The Kara Walker Experience

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The Kara Walker Experience

• An Art and Social Studies Quest for Meaningful
  Learning
• Cecily Spano Nonie Kouneski

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Student reaction to first viewing of Kara Walker
exhibit

• I didnt know what to think.  I didnt want to
  be a part of it.  I was ashamed to be part of
  it.
• Shocked.  I didnt get it at first.  I had no
  reaction.   I was just blank.
• Grossed out.  Really uneasy.
• Why did a guy have a baby and what is her
  obsession with guy on guy action. . .to me if she
  were trying to do art on racism and slavery make
  it more realistic on what happened, not guys
  having babies and stuff.

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Student reactions continued

• Shocked, I didnt know what I was going into!
• No immediate reaction.  When I studied it more,
  (The student returned to look at the exhibit two
  or more times) I started to get it.
• I looked at it as art.   I tried figuring it out
  as art.  First as art, and then I tried to think
  about the meaning later.
• I didnt believe it.   I thought her work was an
  over reaction.

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The Kara Walker Unit

• Race Curriculum
• Art Curriculum
• Working with an Artist
• Going to the Walker
• Creating an Art show in the Kara Walker art show

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Research Question

• Does Art infused curriculum, in a collaborative
  model, help students create better work and learn
  more?
• Three elements
• Relationships/Collaboration
• Art
• History

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Why Do This Project?

• The Kids, and who they are. . .
• 22 students
• 13 boys and 9 girls
• 5 African Americans
• 2 Mexican Americans
• 1 Asian (exchange student from China)
• The rest White
• Low to middle income
• Creative, not a lot of buy-in to traditional
  school

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Quotes (shows type of kids)

• At first I really didnt want to do it because I
  didnt know what it was!
• My mom made me feel bad. . .about 15 minutes into
  the tour she asked if Id feel bad if she left.
  This did really make me feel bad and made me a
  little quieter during everything.

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Collaboration

• We believed this to be the most important factor
  in academic success for this group of students.
• Relationship Question  What would the
  development of relationship within the classroom
  do to the level academic success?

• Relationships
• student to teacher student to artist
• teacher to teacher Student to curriculum
• student to student

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Quotes About Relationship

• Everyone else was great motivation, I cant
  really talk about it enough...the chemistry our
  class has was really motivation for me.  Knowing
  I had all of those people to back me up if
  something went down....I mean we are a very
  obnoxious class, and to see us all come together
  and  help each other out when the help is needed,
  I think thats such a good quality to have, and
  to have in a group of kids like us is really
  cool!

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Relationship quotes cont.

• I feel like a stranger in other classes.  In
  this class we know each other and respect each
  other.   Theyre the only classes I go to and pay
  attention.
• The group as a whole. Spano really kept me going
  because it seemed really important to her.
• When I met Leah I really did get excited, she
  knew it was our response and she didnt make us
  do anything we didnt want to do

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Relationship continued

• The best part was getting to know my classmates
  in a way I didnt know them. It drew us together
  in a way I will not forget. Also, allowing Spano
  and Ms. K to get to know us, that most teachers
  wouldnt even try to see about us.
• What made me keep going was my other peers and
  Spano and Ms. K. They showed me much respect and
  believed I could do it.

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Relationship continued

• The group experience, there was both individual
  and group understanding. Theres a lot more
  respect and trust in the class now.
• To trust people, (students and students, students
  and teachers). To be respectful and understand
  other perspectives.

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Relationships continued

• I had no idea what was going on in the Kara
  Walker show. Going through it with my teachers
  and classmates helped me better to know it wasnt
  crazy. In fact it was real.
• I was surprised they (teachers) trusted us to do
  this. It was really heavy and hard to deal with.

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Relationship continued

• We talked about it and got over being awkward.
  Finally we were talking straight to the point. We
  had to dig deep into what we thought. We knew we
  were safe to do that.

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Art Goal

• Artists use their work to convey meaning.  I
  wanted to see them use artistic tools and
  concepts to create meaning for the themselves.

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Quotes about Art

• Completely different.  Weve never gone to a
  museum. Never seen an art show
• We were more focused on art.  It felt like we
  were missing a whole month of history
• The show (Kara Walker show) expresses the hatred
  in a very clear way. . .maybe her goal is to lead
  people into this emotion.

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Art quotes continued

• You have to make the meaning for yourself. The
  purpose of the exaggerated is to bring attention
  to what it was like.  If it wasnt vulgar,
  shocking, violent it wouldnt make a statement
• Id have liked more time to look at the exhibit,
  look deeply into stuff in particular.
• Watching the movie helped a lot. It gave me a
  different perspective. Like what Walker might be
  thinking.

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Art quotes continued

• We have a better understanding of the resources
  to understand art.
• I know what I am talking about when I see art. It
  taught me a way to look at art.

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History Goal

• Historical Content should be present in the
  creation and presentation of the student works of
  art.
• Knowledge verses Understanding

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Quotes about History

• Actually I think the history book told us about
  that kind of history, its just not a picture,
  its words. But, when I saw the pictures, its a
  different experience than reading. I havent got
  more knowledge, but I understand it better.

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History quotes continued

• I knew what racism was and how it effected
  people. . .but I saw racism in a different way
  after going to the exhibit. I never realized how
  harsh and sexual and creepy it was. Well I did, I
  just never saw something like this, when it was
  big, and displayed on the wall like it was, it
  was so strong that now I understand a little more
  about the history of slavery and racism.

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History quotes continued

• Idea for Kara Walker piece and immigration, Army
  green silloutes for boarder patrol, brown for
  Latin American immigrants. Putting the abuse of
  immigrat as they cross to the U.S. Kara Walker
  style. (not gonna happen)

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History quotes continued

• I used the stereotypes and things (in his work)
  that we use today about racism, and Kara Walker
  used the Stereotypes from way back, and it kind a
  came out to me as like present to past
  stereotypes in the world.
• I know that the history of racism was bad,
  filled with anger, people killing each other and
  so on. But what Ive learned is that it goes
  father than what we know about it today. It kind
  a woke me up to the real world that was kind a
  been hidden from us.

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History continued

• A lot of us realized the truth about slavery. I
  got a better understanding of going to that
  limit. (When questioned about what he meant by
  limit the group began a discussion of power
  including the brutality of slavery, racism, and
  sexual behavior. How they hadnt understood what
  really happened before even though they had
  studied slavery and the Civil War. They all
  agreed that Kara Walker displayed a truth about
  racism and slavery they hadnt known before.

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Other indicators

• Grades
• Attendance

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Two Student Examples

• Valerie
• Kenny

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Conclusions

• Miss K said that were the ones that can stop
  racism. Us a group. If anybody can do it, its us
  for sure.