Arts Advocacy Day is this Wednesday!

Arts Advocacy Day gives arts supporters the chance to make sure decision makers know about the strong arts community in Minnesota and that their support of the arts is important. Have your voice heard! Join us at the Capitol tomorrow!

Unable to attend? Minnesota Citizens for the Arts has a great tool that assists you in sending an email to your legislators. It takes less than a minute! Click here.

Please visit the Minnesota Citizens for the Arts website for information on how to sign up for Arts Advocacy Day and how to help make a difference in Minnesota politics.

Hope to see you at the Capitol!

How will you show your support for the arts?

Arts Partner Education Spotlight: The Minnesota Opera

 

The Minnesota Opera has a variety of educational programming from school performances to residencies, here are some highlights:

Project Opera: is an auditioned program with three ensembles ranging from grades 4-12 where students learn how to sing, act, and perform opera! The program culminates with a performance of an age-appropriate opera.

coOPERAation: Bring an Opera Teaching Artist to your classroom! Topics can include vocal coaching, preparation for a live performance, and career guidance. Opera Through the Eyes and Ears of Mozart is a touring opera company that can come to your school and perform a 40 minute piece with your students!

Student Dress Rehearsals: These dress rehearsals take place as the Ordway and are fully staged, with a full orchestra. Tickets are just $9.00 (service charges may apply). Visit the Opera website for more information on when these performances are and if there is availability.

ImagineOpera.org: This is a great resource for teachers and students in the classroom. Be sure to check it out!

Take a look at ALL the links above to find even more information on what the Minnesota Opera has to offer your students!

Memphis Student Rush Tickets Available NOW!

Memphis doesn't arrive at the Ordway until March 13th but students can buy rush tickets NOW through the 29th of February! Also be sure to check out the Memphis Performance Guide!

$25 weeknights, $30 weekends (Not valid on Fri. or Sat. evenings.) Valid on Scale 2 or 3 seats only. Tickets will be held at will call. Must present valid student ID. Price includes fees. Offer expires Feb. 29th, 2012.

USE PROMO CODE: MEMPHISRUSH

ordway.org    651.224.4222

And The Nominees Are........

Award season is in full swing and it's time to select nominees for the 7th Annual Ordway Education Awards!



Barbara Cox from Perpich Center for Arts Education
 Winner of the 2011 Vision Award
Photo By Kristie Gaalswyk



Established in 2006, Ordway Center for the Performing Arts’ Education Awards were created to honor the contributions of individuals and institutions that have furthered the mission of Education and Community Engagement Programs at the Ordway.

Individuals and organizations from any artistic, educational, or cultural field are eligible, including individual artists, professional administrators and teachers, volunteers, philanthropists, and partnerships or leadership teams.

The submission deadline for the 2012 Education awards is March 9, 2012. Winners will be announced at the Annual Liaison Event Friday, May 11, 2012.

Come Support the Arts in Minnesota Feb. 29th!

Minnesota Arts Advocacy Day is coming soon to The State Capital Building. Arts Advocacy Day is a great way to get involved and tell your local politicians to keep supporting the arts!

Please visit the Minnesota Citizens for the Arts website for information on how to sign up and help make a difference in Minnesota politics.

Have you participated in Minnesota Art Advocacy Day in previous years? Tell us about your experience! Or tell us how the arts have affected your life and why you think funding for the arts is important!

Learning by Doing: What We Can Learn from the Arts

Check out the article below about teaching and the arts from the Americans for the Arts ARTSblog.

Not familiar with Americans for the Arts? Check out their website and learn more about the Arts in the USA and how you can get involved.
http://www.artsusa.org/



Learning by Doing: What We Can Learn from the Arts
by Brian D. Cohen Originally Posted on Jan. 11th 2012 here

“For the things we have to learn before we can do them, we learn by doing them.” (Aristotle, The Nicomachean Ethics).

The educational model of learning by doing is nowhere better exemplified than in arts education. Teachers in every discipline increasingly recognize the value of not only what students know, but what they do with what they know.

Educators are talking a lot about assessment these days, but education is too complex an enterprise to measure in one dimension. Measurement in education is too often instantaneous and linear; a momentary capture of what we already know we’re looking for. At one moment, a student shows that he or she knows a certain amount about one thing, and then the class moves on.

Say you’re learning about cell division.

Your class takes a week to study it, at the end of which you have a test. You get 36 of 50 right and you get a C – and you may never learn why you got 14 wrong or how to get them all right. And, by the way, you learn that you’re bad at science (which nobody told you involves observation and experimentation – just like art). 

A math teacher colleague created a rubric of skills and content he wanted his students to master. He made sure that these skills were essential (necessary to learn), cumulative (you needed to learn them to move on in the subject), and useful (kids could apply skills right away in context). He gave the kids the year to master them, and (because he was a math teacher) he kept a chart of when each student showed he/she could apply the skill. He approached each student and each topic in a different way.

As long as they got there, he felt – rightly – that he had done his job.

Performance in the arts involves a complex layering and interrelationship of knowledge, understanding, and interpretation. What do kids learn in an arts class? Not only the rules and language of their medium, but – importantly – to develop their own habits of mind and imagination and to acquire the discipline of continuing to work in the face of not being able to get the answers right away. And, they often learn that there is more than one way to get to an answer, and sometimes more than one answer.

What you measure is what you teach for. When we assess students in art we hope to find something we may not already know – what the student has discovered and shown us, if we are open to seeing and hearing it. Not just “is this good?” – but “what did this student intend, what has this student accomplished, how did they get there, what have they told me, what have they taught me, what have they made me feel?”

Can we teach and assess art – or science, math, history or literature – as an active and meaningful process of observation, participation, exploration ,and application?

Can we teach for and assess curiosity, determination, resolve, and imagination?
Can we help students develop a tolerance for struggle and frustration, for occasional failure, for uncertainty, for sometimes being wrong, and for trusting in their own courage, intuition, stamina and daring?





What do you think about the questions presented in the article? Feel free to post a comment below! We would love to hear what you think!

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