from Willowbrook Elementary — Altoona, Iowa

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Biography

Everyone has a story... and that story is worth making art about.

If my students leave my classroom with nothing else, I hope they leave believing that their thoughts & experiences are rich and worthy of expressing creatively. I remember my school art experiences - the teacher would assign a drawing or painting and I would sit there and think, "I don't know what to draw." My mind was blank, and didn't know what to do about it!

I am thankful to have completed both my BA and MA through the New Art Basics program at Iowa State University. This program went beyond learning media and elements & principles. We learned how to teach the thinking skills that artists use, how and why artists make art. I learned so much about how to make art experiences relevant to students' lives. In recent years, I've been incorporating a TAB (Teaching for Artistic Behavior) model in the art room, which makes the art making process much more student-directed.
I've been teaching elementary art for Southeast Polk Schools in Altoona, Iowa since 1991. The best part of my job is working with students over a six year period, watching their personalities emerge and their skills develop. As I have experimented with different teaching strategies over the years, I'm excited and pleased to say that I don't see any Blank Brains here!

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