Using Evernote for Art Portfolios

At the end of the first semester this year,  I shared my LOVE of Evernote  (tutorial links in that blog post) with my advanced high school art students and showed them how fabulous it could be to help them stay organized when they go off to college in the next year or two.  

I also showed them how awesome it can be as a place to store their artwork by asking them to create a student Art Portfolio and write an analysis of their work this year.  They had to include this year’s work, but I also gave them the option to include work from other years and many of them added work from 7th grade on up! (Don’t you LOVE those kids who keep their work from every year of Art??  Makes my heart happy!)

View of the online version of Evernote

To get their work into Evernote, I gave them tips on photographing their work and enhancing those tired photos in iPhoto.  We kept it simple by asking them to crop it to the image, and hit the “wand” to enhance color and value.  

In their analysis I asked them to talk about where they could see growth in their artwork and what areas they still needed to work on.  This analysis was written as a separate “note” in the Student Portfolio “notebook.”  

STUDENT ART ANALYSIS SAMPLE...

Once they are done, they just "share" it with me by emailing me a link to their notebook.  I can then download it into my Evernote account.  

It has been so eye opening to see how far they have come and to read their remarks and comments.  They are typically hard on themselves, so it was great for them to witness the progress they continue to make with their skills and creative vision.  

View of the downloaded Evernote desktop app

Another nice part of this setup with Evernote is that it automatically goes with them when they graduate.  Other programs that are tied to school accounts make it hard to take all of that work with them when they leave.

Once students have done this once, they can just keep adding to it from year to year. I plan to make it part of the "end of the semester" routine each year.

This will be the last post before we wrap up the school year.  
Happy Summer everyone!!  See you in the fall!! :-)

Using Evernote to Create a Teacher Evaluation Portfolio

I am a HUGE fan of Evernote!  In the past couple of years, I have “digitally organized” myself both at school and at home.  The uses for this lovely program are never ending.  If you are not familiar with Evernote, in the interest of time, let me share the Wikipedia definition with you:

“Evernote is a suite of software and services, designed for note taking and archiving. A "note" can be a piece of formatted text, a full webpage or webpage excerpt, a photograph, a voice memo, or a handwritten "ink" note. Notes can also have file attachments.”

You can group Notes into Notebooks and all of this information is accessible on your computer, tablet and smart phone. There are tons of great tutorials already online explaining how to use Evernote far better than I would, 

(such as here and here ) so I will not go into it, but don't worry - it is very easy to pick up!

My favorite new use for Evernote is my Teacher Evaluation Portfolio.  In Iowa we have 8 Teaching Standards with a variety of criteria listed for each one. In my school we fill out this Portfolio Reflection Sheet (which I just copied and pasted into its own note so I could use it over and over again.)

and attach artifacts (photos, scanned student examples, etc.) as evidence.  In the past, all of these artifacts and reflections (at least 2 listed under each standard, with a list of all the criteria it represents included) were put in a thick binder and turned in to my principal.  The longer you teach, the bigger this binder gets, as we add to it every third year.  

ENTER EVERNOTE!  No unwieldy binders, no papers, sheet protectors and file dividers, etc, etc!  

When I am done with my portfolio, all I have to do is click the "share" button and put in my principal's email address.  Evernote sends him a link and he can see (only) my Teaching Portfolio Notebook.

Here is an example of a Portfolio Reflection filled out and the accompanying photo (screenshots):

And a screenshot of my portfolio (in progress - I'm not done!):

I am also excited to get my students started using this program to create and maintain a portfolio of their artwork and all of its other excellent uses for students (more on this later!) I encourage you to give it a try - it is awesome!  

Happy Evernoting!

SMART Goals: Visual Literacy in the Art Room

http://uwlibimages.wordpress.com/category/visual-literacy/

We all know that our students are bombarded by visual information every day.  The multitude of screens in their lives give them a steady diet of video, typography, photos, digital art media, etc… not to mention the amount of print they are exposed to in the form of books, magazines, billboards, signs and so on and so on.  

In our professional development in my school district, we set and gather data for SMART goals. My SMART goal for the last couple of years has been focused on Visual Literacy with my high school students.

I love this definition:  “Visual literacy is the ability to see, to understand, and ultimately to think, create, and communicate graphically. Generally speaking, the visually literate viewer looks at an image carefully, critically, and with an eye for the intentions of the image’s creator. Those skills can be applied equally to any type of image: photographs, paintings and drawings, graphic art (including everything from political cartoons to comic books to illustrations in children’s books), films, maps, and various kinds of charts and graphs. All convey information and ideas, and visual literacy allows the viewer to gather the information and ideas contained in an image, place them in context, and determine whether they are valid.”  http://www.learnnc.org/lp/pages/675

I present various visual pieces to the students and ask them to do a visual analysis.  We have critiqued artworks, photographs, print ads, youtube inspirational videos, and most recently…this movie trailer. (The Monument Men: Have you seen this trailer?  I cannot WAIT for this movie - and after viewing it, my students can't wait either! It is based on a true story and we are extra proud because George Clooney's character was born in Iowa.)

Here is the document the students use:

(I tweaked it, but the original information came from this website.)

Here is the simple rubric I wrote to gather the data for my SMART goal. 

We have had some great discussions based on this process.  If I am being honest, my students do not love this part of the class…but I’m ok with that.  I keep telling them that it is SO good for their brains!!  Thinking!  Processing!  Analyzing!! Reflecting!!  I love it enough for all of us!!!
Happy Critiquing!

Semester Art Assessment: Personal Squares

Figuring out how to assess high school students during the end of a term or semester (we’re on a block schedule so we work in terms) is challenging in Art.  Pencil/paper tests (which we do also) may capture the knowledge, but they don’t demonstrate the skills I’m looking for.  I designed this Art 1 (freshman) project to help with that.  It is also popular because it is very big on self-expression, which is essentially the primary focus in my classroom.  When older students are around while the freshmen work on this, I always hear “oh, I loved that project!” 

We start with a sheet of 18x24 paper and then draw a three inch grid on it.  This gives them 48 three inch squares to work with.  To start them out, I give them requirements for half of the squares.  This gives them some parameters from which to problem solve design solutions, serves as a review of the some of the projects from the semester and is a chance to prove what they’ve learned.  

This list can obviously be tailored to your teaching, but here is what I came up with and it works quite well for us:

5 squares of letters (one letter per square)

4 squares of solid color

6 squares of designs/patterns

5 glue-ons (photos, random small objects, other artwork, etc.)

1 square created like Monet or Van Gogh

1 cubism square

1 monochromatic square

1 shaded drawing square

The other half of the squares are the students' choice to include as expressions of themselves:  favorites (food, team, class, music, movies, season, etc...), representations of family and friends, memories, plans for the future...the possibilities are endless!

I remind them that this is graded on how well they meet the Art Standards (which are posted on the board.)  

They are allowed to use colored pencil, shaded pencil, pen and ink, and watercolor.  They may use markers if they 

"push color” with colored pencil over them.  I do not allow pastels or oil pastels because they smear too easily and mess up other squares.  

The resulting work is a patchwork of self-expression that beautifully shows who they are at this moment in time.  To be done well, it does take quite a time commitment, but is less daunting when working in 3” increments.  Every so often during this project I ask them to count the number of squares they have left and divide by the number of classes we have left.  That is the goal for the number they need to get done each day (not including weekends.)  This gives them a goal to shoot for and keeps (some of them) on target.