’s class, said that the project made him think about how far back his family goes. He said he would like to do research on his family again. When asked about how the pro- ject helped him learn, Henry said, “It helped me in social studies. It helped me because we learned about where families came from and their troubles getting to America.”
The students seemed to like this project very much. They were very enthusiastic. I think the stu- dents liked talking about their ancestors the best.
Photographer: Isabelle LeGare
(Fifth Grade)
Mr. Fion views the dance he teaches as a way to unite stu- dents and create a will to learn further ways of expression through movement. According to Mr. Fion, “Hip-hop is able to cre- ate a sense of community; it boosts confidence and serves as a great form of cardiovascular exer- cise.”
“The dance lessons we had in gym these last few weeks were unlike any activity we’ve ever done in this class,” stated Megan Wil- liamson, a junior at Red Hook High School. Branching away from the typical team sport activi- ties usually practiced in physical education classes, the hip-hop dances did not exclude a single student on account of skill or ac- quaintance, for all students moved as one in the same mind- set. The act of dancing as a group breaks down barriers usually pre- sent in a high school dynamic. A junior at Red Hook High School, Lauren Laibach said, “Watching
everybody do the same routine was really neat. Especially be- cause the people that could and couldn’t dance pretty much looked the same attempting to dance the way Edwin did.” The students left their comfort zones and were not afraid to feel a little silly trying to dance like a hip-hop dancer. Having a qualified dancer
like Mr. Fion as a teacher enabled the students to get the most physically and culturally out of the hip-hop classes.
Mr. Fion started hip-hop at an early age and danced seriously when he was in high school. He spread his love of hip-hop throughout local schools, sharing
the culture and spirit of the dance. Now, after fifteen years of dancing, he teaches students the spirit of hip-hop as well as having a professional dance career of his own. “I love everything about teaching students—seeing the dancers they have become and the confidence they have built from dancing,” said Mr. Fion.
Hip-hop is a dance form that provides a way to express feelings and display culture. With Mr. Fion to guide them, the students of Red Hook were able to join as a group and “get down and boogie” to- gether, learning new ways to exer- cise as well as express them- selves. In the words of Allison Diaz, a high school freshman, “I can’t wait until next year!”
Photographer: Krissy Mulpeter
“Story Laurie”
By Ashley Pica (Eighth Grade)
During February and March a group of ac- tors came to our school from Epic Theatre Ensemble to teach the eighth graders about acting. Within a short period of time, these actors and actresses taught students enough skills so that they were able to put on a per- formance of Othello by William Shakespeare.
Every Friday actors came into the eighth grade English classes to teach students about acting. Students were taught simple skills that would help them un- derstand and perform parts of Othello. The lessons included learning about staging, memoriz- ing lines, understanding subtext, and delivering lines. In each of the classes, students would exer- cise these new skills. It was sur- prising to see the shy, timid stu- dents step out of their boxes to become actors themselves. Epic Theatre Ensemble not only taught
the students about acting, but they also taught students how to dissect Shakespeare’s Othello in such a way that it could be under- stood. The culminating project for this residency included small group performances of scenes from Othello. With all of the new tools the eighth graders had learned, they were able to put on superb performances.
Most, if not all of the eighth grade students, enjoyed having people come into their class to teach them things about acting. During the classes, each and every student was fully engaged in what was being taught and never once was there a dull moment. A lot of students liked the lessons because they brought in creative new ways of learning. Some of the exercises done in the classes really excited the students and had them talking about it all day. Other students in the eighth grade really enjoyed expressing themselves in ways not normally done in regular classes.
It is important to realize that the lessons with Epic Theater En- semble were fun, yet filled us with new knowledge about acting. The creative lessons really excited stu-
dents, even those who do not nor- mally take chances in the class- room. For all eighth grade stu- dents, the residency was a posi- tive experience.
Photographers: Kyla Gabriel,
draw landscapes.
As students were drawing, I asked them several ques- tions. One stu- dent said she learned better drawing skills from this resi- dency. An- other student thought the project would help her in math to draw rays. One student said, “This class made me think of beauty and na- ture.” Students liked drawing for
this residency the most.
Overall the class went smoothly.
By Rachel Eccles (Fifth Grade)
On Thursday, May 28, 2009, I interviewed Mr. Mirko Gabler, an arts-in-education teacher at Mill Road Elementary School. He has been teaching classes at Mill Road since 1985. Mr. Gabler said, “I try to get kids to be inspired to sit out-
side and draw landscapes.”
Mr. Gabler thinks kids have a good eye while they draw. He said, “The kids are open-minded and are willing to try new things.” The ma- terials for his residency were paper, pastels, and a slide show. He also incorporated some storytelling too. Every year he looks forward to his
I thought that Mr. Gabler was a genius in the way he worked with the third graders. Students agreed
that the class was really fun.
Photographer: Ho Sun Kim (Fifth Grade)
Paper and Pastel
Page 6 EASEL
She is more used to individuals looking to her for improvement on specific skills.
Ms. Arce’s main focus of the residency was to teach boys and girls social skills by having them interact with each other during swing dancing. Dancing is also easy because it does not require much equipment— just music and comfortable clothing.
When asked how her project ex- cited students, Ms. Arce ex- plained, “They get to dance with other boys and girls who they normally wouldn’t interact with, and it’s fast paced with exciting movements!” Her favorite parts were watching students under- stand swing dancing techniques and then performing the dance. It was obvious that Ms. Arce en- joyed teaching high school stu- dents.
It was also obvious that all students enjoyed themselves. Senior Lena Peterson enjoyed this project because it made her more aware that health and fit- ness can be achieved in a fun way like dancing. She said it was invigorating: it made her more active in physical education class, and everyone in class was
able to participate.
Dancing in school seemed to be fun for teachers and students alike. It was an easy way for stu- dents to learn social skills and communicate with one another. It was a stress-free experience.
Photographer: Kelly Craft
Page 7 EASEL
(Fifth Grade)
In March, Mr. Mimo Camara and Ms. Pam Lord Camara did a program with the kindergarten classes at Mill Road Elementary School. They played traditional music of their culture.
The Camaras have been teach- ing artists for local schools for fif- teen to twenty years. The unique part about their arts-in-education program is that it teaches children about different languages and cul- tures. The focus of this residency
was to expose children to tradi- tional forms of drums and dance from western Africa. The materi- als they used for this residency were hand drums, that are called djembe, and stick drums. Shar- ing songs, drums, and dance ses- sions were the artists’ favorite parts of the residency.
At Mill Road Elementary School, the residency excited stu- dents. The kindergarteners learned a new song and dance from Guinea. Students said that the teaching artists made the program fun by letting them dance without their shoes on and allowing them to bow for ap- plause. Students would like to
dance again and get applause for their performance.
Most of the students liked this arts-in-education program. Next year I think the new kids will be happy if they get to learn dances with the Camaras.
Photographer: Conor DePaoli
A World of New Dances and Music
Red Hook Central School District 7401 South Broadway Red Hook, NY 12571
Bard College Arts in Education Coordinator
Ann Gabler
Marie Sturges
Senior Typist
Kay Gilbert
Arts-in-Education Staff Contributors:
Fifth Grade Teachers Kristen Griffin Mary Hare Kelly Jones Patricia Levine Amy Perconti Leah Rivera Janet Synan
Middle School Teachers Mackenzie Dabo
April Montgomery
Pam White
Red Hook Central School District
Paul Finch, Superintendent of Schools
AIE Newsletter Editor: