The Care and Feeding of a TAB Choice-Based Art Program

Joyce Moore Jaime Evergreen Elementary School Shelton, Washington

What is TAB? Teaching for Artistic Behavior

Developed over past 30 years by classroom teachers and through classes at Massachusetts College of Art

TAB is a collection of shared strategies that focus on the belief that children benefit from authentic experiences based on their individual interests.

TAB is a philosophy, a methodology, and a professional learning community.

What is the research base?

TAB borrows from Howard Gardener's multiple intelligences, Victor Lowenfeld's work with children's developmental stages of art, constructivism's focus on following children's interests, collaboration, and individualizing instruction. Harvard's Project Zero: Eight Habits of Mind inform the pedagogy as well.

Eight Habits of Mind from Studio Thinking

Develop craft – learn to use and care for tools and materials (brushes, viewfinders)

Engage and persist - Learning to embrace problems of relevance within the art world and/or of personal importance, to develop focus and other mental states

conducive to working and persevering at art tasks.

Envision - Learning to picture mentally what cannot be directly observed and imagine possible next steps in making a piece.

Express - Learning to create works that convey an idea, a feeling, or a personal meaning.

Observe - Learning to attend to visual contexts more closely than ordinary "looking" requires, and thereby to see things that otherwise might not be seen.

Reflect

Question & Explain: Learning to think and talk with others about an aspect of one’s work or working process.

Evaluate: Learning to judge one’s own work and working process and the work of others in relation to standards of the field.

Stretch & Explore - Learning to reach beyond one's capacities, to explore playfully without a preconceived plan, and to embrace the opportunity to learn from mistakes and accidents.

Understand Art World

Domain: Learning about art history and current practice.

Communities: Learning to interact as an artist with other artists (e.g, in classrooms, in local arts organizations, and across the art field) and within the broader society.

What does a TAB teacher do?

Provides mini-lessons on techniques Guides students as they explore media Provides extensions and “next steps” for student

artists Plans for reflection and assessment Encourages students to display Advocates for student artists in the community Helps learning community understand

developmental stages in children's art Collaborates with classroom teachers

What is the role of the student?

TAB students are artists who experience the process of artmaking by taking an idea, gathering materials, setting up a workspace, creating art, and cleaning up the studio area.

What does a TAB classoom look like?

Among the possibilities:

Individual studios devoted to specific media Centralized storage with open tables Students at assigned seats but with individualized

materials Art on a cart – choices travel with teacher Shared space with other teachers (storage available

or not, display semi-permanent or not)

A student in a TAB program can:

Make art for a variety of purposes Paint, draw, cut, stencil, paste, sew, weave, make

puppets, fold origami, design Notan, collaborate with a friend, build sculptures from paper and cardboard, papier maché, print, make books, draw cartoons, work with clay, build with blocks, read about famous artists, draw from models, and invent new methods of artmaking

Reflect on the creative process and relate those thoughts via artists' statements

Resources and ReferencesTeachingForArtisticBehavior.orgEvergreenArt.Birdsong.orgTab-ChoiceArtEd@yahoogroups.compzweb.harvard.edu/Research/Research.htm

Douglas, Katherine M. & Jaquith, Diane B., Engaging Learners Through Artmaking, Choice-Based Art Education in the Classroom. New York: Teachers College Press, 2009

Hetland, L., Winner, E., Veenema, S., & Sheridan, K., Studio Thinking: The Real Benefits of Visual Arts Education. New York: Teachers College Press, 2007

Lowenfeld, Viktor, Your Child and His Art. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1965

Theory of Multiple Intelligences. Retrieved October 5, 2009 from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_multiple_intelligences