Art can be an effective teaching tool. Students who incorporate art into their lessons enjoy experiential and inquiry-based learning.
Lindsey Ervi, the arts integration coordinator at Voigt Elementary Arts Integration Academy, joined an international cohort of arts educators in a continuing education series sponsored by The Phillips Collection and the University of Maryland. From October 2021 through March 2022, Ervi attended online sessions and developed her arts integration capacity. Led by The Phillips Collection, Ervi learned new strategies, tactics, and techniques while creating innovative and compelling arts integration lessons for Voigt students. Participation in the program is free and includes student project materials and a supply stipend.
“I love using the arts to inspire students to learn, help them self-reflect, and build their confidence,” said Ervi. “The Phillips Collection program widened my scope of techniques to take into the classroom.”
Intersecting visual art and math, Voigt second-graders learned about the area of a rectangle and created original works of faux stained glass. Students progressed in understanding a rectangle, the sides of a rectangle, and then the inside of a rectangle, the area. Using cellophane, they explored tangrams, measured the area, divided it into equal parts or square units, and used their materials as tangram pieces to construct an image like stained glass.
“We explored the work of Kehinde Wiley, learning about his process of replacing the figures in historical works of art with modern people of color,” said Ervi. “Each student created a faux stained glass work—using half-inch graph paper, transparency film, and Sharpies—to honor a person important to them in their work. Students also created a math problem about the area of the color(s) in their piece.”
The completed faux stained glass works by 18 Voigt second-graders are on display in person at The Phillips Collection museum in Washington D.C., and on the museum’s website.
“Each piece is a beautiful and accurate demonstration of the wide range of skills our teachers see from our students,” said Ervi. “The connections between visual art and math helped students who struggled develop their resilience.”
The Phillips Collection was founded in 1921 and is known to be America’s first museum of modern art. They are a private, non-government museum supported primarily by donations.
For more information about arts integration at Round Rock ISD, send us a Let’s Talk.
