Transcript Climate Change MAEA WEB

The Art of Climate Change:
Feminist Art-based Inquiry
Dr. Cathy Smilan
Elizabeth Dooher MFA
Christine Neville MAE
Sarah Richard
Cathy Smilan
University of Massachusetts Dartmouth
[email protected]
This Session:
 Situates art learning within global issues impacting students’ daily
lives
 Presents lessons developed from critical art-based inquiry center
around the debate: Global Warming is a Humanist Concern

Shares teachers dialogue about political and environmental issues
 Suggests safe ways for engaging in controversial content without
becoming part of the controversy.
 Illuminates multiple perspectives through their art lessons.
 Encourages challenge of statements and permission to disagree
through respectful verbal and visual representations.
 Fosters problem identification, analysis and dialogue are critical
peace-seeking and negotiating skills essential for 21st century learners
Natural and manufactured visual constructs require ability
to make, read and interpret visual images.
Art teachers must cultivate interpretation and
communication, guiding technical development and
increasing social awareness.
“Children cannot know what they cannot see, and they cannot
see without knowing, for seeing itself is a way of knowing
(Eisner, 2002, p.113). Through conceptually based lessons, we
can help students to inquiry about the problems they can see and
solutions they can imagine.
Uniquely situated to initiate purposeful inquiry into globally
relevant concepts, art teachers must challenge their own
perspectives and possible biases, transforming invisible
concepts into visual constructs (Marshall, 2009) that demand
acknowledgment and debate.
Investigating Climate Change
Incorporating critical feminist pedagogy, environmental
education and art-based research in art education posed
many challenges and possibilities.
Investigation through critical debate and art-based methods
provided opportunities to grow individually and collectively.
Combining awareness for global environmental issues with
feminist/humanist perspectives elucidates causal
relationships and global impact through keen observation of
changing signs and situations of our visual environments and
our responsibility for ecological stewardship.
First, we must consider our environment as an essential part
of our visual culture.
Empowering Teachers…
An important consideration in contemporary teaching is
relevance; if content is relevant in students’ lives, teachers
must find ways to deal with controversial issues without
becoming part of the controversy (Clarke, 2005).
Education is always political. The teacher has to ask, what kinds of
politics am I doing in the classroom. That is, in whose favor am I
being a teacher. ~Paulo Freire, 1970
Art-Based Reflexive Practice
Lessons
In a Feminist Perspectives of Art course, the concept of global
warming and climate change was incorporated into studio work
that informed K-12 lesson planning.
The theoretical framework of “gender and environmental
responsibility” for collaborative and responsive work toward
social change (Stephens, Jacobson, & King, 2010, p. 374) became
the impetus for the debate prompt: Global warming/climate
change is a feminist concern.
Elizabeth Dooher
Bristol Community College
[email protected]
Climate Change is a….
POPULATION issue
Water Issue
Economic Issue
Poverty Issue: first and third world
200 million women worldwide want but can not get
contraception.
By 2050 (November 2009 Prospect magazine) population at
continued growth a “second Earth” would be need to sustain.
Fitzgerald, M. Climate Change is a Feminist Issue. The Guardian. October 29, 2009. Retrieved from:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cif-green/2009/oct/27/climate-change-contraception-women-feminism
Created and issued by Women’s Environmental Network
and the National Federation of Women’s Institutes
Federation of Women’s Institutes
“70% of the worlds poor are women”
“85% of victims of climate disasters are women”
Women’s Manifesto on Climate Change Women’s Manifesto on Climate Change 15 May 2007. Retrieved from:
https://www.wen.org.uk/s/manifesto
Essential Questions
Guiding Questions
What is nature?
What is your relationship
with nature?
Is there an appropriate
balance between letting
nature be and intervening
with nature?
What are some
interventions in nature?
What are some ways human
interventions with nature
benefit humanity?
What are some of the ways
human interventions with
nature ultimately hurt
humanity?
Motivation
Students will read Bill McKibben’s article “Consuming
Nature” and participate in discussion of the article and the
topic “nature”.
Students will view the artwork of several artists who address
the concept of nature in their work.
Students will participate in a demonstration of sewing
techniques and draped glue forms and given the opportunity
to experiment with the materials..
Overview of Lesson:
Nature Nurture…Nurture Nature
Students will read the article Consuming Nature
by Bill McKibben
Students will be asked a series of essential and guiding
questions
Students will brainstorm/mind-map on the topic of nature
Students will learn basic sewing and draped glue fabric
techniques
Students will be asked to identify their relationship with
nature and to create a piece utilizing fabric that expresses
their multifaceted relationship with nature
Sarah Richard
Student at the University of Massachusetts
Dartmouth
[email protected]
Junior pursuing my BFA in Art Education Secondary Education
Teaching Approach:
student-centered, utilizing Socratic method and art-based
inquiry engaging students in critical thinking and problem
solving skills
Issues on Climate Change Lesson Goals:
Teach students a direct correlation between our
materialistic lifestyle and the effects on our
climate
Upcycle found objects to create 3D sculptures
of researched issue of climate change
Introduce subtractive and additive methods of
sculpting, sewing, weaving, knitting.
Expand knowledge of manipulating found
materials to serve functional and conceptual
purposes
Exhibit the wide range of issues stemming
from climate change
Understand causes of and responsibility for
climate change, the effects that climate change
has on our world, and what can be done to help
change those effects.
Emphasis on upcycling, recycling, and
sustainable practices
How Does Climate Change Affect
Motivation:
Videos to
Prompt
Discussion
Biodiversity? Published by California
Academy of Science
Morgan Freeman's Powerful Climate Change
Short Film. Published by The Daily
Conversation
Climate Change, Natural Disasters and the
This lesson will be introduced by
Urban Poor. Published by World Bank
showing students 4 short videos
online that capture the grand scale of
climate change, some of its many
effects, and proposed solutions to
these issues.
Evidence Of The Extreme Climate Change
Published by HawkkeyDavisChannel
Engaging
Students in
Research
Essential Questions:
Who is/are the real victims of
climate change?
Which aspects of climate change
are within human control? Which
aspects are out of human control
and why?
To what extent are humans
responsible for both causing and
fixing climate change, if at all?
Guiding Questions:
What are some issues today that result
from recent changes in the climate?
What are some practices/ lifestyle
changes we can do to help curb the
effects of climate change?
Who/what is affected by the climate
change?
What are some causes and
consequences of climate change?
How have you personally been affected
by climate change?
How does climate change influence us
and our community?
What does climate change look like to
you?
How can you represent your concerns
about climate change symbolically?
How can you use upcycling to engage
other people in dialogue about climate
change and to raise awareness about
this issue? What might that look like?
Example Artwork:
Title: Colorless Coral
Artist: Sarah Richard
Date: May 2015
Medium: mixed media (recycled
materials including bubble
wrap, plastic grocery bags,
paper towel rolls, egg
cartons, packaging foam,
wooden skewers, yarn, wire,
and embroidery floss) and
hot glue.
Why teach about climate
change in k-12 art education?
Why take a feminist lens on
climate change in this
art-based research?
Students gain not only an in depth
By looking at a broad issue such as climate
understanding of the issue but also a
change through a feminist lens both
personal connection and passion for the
students and teachers are challenged to
topic
think more critically.
Our students have the ability to challenge
Adds depth to what our students decide to
the processes of pollution that contribute to
research while adding breadth to the
the climate change.
different directions their artwork can
It empowers our students regardless of their
explore.
age because they can start taking an active
Taking a feminist perspective allowed me to
role in this issue by promoting recycling at
take my research further:
home and being conscientious of the waste
not just biodiversity changes but
they create on a daily basis.
effects on community and people’s
daily lives
Christine Neville
Fairhaven High School
[email protected]
@c_neville_FHS
Grew up in a coastal community
Own coastline property
Teach at a school in a costal community
Climate Change Lesson
Students will create
an original artwork
using Adobe Photoshop®
to communicate a
personal message
about climate change.
Essential
Questions
Guiding
Questions
How can/does climate change
and/or global warming effect our
community?
What is climate change?
How can you represent what you
want to say about climate change
through visual imagery?
What is global warming?
What are the effects of climate
change?
What are the effects of global
warming?
What do you want to say about
climate change/global warming?
Motivation
Students will research climate change and global warming
along with possible effects and preventions to prepare for
further discussion.
Students will watch an informational TED talk about climate
change by scientist James Hansen.
Students will have small and large group discussions about
climate change and possible ways to represent visually.