Episode Guide

1. Principles of Artful Teaching Opens with teachers sharing passionate insights about why they teach the arts to young people. Then short classroom segments illustrate how arts teachers employ seven “principles of artful teaching” to meet the needs and imaginations of their students.

2. Developing Students as Artists Participants explore how arts teachers help students develop knowledge and fundamental skills while weaving in opportunities for creativity and independence.

3. Addressing the Diverse Needs of Students Arts teachers are aware of and respond to the many differences they find among their students. In this session, participants meet a visiting theatre artist who takes advantage of the different backgrounds and learning styles of ninth-graders to help them understand and embrace the playwriting process.

4. Choosing Instructional Approaches Arts teachers take on a variety of roles, and use many different instructional techniques, as they engage with their students. Teachers can be instructors, mentors, directors, coaches, artists, performers, collaborators, facilitators, critics, or audience members.

5. Creating Rich Learning Environments Arts teachers create a safe environment where students feel free to express their thoughts and feelings and take creative risks.

6. Fostering Genuine Communication Arts teachers communicate with students, and students communicate with each other, in respectful ways that encourage communication of original ideas through the arts.

7. Making the Most of Community Resources Arts teachers develop relationships with community members and organizations by bringing artists into the classroom, taking students beyond school walls, and asking students to draw inspiration from the voices of their community.

8. Nurturing Independent Thinkers Arts teachers use formal and informal strategies to assess their students’ progress and to modify their own teaching practice.