Rituals and Routines

in the Secondary Visual Art Classroom

Bethany Narajka
06.2017

Aims, Goals, or Objectives:

All students will be able to actively engage in classroom rituals and routines that build
positive classroom culture.

Grade Levels:
6th-12th

Colorado Visual Arts High School Standards:

VA S2.1.b
Envision and Critique to Reflect: Reflective strategies are used to understand the
creative process.
Evidence Outcome: Communicate and defend reasons for opinions about the intentions
(successful or not) of a work of art (DOK 1-4)

VA S2.2.c
Envision and Critique to Reflect: A personal philosophy of art is accomplished through
use of sophisticated language and studio art processes.
Evidence Outcome: Document and apply investigations into a range of traditional and
nontraditional studio practices to personal expression (DOK 1-4)

VA S2.3.c
Envision and Critique to Reflect: Interpretation is a means for understanding and
evaluating works of art.
Evidence Outcome: Recognize and debate diverse approaches to creating art across
time and culture (DOK 3-4)

Introduction:
Shocking News! Visual Art classrooms are not inherently creative spaces! Creating a classroom
culture that fosters authentic inquiry and expression requires more than laying out art materials
in front of students. Simple rituals and routines can deeply impact students readiness to engage
with the lesson content and with each other.

This lesson plan functions as a classroom culture-setting tool, for use primarily at the beginning
of a course or semester. The content has only been tested with a few groups of learners, so
please think of it as a draft until further updates.
Themes:

Connections: Intellectual and emotional entrance points to the class period are made available
through daily poetry reading. Building language around sensory words through poetry also
expands opportunities for deep engagement with conversations around art-making.

Risk-Taking: Students are invited to give their opinions in response to the Chat Pack questions
at the end of every class period. The topics range from silly to profound, and the frequency of
reading from the cards every day gives students the chance to share their thoughts on a regular
basis.

Imagination: The Overheard at KCAA bulletin board invites students to post a line theyve
read, overheard, or written themselves that surprised, enlightened, or impacted them in some
way. The ongoing collection of clever or insightful lines can awaken students to the poetic
language all around them, and promote their personal use of it.

Sensory Experiences: The combination of all the culture-building activities naturally brings
language supports into the classroom, which can be particularly beneficial for English Language
Learners. In Poetry 180 and the Chat Pack, its heard (and can be displayed on the board for
added clarity), and the Overheard bulletin board invites writing samples. These activities occur
in addition to art-making.

Perceptivity: All the activities are designed to increase perceptivity to language.

Active Engagement: Each of these activities asks for students to participate in the Arts through
a variety of entry points that continue throughout the year.

Timeline:
Year-long, with emphasis at the beginning of the school year and after breaks (if
needed)

Materials:
1. Poetry 180: A Turning Back to Poetry by Billy Collins
2. Bulletin board titled Overheard at [your school], paper scraps, writing utensils, and tape
or push pins
3. List of conversation starters (possibly Chat Pack, a deck of cards available for
purchase online)
4. Poster with sentence stems to support English Language Learners, as well as students
who may need an introduction to conversation tools.

Activities:
1. Poetry: The teacher reads one poem at the beginning of each class period from Poetry
180: A Turning Back to Poetry by Billy Collins, American Poet Laureate.
Rationale: While the teacher may invite students to read (without pressure or
requirement to do so), the purpose of the ritual is to make time to pause before the class
session begins. As recommended by Lisa Zimmerman, professor at the University of
Northern Colorado, the intent is to make poetry and poetic language a living part of the
classroom experience.

2. Overheard at [KCAA]: The teacher installs an easily-accessible bulletin board where

students post a line or two theyve heard at school, read in a book, discovered in a song,
or wrote themselves. Students may bring their lines with them to class or write them
down during a free moment during the class session.

Rationale: The poetry board serves as a visual reminder that poetry exists all around us
if we remember to listen closely. Students are invited, not required, to participate through
writing and posting their own lines or through reading the lines that have been posted.
The board can also be viewed as an interactive installation art piece.

Image from the Poetry Center at Castro Elementary:

3. Chat Pack Conversation Starters: After students have cleaned the classroom and are
preparing to leave, a student may volunteer to start a class conversation around a topic
from the Chat Pack conversation cards.

Rationale: Art critique requires students to express personal views and listen to the
opinions of others. The end of class is often a tricky time to re-engage students who are
already mentally preparing for their next class. I was introduced to this activity by a
generally unenthusiastic high school senior, who stated that his teachers use of the
Chat Pack every day proved to be a profound way to learn about his classmates and
reflect on his personal views.
 4. Conversation Cues Poster: The teacher posts and reviews a set of sentence stems
that support positive conversation habits. (Suggested list included on the final page).

Rationale: With so much opinion-sharing built into the classroom structure, its essential
to establish expectations around both sharing and listening.

Adaptations:
- Post the poems and Chat Pack text on the board for ELLs.
- Scaffold conversations for more challenging classes by practicing with student
volunteers for a few class periods before jumping into full class discussions.
- Balance full-group conversations with small groups (with share-outs).
- Assign different roles to students in the conversations, such as Interviewer and Celebrity
or News Reporter and Observer.

Evaluation:

Though students will be evaluated on specific written or verbal work throughout the year, these
activities are designed to build conversation and opinion-sharing into the classroom culture.
Regular routines that challenge students to engage may help to make graded assignments less
overwhelming.

I assembled the following questions to check the pulse of the classroom culture:

1. Is every student able to share their thoughts, stories, and opinions, either in writing or
speaking? What supports can be added for those who dont yet engage?

2. Are students bringing ideas to the classroom that they collected or reflected on outside
of the classroom? Have the conversations expanded beyond the class period?

3. Are students using respectful language tools that promote open dialogue?

4. Are students more likely to share and reflect on Visual Art assignments by reading and
speaking throughout the year as a result of regular language integration?

Final Note: All of these activities are designed for classroom time that is easily lost during
transitions at the beginning and end of class. Very little class time will be dedicated to
maintaining these culture-building activities beyond the first weeks of school. Yet, the impact of
each activity can be felt when theyre incorporated with fidelity.

Attached Below:
Visual Aid for Collaborative Conversation
Source: https://sites.google.com/site/teachermrheath/home/engage-now---student-interactions