CAUGHT BETWEEN CONTROL AND CREATIVITY:
BOREDOM AND THE CLASSROOM
Popular culture was where the action was -- It marked out a territory where pleasure, knowledge, and desire circulated in close proximity to the life on the streets. . .We felt rather than knew what was really useful knowledge. And we talked, danced, and lost ourselves in a street culture that never stopped moving. Then we went to school. Something stopped us in school. For me, it was like being sent to a strange planet. . .what we learned had little to do with where we came from, who we were, or where, at least, we thought we were going. (Henry Giroux, 1994, pp. 6-7)
Examining Relationships Between Control and Boredom
Within the past year, I have visited K-12 art classrooms in a variety of socio-economic and racial contexts in West Texas. (1) As a university professor, part of my task is to assess the performance of student teachers in public school settings. Like most of us in art education, I value creativity, imagination and critical thinking in the classroom. Yet, my observations and talks with student teachers and cooperating teachers alike lead me to believe there is a serious paradox operating in art classrooms: creativity is compromised as teachers control student thoughts and actions.
How do I know this? I know it because I am often bored in the classes I attend and supervise: bored by the crayon and color wheel banality of it all, listening to the same -- often picayune -- points being made over and over again. This boredom signifies to me a disturbing relationship between creativity and control. It suggests to me that excessive teacher control, student passivity and content-restricted curricula create a classroom climate inhospitable not only to student inquiry but self-expression itself. The field of art, inherently heroic and interesting, a field that prides itself on using creativity and imagination to produce rigorous social critique, is reduced to a glorified methodology.
I have observed student teachers and cooperating teachers planning lifeless lessons that are passed off as art "activities." Inordinate amounts of time are spent controlling and regulating --making sure students are quiet and immobilized. Rarely do I witness opportunities for students to integrate their lived experiences into the classroom. "Real life" seems far too dangerous, chaotic, and controversial. Teachers are taught that regulation and control are necessities of school life.
I have found patterns associated with this ennui in which teachers are central to the interrogative matrix. Are certain teachers more creative or more controlling? Are students paying attention? Are they actively involved? Are they able to integrate the "stuff" of their lives? What relevant content is allowed into the curriculum? Do the students see themselves as artists or students? When teachers seem to respect and trust themselves and their students, they tend to get beyond their fear of "losing control" in the classroom. These classroom atmospheres differ significantly from tightly controlled ones. Students appear more curious, are more apt to share their ideas, have more humorous exchanges and are eager to explore and examine issues that touch their lives.
How I Was Taught to Teach
I was taught that a good teacher is always prepared, anticipates problems and student needs, demonstrates authority and expertise in art, and exercises appropriate classroom management strategies (See Wachowiak, 1977). Above all, I was taught that a good teacher is always "in control." Unintentionally, I set myself up as "the expert," a teacher who supposedly knows as much about "life" (my own and that of my students) as I do about art. I was taught that I had to know more than my students because I was the teacher. It was up to me to motivate, educate, assess and entertain them.
In what Paulo Freire (1989) refers to as the banking model for teaching, I figuratively "filled" students with information and facts. In the banker's role, I defined the curriculum, directed teaching, monitored student behavior and assessed progress. Students were dependent upon my vision and objectivity as a teacher. Students lived the classroom curriculum through my projects and assessments. We were limited by my vision, knowledge, interests and experiences.
Eventually, I became exhausted controlling students' thoughts and moves. After only three years of teaching elementary art, utilizing a quasi-experiential approach (2) modeled after Wachowiak (1977), I became bored with what I was offering students as art content. I began to question my methodology, one that was based primarily on the elements and principles of design. I realized how unrelated the school art activities were from the actual lives of my students and from how artists create. Consistency, routine and a predictable plastic aesthetic had replaced inquiry and learning. Efland's (1976) notion of a school art style rang true. My students' art reflected school culture, not their lives. Within my frame, teaching and learning demanded little cognitive strain. I utilized easily manipulated materials and repetitive concepts. With little exception, most art projects done in my classes were similar in size, materials and content. I unknowingly promoted and perpetuated a ubiquitous definition of childhood "creativity" that had actually become a euphemism for conformity and control.
At the same time, I became alarmed at how little information I was actually conveying to students. Classroom activities reflected a lifeless methodology that betrayed the true and fundamental power of art -- its ability to change and transform us into thinking and caring human beings. I avoided discussion of contemporary issues in my student's lives. Thinking back, I realized that our discussions about art were "dumbed-down." I automatically censored my students and myself. Not surprisingly, bodies and feelings got denied and ignored. Important issues and identities were rendered invisible. Noticing how students' conversations about art were rare and uninformed, I realized I was fostering educational dependency in them. "What do you want?" they would ask me. "Is this okay?"
Expanding Notions of Teacher: Allowing Student Agency and Voice
Allowing student agency and voice required my rethinking of what is possible in the classroom. Having been taught that I was responsible for every aspect of a student's education, I reexamined models I had learned. I was Freire's "banker." My role as teacher was to fill students with "true" knowledge and information. The student's responsibility was to store the new information, not act on it. Students were objects, not active agents in their own educations. Freire's (1989) "problem-posing" model for education refocused my energies toward student-generated planning and development. Within a problem-inquiry environment, students co-plan and co-create units and lessons. My role as teacher is advisory and supportive as students become co-responsible for the intellectual and aesthetic environment in the classroom. Student interests, life experiences and knowledge form the backbone of the curriculum.
It was Belenky, Clinchy, Mattuck and Tarule's (1986) "midwife" teaching model that offered me the support I needed to assist students rather than lead them. Their concepts of sharing, connecting and cooperating, guided me in reexamining my role. Teacher as expert and controller, as they pointed out, is male-defined, heirarchical and mystifying.
By considering the student a resource and an active agent in the educational process, my teaching was transformed. I began to analyze aspects of my classroom practices and have become much more open with students, sharing with students how I think through issues and concepts. I now critique and demystify the process of teaching, demonstrating by example to students, allowing them to see me as vulnerable and human rather than superior and unapproachable. Demystifying the learning process reveals to all of us -- both students and me -- new levels of understanding and appreciation. We can all voice ideas and feelings about issues in art that we are concerned or uncertain about.
While such notions of teaching might seem revolutionary and heretical to some, I perceived them as a return to sanity. (3) For me, they both challenged and broadened the notion of what a "good teacher" is or can be. As I developed and recognized "more complex representations of identification, belonging, and community" (Giroux, 1994, p. 13), I conceived a classroom as a site where power, history, community, agency and identity converge. (4) This revitalized definition of teaching opened me up to the potential and opportunities for classroom and school life. Only within the past few years however, have I developed the courage to implement these theories into my classroom practices.
Experiments in Education: Rethinking Theory into New Practices
I had successfully taught elementary art for ten years. My return to graduate school for an advanced education degree offered me both opportunity and space to experiment with alternative pedagogical theories and practices. I planned and developed a ten-hour workshop in conjunction with a "College for Kids" program. The "College for Kids" program was developed to acquaint upper elementary and middle school students with university life and scholarship. Selected students spent three weeks on campus in small groups engaged in workshops and other large group activities. Each small group (ten students) was mentored by a supervising teacher who simultaneously earned graduate credit. The one-week, two-hour-per-day workshop involved fourth through sixth graders who were intellectually gifted and highly motivated. Local school teachers and administrators nominated and selected students. All students selected for the three-week program received scholarships to participate.
Preparation for my course began a half-year in advance and consisted of developing a title and course description. I chose: "Art and Social Change: From the Simpsons through the Gulf War to the Olympics." I decided to engage students in contemporary and critical issues in relation to art -- in short, what professors and students do at the university. I was purposefully vague in the course description about what would happen in the workshop to allow topics to emerge from the students. My intention was for the group to choose and research a topic or topics of interest.
As the workshop drew near, I was wary of my strategy and approach. No other session was being approached this way. Apart from adhering to a general theme of art and social change, I would expect the students to decide what they would do. Years of university training and classroom teaching had not prepared me for the anxiety I experienced prior to the workshop. (5)
First Session: Creating Community
Our first session consisted of casual talk about the purpose
of universities and the differences between university life and
primary school life. I explained the format of the class to the
students: how we would collaborate, support each other, and develop
and research one or more topics. We began to discuss contemporary
art and social issues, looked at some slides and books and talked
about possible projects. Nearly all of our first session consisted
of engaged discussion and many, many questions. The students initially
found it difficult to comprehend that they could choose and determine
their projects. But after the initial shock, they became quite
excited about the possibilities, and they seemed as interested
in my opinions about art as I was in their perspectives. (6)
Subsequent Sessions: Community in Action
During the first session, three different interest groups developed. The first group consisted of two students who focused on technology to capture and recapture portraits. Interested in the relationship between emerging technology and art, they utilized scanners, digital cameras, and various software programs to develop auto/biographical art examining issues of personal identity and isolation. The second group, also consisting of two students, developed a comic book based on age bias and related discrimination issues. They worked diligently adapting their ideas to a comic book format.
The third and largest group of six students decided to create and produce a videotape program. Using a television interview format, they self-interviewed each other based on the question "Should Athletes Be Role Models?" They were intrigued with recent cultural events concerning athletes, particularly O. J. Simpson. To prepare for their interviews, they planned a timetable to research magazines and books on the topic. They visited a library on campus and talked to people who were familiar with video and documentary. Each member selected a task: some were researchers, others writers, still others actors. They produced a list of video equipment and strategized how to obtain what was needed. They also requested to work privately in an adjacent seminar room without interruption from their supervising teacher or myself. I readily agreed. In spite of the video group's request for privacy, the supervising teacher periodically insisted that she be permitted into the room to monitor progress. I respectfully knocked on the door at various times to ask if the group required anything. I was usually told that everything was proceeding according to plan.
As all three groups worked on their projects, I offered my assistance as needed. Each group was invested in its idea and execution. All three groups worked diligently to complete their projects. The computer group developed strategies to overlap portrait images of each student in the group. The comic book group established themes and began planning and producing a book. They problem-solved drawing and other issues that arose. For example, they solicited help from other group members to color the book's images. Unlike previous lessons that I had taught, I found time to witness and experience students' learning and progress. Because I was not in charge of any of the projects, I soon realized I would need to rethink my role, needs and time allocations as facilitator.
Final Session: Presenting Process and Product
The last day of the workshop consisted of final touches on projects. We invited another class to join us as each class took turns presenting projects to each other. My groups presented not only the finished product, but the thinking and planning that was paramount to the projects. (Such explanations and testimonies are an important part of this teaching/learning model.) The portrait images and explanations offered from the computer group were brief but compelling. Though somewhat shy and private, they quickly spoke to the immediacy of a portrait as a living image. The comic book group explained their choice for format due to a specific personal experience: they had been asked to leave a comic book store because they were perceived as "kids fingering products" with no intent to purchase. The video group showed their six-minute tape. They edited the final copy and talked about the difficulties of developing not only a theme but the technical issues involved in videotaping. This group also spoke about the considerations of collaborating on a project, noting both the anxiety and pleasure of working as a group.
Students evaluated their workshop experience with medium to high marks. The experience several noted, seemed more like real life than school. Their supervising teacher, on the other hand, commented on how lax I had been with the students who had proceeded on their own. She noted that I did not have the expected classroom discipline or management skills. Such reactions were appropriate from her perspective. A good teacher, she believed, was one that was on top of everything, in charge and in control. But her reactions belied the reality of the class: there were no discipline problems and students were engaged and interested in their work. Apart from minor assistance, they planned and developed their ideas successfully on their own.
Connected Teaching at the University Level
My teaching approach with young students worked well with university students too. Recently, I have labored to incorporate aspects of connected teaching and collaboration into my university classrooms. Last year, in an art education course that examined the social and institutional impact of schools and schooling, students signed up to give historical presentations from Wygant's (1993) School Art In American Culture: 1820-1970. These presentations were spaced throughout a ten-week time period. Students divided into groups to examine book chapters that paralleled their interests. Chapters were presented in myriad ways. The first group presented a chronological survey of schools and art in the nineteenth century. They augmented their presentation with family photographs of the era and used slides and books to provide a context of the time period. Throughout the presentation, they openly described the difficulties they had had as a group finding information and organizing their thoughts. This had a great impact on subsequent presentations as class members actively assisted other groups prepare for their presentations.
The 1946-1959 group focused on Black Mountain College and the social and critical issues of the Cold War. (7) They invited students to dress according to the time period for their presentation. They changed the art room to reflect a coffee house of the 1950s, replete with small coffee tables, table cloths, the smell of coffee and burning candles. They projected slides of artists and writers from the time period that repeated continuously throughtout their individual talks. They even had us participate in a civil defense drill. (8) All of this had a profound impact on students' attitudes toward history and learning. (9)
Integrating Students' Lives in the Curriculum
In an art education foundation's course, I had similar reactions to integrating students' interests and lives in the course material. Students were receptive and helped co-plan various aspects of the course. For example, students were encouraged to collect readings and books that we examined in the course. Through discussions and activites we personalized the learning process. We listened to each other and noticed the similarities and differences in our lives. These themes -- our hopes, fears, expectations, experiences and desires -- became avenues to engage both art and education. Such discoveries helped us examine not only our own, but each other's humanity. Students' final presentations represented how they had integrated their lives and personal interests into the curriculum of the class.
One student narrated a slide presentation explaining how he and his family cared for his younger hemophiliac brother. The slides revealed a nurturing brother assisting in life-care. The student challenged myths and fearful stereotypes of hemophilia. Much of the negative reaction towards people with hemophilia is due to fear and ignorance of the transmission of the HIV virus. Most students were silent throughout his presentation. Some cried.
Another student shared with us her reawakening to her Hispanic heritage. She was energized by discussions in our class throughout the semester and began to examine her "roots." She apologized for not knowing much about her race or ethnicity, and galvanized us to the importance and meaning of cultural identity.
Still another student spoke about abusive situations related to childhood. She personalized her topic with autobiographical stories. She shared books on abuse and relationships she had read. She cited the profound impact she experienced throughout the semester in terms of identity and self-esteem as motivation for selecting a topic of personal relevance.
The most difficult moment during the presentations occurred when one student showed slides of her grandfather. She documented her institutionalized grandfather living with Alzheimer's. The accompanying music expressed her sturggle to slowly lose someone she loved. Many of the students (male and female) were in tears throughout her presentation.
Self-Connecting and Self-Education
I think that what we need are more complicated ways of imagining ourselves in the world that are truer to what people know and what people's imaginations are about. (Herman Gray in M. T. Riggs, 1991)
Like the many students I observe daily in schools, or interact with in university settings, I entered school with certain race, class and gender experiences and many opinions and ideas about life and art. Unfortunately, I was not able to integrate much of my personal life in my art. This was true even at the graduate level. I was treated as a passive consumer of knowledge. In many ways, I was protected and sheltered from a truly transforming art experience. In retrospect, I can see that when I perpetuate such an ideology of control, I inhibit students (and myself as teacher) from real world concerns, further marginalizing art in the classroom and in life.
My experience of teaching in schools compels me to question art practices that reconstitute it into a "safe" subject. When art is censored, controlled, and reduced to inane basic elements, we need to ask ourselves: is this art education? Denying our students the transformative power of art, what are we trying to control? Since students know what is truthful and real to them, I contend that we need to validate not only their ideas about art but their lives as well. By controlling students' ability to integrate art in their lives, I further contend we deny them the opportunity to participate more fully in the self-education that is implicit in art itself.
It took, and continues to take, great personal courage for me to publicly rethink how I teach in a classroom. To move from a controlling pedagogy to one that is more student-centered and joy-filled is to constantly confront my own demons: the bored and boring tradition that I am turning my back on. (10) Yet, as I spiral through my own learning, I am reminded that boredom itself was key to my pedagogical change. (11) Such a recognition allows me to let go of control, yet look within the traditions of art and education for other ways to learn and teach. This collaborative connected teaching model is not easy. (12) It complicates the navigation of my artistic and educational terrains.
Teachers can already create spaces in classrooms where creativity, imagination and critical thinking are more apt to occur, and it is already possible to rethink teaching. These teachers let go of false personae (of authority or truth, for example) and let real -- selves -- and the real world into their art and classrooms. Inviting the real world into the classroom entails real emotions, real problems, real art, real artists -- initial results: excitement and voice. Gradually, teaching and learning focus and engage students toward meaningful and responsible learning. I suggest that both my boredom and search are pathways to roads of better teaching for me. Roads where I enable and nurture not only the student's creativity and imagination, but my own as well. Where together, we reexamine, share and release power.
Footnotes
1 Issues of control are ubiquitous to the field. I use West Texas merely as an example.
2 Experiential in that the focus of the curriculum was to offer students multiple "experiences" in a variety of media.
3 I need to warn you -- the reader -- that connected teaching takes time to develop. It is a serious pedagogical commitment. Valuing voice, gaining student trust and honoring the unexpected, is not for those who value traditional meritocratic methods.
4 Relationships between gender, power, knowledge and art practices have been scrutinized by feminists and social and critical theorists for some time now (Apple, 1979, 1982; Bourdieu, 1984; Dalton, 1995; Duncum, 1989; Silin, 1995; Wolff, 1981). Dalton (1995) laments that "[m]ost contemporary art education theories continue to be trapped within the discourses of the high Modernism of the thirties and forties" (p. 45). Though art educators have argued for curricular reform (Beyer, 1984; Brady, 1987; Duncum, 1989; King, 1987; Perr, 1988; Schellin, 1990), resistance to change remains steadfast. Traditional ways of teaching art are defended obstreperously. For example, Cahan and Kocur's (1996) curriculum text espouses multivocal, critical and contemporary perspectives and is considered highly suspect if not heresy by many art educators. The integration of the self into teaching about art remains highly problematic. Much art education discourse continues to focus on interpretations and reinterpretations of Modernist principles and practices (See Anderson and McRorie, 1997).
5 In this case, anxiety was a good thing in that it honored my uneasiness as I ventured about unfamiliar pedagogical terrain.
6 With the class underway, the supervising teacher became uneasy about classroom management strategies. Though much younger than I, she relied on traditional classroom practices, such as requesting students to raise their hands, getting permission for things, etc. This worked against my notions of collaborative teaching. She was uncomfortable with the class, stating her reservations in an evaluation sheet.
7 The 1946-1959 chapter group presented a workshop at the 1997 Texas Art Education Association fall convention based on their research and class experiences.
8 Civil defense drills were choreographed group performances in the 1950s and 1960s that prepared us to protect ourselves in public schools against nuclear attacks. A usual drill consisted of proceeding to basement areas and lining up against walls with our hands over our heads or simply hiding under our desks for [maximum] protection.
9 Students noted in class evaluations that the extremely dry information of the text came alive in the various presentations.
10 Even though current educational literature emphasizes student-centered teaching, it is not practiced nor understood by many educators.
11 Classroom management will always be an issue in a banking-driven pedagogy. Implicit within this model of teaching is an understanding that the teacher maintains social order through control.
12 Can traditional or novice teachers practice connected teaching? Yes, but it means rethinking not only how we interact with students but why. One has to be dissatisfied with staus quo methods and equally interested in equity issues across race, class and gender. Novice or verteran -- it's all about creating classrooms with real people and real issues.
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