Name: Matthew Peterson

Use the following scale to rate yourself:

10/9 =
8/7 = Good
6/5 = Average
Excellent

4/3= Fair

2/1 = Needs Improvement

Participation in-group: What ideas did you contribute that added meaning to the movie?
(even if you were not able to use them) Please give specific detailed examples:
I would give myself a 10 in participation in-group. I contributed several ideas that helped add
meaning to the movie. For example, I remembered seeing many pieces of artwork in my field
classroom so I suggested we use pictures of actual student artwork in our movie (after gaining
permission of course). This helped show real-world applications and effects of arts integration in
the writing content area. I also suggested several ideas for the textual components of our movies
including, Generating info leads to better retention than just reading it, We use art to help
children tell their stories, and students learn to write about art and through art. I think these
really helped convey our message of how important arts integration is (because it helps students
to learn, engage and remember better) and how the arts-content relationship must be reciprocal.
Lastly, I contributed the idea to change the lengths of some of our images in the movie. Madison
then figured out how to do this by changing the trailer to a project in iMovie. This added
meaning because it allowed viewers time to read and process both images and text. Before this
some student artwork was hard to comprehend because it flashed by so quickly.
Describe one obstacle you had to overcome, what was it and how did your group resolve it?
Amanda, Madison, and I all worked together to make the Ferris Buellers Day Off clip work.
Amanda contributed the idea, which we all loved, but then it was very difficult to make it
happen. We had a youtube clip that would work well, but getting it into iMovie was a
challenging technological feat. I figured out how to convert the youtube video to a video file
using an online converter. Then, Madison figured out how to import it and trim it in our movie.
Lastly we all worked together to add sound by playing the clip while the laptop recorded a
voiceover. This clip helped add meaning because it ended the PSA on a light-hearted note and
reminded us that in non-innovative and uncreative classrooms students are much less engaged. If
students are bored out of their minds, they wont learn very much. I also loved how our whole
group worked together to solve the challenging obstacle of actually implementing our idea.
Share your thinking as a student and also as a teacher as you created your PSA (what did
you learn, and how can you use that new knowledge as a teacher?)
As a student I thought and learned a lot about how the arts make learning more engaging and set
learning in a real world context. I also learned a lot about the technology iMovie. I had a lot of
fun creating videos and was so happy that the final product looks so good. The app is fairly
intuitive and makes it easy to create visually-appealing videos. I think I can use all these things I
learned as a student to teach more effectively. I think integrating the arts is essential in teaching,
and now I have an excellent strategy that my group worked hard to develop. Using creative art
activities in writing can help students generate ideas to write about and vice versa. As a teacher, I
also recognize the great value of iMovie as a potential learning and making tool. In my Weebly
reflections Ive listed several potential classroom applications that could allow students to learn.
Students can use iMovie to engage in authentic creation of meaning in many subjects, including
creating social studies projects or working as a group to show how to solve a complex math
problem.

Explain how you illustrated the value of art, creativity and visual literacy beyond making other
subjects more fun.

Our PSA was premised around the generative effect of art. Ive often observed that students get stuck
after a couple sentences when writing. However, if you ask a student about the story, they can tell you so
many more excellent details. Using art as a form of pre-writing allows students to establish the story in
their heads and make choices about whats important through what they decide to include in their artwork.
Also, its important to remember that stories can be told through only images. Weve looked at many
images in class that tell rich stories, often through only one image. One of our key tenets was that the arts
help children tell their stories. For example, we showed images of the family trees that students in my
class made and the all-about me books in Amandas classroom. These use images to tell stories about who
students are. When we can engage students in thinking critically about art, they can learn so much about
interpreting details, determining importance, and analyzing relationships. These are all critical analytical
skills that we want our students to develop and that the arts can aid.

_____10____ Overall rating I would give myself: Please explain your thinking.
I would give myself a 10 because I worked diligently and collaboratively with my group. We
brainstormed ideas about how to promote arts integration, collected images, and thought deeply.
We also worked very well together, and relied each others skills and talents to solve problems.
For example, I thought up a lot of what we could write because I have a certain knack for words
and phrases. Madison was very skilled with iMovie and figured out how to make all our groups
wild ideas happen. Amanda was very innovative and brainstormed a lot of ideas for us to use in
our movie, as well as gathering images of artwork from her host classroom. I think this excellent
team-work and collaboration, more than anything else, is why I would give myself a 10. I was
also impressed with our final product. I think it is aesthetically pleasing and presents a clear and
logical argument for why arts integration is important and beneficial. While our iMovie was a
little more serious than others, I think the use of student artwork makes it powerful and
believable.