In response to your previous post, I have found art to be a very important subject for primary students in relief teaching. It is a very powerful medium in a challenging class and also for the inclusive students, including those who don't have much English or in wheelchairs or with mental health issues. I had a very difficult grade 5/6 class this week which included a group of 5 boys intent on constant revenge, bullying and disruptive behaviour. The senior staff give invaluable assistance and support at this school but you still have to get through the day and work hard to give the students meaningful experiences. It's important to me to be the best I can be but sometimes it seems nothing works. I thought I had a bad day but the principal told me it was a good day as she had heard the students talking about their Crazy Hair Day artworks in the playground during lunch and she said that doesn't normally happen and was a good sign. So from me I say "if the day is not going well, turn to art".
Media
Most primary classrooms I have been in this year during relief teaching, have a bank of about 5 computers set up at the side of the room and some classrooms have had a computer lab close by where the class may split and work in both rooms. Girls generally seem to work well on projects, although that said, I have regularly had grade 5 girls who just want to look up images of One Direction or Justin Beeber, but boys are often just wanting to play repetative games of building up and smashing down or jumping obstacles or some inappropriate games that show the shedding of blood by knocking off body parts when an obstacle is hit. These all come under the guise of so called "Maths Games". Media products add a whole new dimension into classroom management for the teacher. There are positive and negatives for its use. Every class seems to have one boy who won't engage in other work and just wants to be on the computer all the time and will invent the most amazing excuses as to why he wants to be on the computer. In art teaching, I find a number of students are unable to form their own creative ideas and want to scroll though images on the computer for so called inspiration. They generally don't accomplish much during the lesson.
Once I have established some rules for responsible use of computers in the classroom, I generally have students use them in lessons as much as possible and take names on a list and set use at about 20 minutes each group. Students respond well to this structure and fairness. There is always some students who are not interested in using the computers and get on with their individual artworks. I privately appreciate this attitude.
In art projects I often combine the art project with science ie in a regular 5/6 class we discussed animal hair fibres, looked at prepared slides in a microscope, chosen students searched google images for microscopic images of hairs and they used them to refer to in creating circular artworks of microscopic images of animal hairs.
Grades 3 to 6 have opportunities to produce powerpoint presentations on events happening at school or for special days like Anzac Day and the weekly assembly offers them an opportunity to show their products. They seem to take special responsible ownership of these appropriate creative projects. The democratic principle works well. They need help to get underway but respond well when left to complete the task over time and only require occasional checking to make sure they are on the right track or make suggestions for improvement. I also find the updated facilities like picture tools in Microsoft Word are excellent for engaging students in computer generated artworks. I believe success in use of media creatively in primary school is down to the teacher's experience and how they work with their students in this area. An interesting point that I have observed is where student may sometimes be embarrassed to show their artwork, they are always proud of anything they produce using the computer.
I am looking forward when I finally get my own permanent class to engaging student in more creative and responsible use of computers to enhance creative projects like short films and photo manipulation and of course they are very excited to be able to create cartoon characters. Scaffolding toward this can start with a simple computer game where the students build moving stick figures.
Good resources to read or look at for media use in primary education:
Greenwood, D. (2003). Action! In the Classroom: A Guide to Student Produced Digital Video in K-12 Education. Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield Education.
Shelley, G., Cashman, T. Gunter, G. (2004). Teachers Discovering Computers - Integrating Technology in the Classroom. Massachusetts: Course Technology.
Gunn, K. (2008). Teach Animation. Retrieved from http://www.teaching.org
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