How did it go? Well, I had so much fun with my Chinese friends. The class was not chaotic, and was full of critical thoughts, laughter, and imaginations. I did not take it seriously in the beginning, and I told them that the goal of the class was to explore ourselves and to get to know ourselves or others. Based on this point, I created a safe and comfortable environment for them. I started talking about the goal of this lesson that I mentioned earlier. I emphasized the point that art making can be a valuable tool in the development and exploration of identity. I hoped that they would conclude that they could get to know themselves through art making. Later, we watched a video talking about how artists explore identity. This video is useful and they gave it high rewards/evaluations. After watching the video, I asked them to define identity. They then shared so many wonderful thoughts that I had not thought about. Before creating the identity mind map, we had a brainstorm activity which was the most important part in this lesson. They gave me some critical thoughts that I will share later. When they completed the identity mind map, I asked some questions (those questions can be seen in Powerpoints), such as “what 3 words would you choose to best describe yourself?” “Why do those words accurately describe you?” “What 3 words will you use to describe yourself 20 years from now?” etc. I had much fun in this section since I did not know much about these participants before this class. It definitely helped me get to know them better after class. I will share what I have learned later. I think the most exciting part was the art making. I shared some art works that some artists had made, and taught them how to use PicsArt. It is nice to hear “wow, this application is so user-friendly, it is much easier than Photoshop. I never imagined that I could design my face like this way.” Haha! I had the same feeling when I was learning how to use it. Finally, I’ve included three digital self-portrait artworks which can be seen below. They then appreciated each other’s self-portraits, and shared their thoughts, why they used the metaphors, and what the artworks mean, etc. When we completed the lesson, I realized that I was out of time. I spent TWO hours teaching this lesson. Regardless of how much time I invested in this project, I felt like it was a worthy endeavor to teach the class. To sum up, absolutely, it was fun! Nothing is perfect however it was a valuable experience for all. What did you learn? The questions and the responses As I mentioned in the last reflection, I thought this lesson could be a trial run for my research idea about Asian American identity. After completing this lesson, I have had many thoughts and definitely I learned a lot through teaching this lesson. First, even though I designed the lesson to be taught in 50 minutes, it actually took me two hours to complete. If I ultimately conduct the research project, the lessons that I teach will be considered in great detail. Moreover, it should be a unit for participants to explore not just a lesson. Second, I learned many wonderful and critical thoughts from my friends. For instance, one of my friends said that identity is a sense of self-identification even if the people around do not agree with the opinion. He believes in himself and what he himself believes in. The other one said the identity will transform into different appearances which is based on the circumstances or environments. The last said that identity is unique which means that each of us has something unique apart from others. When I heard a that, I felt like my thoughts are so ordinary. When I asked them how to define themselves (it could be positive or negative), I am surprised that they all shared with me their positive sides. One of them said if people define themselves totally in a negative way, would they then be pessimistic about the world? I then was wondering whether one could use a subjective view point of the world as an indicator of having a positive or negative self-image. What is more, I felt like the participants (my Chinese friends) are mature because they understand themselves, either in positive or in negative ways. They gave me many examples of how their families and peers describe them, and why they agree or disagree. Most importantly, they thought that identity cannot be evaluated or objectively judged because everyone in the world is independent and unique. There is a saying that says, the benevolent see benevolence and the wise see wisdom. I then realized, spiritual maturity is a key point to understanding self-identity. It could be related to age, to intelligence, to environment. I want to summarize my conclusion which could be wrong. With the development of mental maturity, people discover themselves in depth. The reason I have this thought is because the participants are over 25 years old and they have had to adjust to a new life in the U.S. The new environment requires them to grow up and to be mature, and to get to know themselves. I asked them “do you really know yourself?” “Yes!” they said emphatically. I think this is an expression of being mature. Third, I have an opportunity to get better acquainted with my friends. Our lives are full of assignments and academic activities, so we do not often get together, not even to just hang out for a cup of coffee. This is true. Even though we have known each other for two years, I feel like we have not been close. However, thanks to this lesson, I have gotten many incites into how they define themselves. There is no doubt that I know them better than before. I cherish the time we spent together and I felt like we were unified as one. What would you do differently? Why it worked or not worked? I do not think I would do anything differently if I have the same opportunity to teach this lesson again with my Chinese friends, because the lesson was taught smoothly (I do not regret the time that I dedicated to this teaching) and it was well organized. It worked very well. However, it depends on the participants. If this lesson is taught to young students, I may teach it differently. Based on this experience, I think I would only do one thing differently in the future and that would be the time duration of the meeting segments. I may divide the lesson structure into several parts and meet the participants three times a week. Most importantly, I want to teach more about PicsArt. There are some wonderful tools that need to be explored. Moreover, identity is a big topic which needs more than one unit to explore. I think the activities as designed in this lesson could be improved and further developed in order for my friends and myself to enable us to explore identity more in depth. We still need more and more information, wonders, imaginations. However, at least, I worked out several parts of the lesson, and more importantly, I have gotten experience to conduct my future research. Compare and contrast with your pre-thinking. When I review the videos that I have filmed, I think the actual execution of the lesson parallels my pre-thinking. However, there are aspects which exceeded my previous imaginations. First, their views and ideas toward identity are beyond my thoughts, completely. They critically contemplated this question of identity. Certainly, they are thinking more deeply than I was previous to the lesson. I now have strong feelings and was actually a learner as well as teacher in this lesson. In one sense, I was not the teacher but one of the participants exploring this question in unison with my students. My role was transformed during the lesson. Second, I thought I could teach this lesson in 50 minutes! I was so confident! Why? Why? I told my friends that I would not extend the time. I would definitely finish the lesson in 50 minutes! When I realized that I used two hours, I felt very embarrassed and like I had failed their expectations. I was too enthusiastic and optimistic about the success of this lesson. Third, since we did explore so many wonderful thoughts about identity, there is no doubt that the artworks are full of the meanings that we have came up with. One of my friends summarized that she did not verbalize her self-description as many words as she could have. She thought that her artworks were limited to express only a small number of meanings of her self-identity because it is a visual display. Then she asked me why we spent so much time exploring identity since the artworks are so limited. At the time, I did not have a response. Now after having had time to reflect and as I am writing this reflection, I have a possible answer, I realized that art is a tool, a tool to express life. However, the most important idea is that art teaches us to know people, life, and the world from small to big. Art skills are important to learn, however, it does not require everybody to be an artist, an art teacher, or an art researcher, while it helps people perceive, understand, and appreciate all meaningful ideas which may be invisible. Art makes life, people, world meanings visible. Detailed Lesson Plan (revised) and Lesson Presentation
Participants' Mind MapsParticipants' Digital Self-Portraits
5 Comments
Kayla
4/9/2017 03:44:50 am
I bet this experience is very different when “teaching” peers and not a room full of unwilling students. I wish all teaching could feel like you described. Another thing you mention is that you designed it to last 50 minutes, but it took 2 hours. That is something that happened to me constantly in my first couple years teaching. That is one of the most difficult parts of teaching- learning time management. That is especially true if you must stick to a schedule, or if you have multiple classes doing the same thing. It is interesting that you noted that when asked to describe themselves, the participants came up with positives. I am curious to know if that would still be true if they didn’t think anyone else would read them. Your friends portraits are great, I will have to check the app out. I wish that I had such small groups when teaching, as it is hard to get a personal moment with 30 kids in 50 minutes. :)
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Amy R
4/9/2017 04:57:30 pm
OWOWOW!
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Hi Jenny,
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Jenny Z
4/10/2017 09:54:38 pm
Hi Amy, go ahead using PicsArt. This is a very user-friendly tool. I think it should work easily at the middle school level since we used this app to teach the big idea of "daydream" in Tiger Artist Program. The participants are from age 8 -15. I bet you would have fun with this app and definitely you'd like to try in your classroom.
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Zach
4/9/2017 07:02:27 pm
Jenny!
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