Spring Quarter 2026

Critique Sentence Stems

I chose my critique sentence stems that I created for my internship because it was discipline literacy scaffolding that I used many times. These sentence stems were used in Ceramics 1, 2, 3 and Graphic Design. The sentence stems are adapted to the language levels of my students by bolding the key art vocabulary terms, provides definitions for less commonly known terms, and gives students a "fill in the blank" structure for accessibility. Because all of my students are new to critique and have various levels of language levels, I knew they needed to have language focused scaffolds to help them build their academic language for critiquing art. My artifact of sentence stems are adaptable to all mediums and can be used for future lessons. I centered the sentence stems on the elements of art and design principles, which are core concepts for all levels of art ability. The sentence stems are designed to help students fill in the blanks based on their own observations of the art they are critiquing in a way that expresses their assessment using academic language. These sentence stems are a key scaffold that helped them build their oral and written language skills centered on art vocabulary.

This artifact is an example of MIT Strand Four: Planning, Instruction, and Assessment because it shows how I am capable of designing and enacting meaningful instruction with scaffolds to build student knowledge, skills, and understandings to high levels of art vocabulary. These sentence stems were crucial for my students for their critiques and for writing their own artist statements.

References:

Echevarría, J., Vogt, M., & Short, D. (2012). Selected readings. Making content comprehensible for English learners: The SIOP model. Pearson Education, Inc.

Gibbons, P. (2015). Chapter 8: Developing an integrated curriculum: Learning language,
learning through language, and learning about language (pp. 206-231). Scaffolding language
scaffolding learning (2nd edition). Heinemann

Structured Academic Controversy- What makes a good design in art?

Link to lesson plan here.

This lesson is my launch and inquiry lesson plan as an intro for a new graphic design unit. The lesson is centered on introducing various examples of graphic design posters with an inquiry group activity to help students home in the styles and methods of graphic design that they are drawn to, elements they enjoy most, and which styles/methods/elements they do not enjoy. This is to help them identify and articulate their artistic preferences and hear from their peers their opinions on which styles they like/don’t like. This is also a skill building for future peer art critiques that I hope to introduce as one of the final units for this semester. This lesson will help build their experience and confidence in justifying their artistic choices and for articulating their own personal artistic styles.

The students are shown the examples of the numerous styles of design and are prompted to give a thumbs up, thumbs down to signify whether or not they like the design. For my CLD and MLL students, I have included the option for signaling a thumbs up or thumbs down to express likes/dislikes during the slideshow to help them feel confident in expressing their opinions. The slides include representations from disabled artists, non-binary, LGBTQIA+, black, indigenous, Pacific Islander, and women artists. Students are prompted to share why or why not they like the designs using the principles of design to justify their stances. The lesson expands into a structured academic controversy where the students have to reach group consensus on a set of designs on whether or not they're good or bad. The student groups then present to the class their group consensus on why or why not the design is good or bad. This lesson artifact connects to Strand 3: Learning Environment because it shows I am capable of facilitating an inclusive and culturally sustaining learning community in my classroom that fosters a sense of belonging and agency for each student.

The slideshow then concludes with the explanation that there actually is no right answer on what makes a good or bad design. This is because all art is open to interpretation

Reference:

Morrison, P. (2017) Strawberries in Watsonville: Putting family and student knowledge at
the center of the curriculum. In Barbian, E., González, G. C., & Mejía, P. (Eds), Rethinking
bilingual education: Welcoming home languages in our classrooms (pp. 220-228).
Rethinking Schools, Ltd.

Gibbons, P. (2015). Scaffolding language, scaffolding learning: Teaching second language learners in the mainstream classroom (2nd edition). Heinemann

Respecting and Honoring Oppressed Cultures by Combatting Art Appropriation

Link to lesson here.

This is my 2nd lesson in my Face Jug ceramics unit. This lesson is focused on studying institutions that appropriate art from black communities and artists who show their appreciation of historically black art forms. The objective of the lesson is to reinforce the importance of diversity in art and how we as artists can avoid appropriation in our art practice.

During my spring internship, more than half of my student population was black or mixed. This is why it was extremely important to me to make sure I had a unit that centered the experiences of being Black in America, the incredible artists that emerged during slavery, and how we as artists in the classroom and honor and respect them in the art world by avoiding appropriation. This lesson centers the elements of critical pedagogy by having students think critically about their position, status, and situations in life. The lesson gives students tools to question and challenge oppression through critical thinking and encouraging social critique.

In this lesson, students will be presented with a Smithsonian display of a face jug with no acknowledgement to the slave and West African traditions that originated the design , then a 2nd example from the Museum Of Natural History of another face jug (very similar to the first) with a well articulated acknowledgement of the slave practice of making face jugs and it’s roots in West Africa. Students are then prompted to complete a graphic organizer with both images/descriptions and make a list of what they observe is different and similar between the two.

The students then move into listening to a public radio podcast episode where a Southern white ceramicist (Ed Klimek) who makes face jugs is interviewed and asked about the history of face jugs (who notably admits to not knowing the history), then it moves into a discussion between historians about how white artists continue to appropriate this West African tradition under the guise of “folk art”. The historians discuss how they’ve been able to pinpoint face jugs coming to America via a single slave ship in the early 1800’s that escaped maritime law by sailing so fast they crash landed on Jekyll Island.

Students watch a video from Jim McDowell, a black ceramicist who creates face jugs for social justice by mirroring the practices of enslaved potter, David Drake, who used to write poetry critical of slavery on his pots in the 1800’s.

Students then revisit the compare + contrast notes from the Smithsonian and Museum of Natural History. They will reflect in their sketchbooks on how they would feel if they were descendants of David Drake and saw the Smithsonian displaying his art with no acknowledgement to his status of being enslaved and the West African tradition he was continuing. The lesson then concludes with a discussion on the importance of diversity in art and how we as artists can do our best to protect these stories by avoiding appropriation.

This artifact exemplifies our MIT Strand One: Social Justice and Identity because it shows how I have developed my identity as an anti-racist, humanizing teacher working for social justice by exploring the concepts of appropriation in art and setting expectations for my own classroom on how we as artists can honor the art forms from oppressed peoples. This lesson shows my priority of combatting oppression by having students understand appropriation and how we can avoid appropriating art in our practice.

References:

Hammond, Z.L. (2014). Chapter 6: Establishing Alliance in the Learning Partnership:
Becoming an Ally to Help Build Students’ Independence (pp. 88 – 101). Culturally Responsive Teaching and The Brain: Promoting Authentic Engagement and Rigor Among Culturally and
Linguistically Diverse Students. Corwin

Nieto, S., & Bode, P. (2020). Chapter 5: Culture, identity, and learning. Affirming diversity: The sociopolitical context of multicultural education (7th ed.) (pp. 137-151). Pearson

Yosso, T.J. (2005). Whose culture has capital? A critical race theory discussion of community cultural wealth. Race Ethnicity and Education, 8(1), 77-81.

Expression and Vulnerability in Self-Portraits

I chose the below series of artifacts of my student's digital self-portraits alongside their artist statements because this set of student work connects to MIT strand 3 of humanizing students, safe environment, working in community. For this unit, we focused on building community with one another in the graphic design studio through a series of community connections activities (see Winter Quarter 2025) to help build connections in preparation for the level of vulnerability that would come with designing and presenting personalized self-portraits. The artifacts of their artist statements are evidence of the success of building connections in the studio to create the safe space needed as artists for fully realized self-expression. Their artist statements provide explanations of how they developed their self-portrait designs, why they chose the symbolism they chose, and gave students the opportunity to describe to viewers how they want their art to be interpretated.

Reference:

The elements I used to incorporate myself are myself, because I need myself to show that it’s about me and my identity, my best friend who is very close to me, and the picture I chose to create, which depicts a very unique moment in my life when I got to go to the Seahawks parade with my close friends. I got inspiration from the moment I chose to draw because it was so close to my life, so I wanted to share it through my art. For the principles of design, I used a pattern in the windows of the building as they repeat the same shape, combined with space, with my brother, Otis, and I taking the forefront, and the rest taking up the background. For elements of art, I used color with all of the colors in the clothes, skin, eyes, and the background, and I used texture in the clothes, hair, and clouds to give emphasis.

The theme I was exploring was the power of unity and friendship bonds because they are important to what I believe in. My connection to my work is the moment in time that I was recreating because it meant so much to me, and my experience of life with my friends. My impact that I am trying to achieve is the audience discovers the importance of friendship and everyday bonds in their lives

In my self portrait assignment, i included over three things i enjoy, like my friends, my favorite shirt, favorite necklace, favorite game symbol and clef to signify my hobbies. All of these things together make up me, because they are all so valuable to my life. I got my idea from Ms. Jada, in her brush stroke design. I used brush strokes and anchor points to outline my image, using different colors from my body using the color picker tool. This let me use value, as I was able to make darker and lighter parts depending on how much light it got, and later I traced around photos of my friends, as they are my source of inspiration everyday.

I used the element of arts, like line, value, and shape from how I drew myself in my portrait. For the principles of design I used emphasis because I centered myself on the image drawing the viewers eyes to me first, then repetition, in my usage of brush strokes, throughout the project I used the same line shape with slightly longer strokes sometimes. For the final principal I used Balance, Including something in each vertical third of my portrait. For a quick run-down, I first inserted a photo of everything I wanted on there, then outlined the photos with anchor points to create a clipping mask after grouping them, then used brush strokes with different lengths and colors to reach my product. This also goes for the paper background, with the clipping mask tool, and for the background I used the shape tool with a crosshatch filter over it to keep the effect of "paper'. Hope this concluded my artist statement

I created this portrait in Adobe Illustrator, focusing only on the pen tool to create vector lines and shapes. Using the pen tool to trace over my original sketch for this project and obtaining different layers for the different pieces, the shirt, pants, my body, the hair, etc. On every new shape, I made a new layer. Adding more of a unique style of shading using shapes on my hair, making the tool a darker colour for my hair and making triangular shapes to make that unique, different kind of shading. I again used the triangular kind of reflection for my bubbles to make that "realistic" kind of feel, even though my portrait looks more cartoonish. I incorporated the paintbrush tool to make details in the grass, making it look more realistic. I additionally used it for the shine of the bubbles, giving it the reflection look.

The elements that I included in this piece are bubbles because they had a lot of impact on me as a kid growing up, which is pretty silly. I included bubbles because a lot of people do say I am a bubbly kind of person, intermingled with the fact that they were a big part of my childhood. Merging memories of my grandpa, who passed away. His form of communicating, whilst he was suffering with dementia and cancer, was to draw bubbles and give them to me. I knew it was always a way he would communicate with me and throughout my family, which was really special to me. I unified bright colours in this piece to show the happiness and brightness I had as a kid. Another important element that I signified in this piece is the sunflower. I mingled this because yellow is my favourite colour. but also has that nostalgic feel, innocent yet hopeful. Combining the flower with one of my favourite songs, "All Flowers in Time Bend Towards the Sun," by Jeff Buckley and Elizabeth Fraser. Additionally, I also made myself look like a horse. I incorporated a horse because they're my favourite animal. Overall, in this project, I was able to express and show meaningful things in such a basic form, and I really enjoyed that.

I used contrast and asymmetry to show the weird feeling of being stuck in your own head. By putting a bright, textured fish on the dock and myself in the water, I’m using emphasis to show that my fears are the ones in charge of the situation. The fish has all these warm colors and scratchy lines, while the water is a flat, cool blue, which makes the two worlds feel totally separate.

The curved line of the fishing rod is a big part of the composition because it connects the top and bottom of the page, leading your eyes straight to the hook. I also used negative space in the sky to make the underwater part feel more crowded and heavy. The quote helps balance the image and explains the theme: that we stay in prison just because we are scared of failing. I wanted to show that sometimes the safe choice is actually what holds us back in life. I used a shape maker, pen tool, paint brush, line segment, type tool, and gradient to create my art work.

I hope when people look at my art, they reflect on their life and wonder what fears control their lives and how they can take back that control and live their life how they want to.