I believe that I was always meant to be an art teacher. Despite going through ten years of school without art education classes, my childhood revolved around creating. My grandfather was an art teacher, and he made sure I had every possible opportunity to create. He never turned down any of my ideas, and he always found a way to make them possible. He encouraged me to discover, to try, to play, and to create. If I made a mistake, it wasn’t the end of the world, but an opportunity to think creatively and find a way to take my mistake and turn it into something amazing. He pushed me to stay true to myself and to be confident in everything I did. Because of my grandfather, my goal is to be the kind of art teacher that lets students’ interests and ideas lead the learning. He showed me how important it is not to squash a student’s ideas; but to assist them in researching and pursuing those curiosities because it will build their sense of confidence, stimulate their thirst for knowledge, nurture their creativity, and widen their world.
Over the last few years, I have developed a strong sense of what it means to be a teacher, who I want to be as a teacher, and the type of curriculum I aspire to implement. As a means of summarizing the key concepts I have learned and found that I am drawn to, I have created the following teaching manifesto:
My Teaching Manifesto
Emma K. Jebe
Over the last few years, I have developed a strong sense of what it means to be a teacher, who I want to be as a teacher, and the type of curriculum I aspire to implement. As a means of summarizing the key concepts I have learned and found that I am drawn to, I have created the following teaching manifesto:
My Teaching Manifesto
- My goal is to inspire students to learn more.
- I will teach with the intention of making my role unnecessary.
- I will create possibilities in which students are able to construct knowledge for themselves.
- I will provide educational opportunities that aim to engage students in thinking creatively and critically, asking questions, developing ideas, researching concepts, and making connections.
- I aim for my students to leave my classroom equipped to learn and create on their own.
- The main objective of my curriculum is to further develop students’ abilities to pursue their own questions and interests.
- My curriculum will be based on enabling constraints in which artmaking is guided by inquiry and limited by a few rules that drive the artmaking process.
- My curriculum will guide students through artmaking in ways that resemble contemporary art practices.
- My curriculum will be structured in a way that situates inquiry within lived experiences, cultures, contexts, and a range of disciplinary knowledge.
- I will assist students in the exploration of their tangential ideas to discover unexpected educational opportunities.
- I will be transparent with students about the curriculum in order to engage students in the process of creating their own meaningful educational experiences.
- I will engage students’ life experiences in the development of my curriculum in the hopes of helping students find the educational value in all life experiences inside and outside of school.
- I will not teach students with the goal of preparing them only for the future.
- I will teach students in a way that values students’ past, present, and future.
- My curriculum will grow with individual students’ interests and experiences.
- I will not assign work without asking students what they are interested in and what would make the assignment more meaningful to them.
- I will only implement activities that promote creativity and the expansion of knowledge.
- My assignments will encourage independent learning.
- My assignments will be guided by the students’ interests and curiosities.
- I will not assign work that is irrelevant to students.
- I will not assign work that is meaningless to students.
- I will let my students fail in small ways and try to find their own solution before I step in.
- I will require students to reflect on their thoughts, choices, and decisions throughout their artmaking process.
- I will not assess students’ work on how well they did it the way I wanted them to.
- I will have students assess themselves on their process and effort.
- I will do my best to encourage students to work together and create a collaborative environment.
- I will be a guide of social interactions.
- I will be a support for student when they need help.
- I will provide an environment that encourages and supports learning through social interactions.
- I will create an environment in which students have opportunities to acknowledge and challenge structural limitations.
- I will do my best to be aware of students’ impulses and desires in order to help guide them through the process of exploring them.
- I will encourage students to let me know if they are not able to find any meaning or benefit in the work.
- I will use my lived experiences with my students to better understand how they learn and what will spark their interests and curiosities.
- I will show my students that I care about them through my daily actions and curriculum.
- I will always value students’ thought and ideas.
- I will always listen to students to find out what it is that they want to learn.
- I will strive to create a classroom in which the power is distributed as horizontally as possible.
- I will encourage my students to question my ideas, what we are doing, and my reasoning because there is something wrong if I am not able to answer those questions.
- I will not reinforce the idea of the “other” when discussing different cultures.
- I will teach students that all cultures are always in transition.
- My curriculum will focus on developing students’ critical thinking skills.
- I will be upfront with students about the issues and power imbalances within our history.
- I will include a variety of artists with different backgrounds in my curriculum in a way that does not essentialize or flatten different cultures.
- Instead of asking, “How can we represent other cultures,” I will ask, “What can we know about different cultures?”
- I will let my students get to know me as a person.
- I will be critical of myself.
- I will reflect on myself and my teaching daily.
- I will admit to my students when I make a mistake or do not know something so that I can show them how I go about solving the problem or finding the answer.
Emma K. Jebe