My Art Educations: Learning to Embrace the Dialogism in a Lifetime of Teaching and Learning Experiences. DISSERTATION Presented

My Art Educations: Learning to Embrace the Dialogism in a Lifetime of Teaching and Learning

Experiences.

DISSERTATION

Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University

Andrew Lawrence Moffatt

Graduate Program in Arts Administration, Education and Policy

The Ohio State University

2018

Dissertation Committee:

Dr. Shari Savage, advisor

Dr. Deborah Smith-Shank

Dr. Joni Boyd Acuff

Copyrighted by

Andrew Lawrence Moffatt

2018

Abstract

The goal of this autoethnographic narrative inquiry is to develop a pragmatic theory of dialogism, liminality, and hybridity that applies to art educators reflecting the following questions: How can graduate school and a teaching practice interact dialogically? How can the liminal spaces between graduate school (theory) and art teaching (practice) be more productive?

How can an art teacher thrive as a hybrid of teacher/learner? I identify instances of dialogic co- constructed knowledge but monologic or dialectic experiences have been more prevalent. By interpreting and analyzing my art educations a theory is developed to optimize educational interaction to enhance learning experiences of teachers, and consequently learning experiences of their students.

Acknowledgments

Many educators have taught and inspired me through the four degrees I have earned from

The Ohio State University. The university educators make up one half of the equation that is my art education. The other half is my colleagues from public education. Some of these people guided and/or taught alongside me for decades. Together these two communities have greatly influenced the experiences upon which this dissertation is based, and I thank them for working with me.

Dr. Shari Savage took on the role as advisor to a part-time, middle-aged graduate student and guided me through the very long process of how to better connect with art education academia. The evolution of my research into something that remains personal and also academically rigorous is due in large part to her thoughtful guidance. Dr. Debbie Smith-Shank helped hone my writing into a more readable and scholarly text, and I could not have written this dissertation without her help.

My lengthy engagement with the university and completing this dissertation could not have happened without the love and understanding of Lisa. She realized how personally important it was for me to continue this somewhat selfish pursuit. As an often physically and emotionally absent husband throughout this process, I acknowledge the burden I created for both of us. I can’t return the time that I consumed, but I can be more present and attentive from this day forward.

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Vita

1979...... Northland High School, Columbus, Ohio

1983...... B. F. A., The Ohio State University

1987...... B. A. E., The Ohio State University

1988 to present ...... Art teacher, Worthington City Schools

1997 …………………………………………M. A. E., The Ohio State University

1989 to present ………………………………Graduate student, The Ohio State University

Field of Study

Major Field: Arts Administration, Education and Policy

Table of Contents

Abstract ...... ii

Acknowledgments...... iii

Vita ...... iv

Table of Contents ...... v

List of Figures ...... x

Chapter 1: Introduction ...... 1

Overview ...... 1

Problem Statement ...... 3

Statement of Purpose ...... 4

Research Questions ...... 5

Overview of Methodology ...... 7

Rationale and Significance ...... 7

Role of the Researcher ...... 9

Researcher Assumptions ...... 9

Definitions of Key Terminology ...... 10

Organization of Dissertation ...... 12

Chapter 2: Review of Literature ...... 14

John Dewey ...... 15

Dewey’s Emphasis on Experiential Learning ...... 17

Dewey’s Foundational Pragmatism ...... 21

Dewey’s Approach to Knowledge Construction and Truth ...... 23

Summary ...... 24

Understandings of Dialogism ...... 24

Understandings of Liminality and Hybridity ...... 28

Understandings of Third Space ...... 31

Summary of Literature ...... 38

Chapter 3: Research Methods ...... 40

Methodological Approach ...... 40

Narrative Inquiry ...... 47

Autoethnography ...... 50

Practitioner Research...... 58

Research Design, Strategy and “Data” Collection ...... 61

Issues of Trustworthiness ...... 61

Summary ...... 66

Chapter 4: Research Findings (My Narratives) ...... 68

Overview ...... 68

Teaching and Learning ...... 72

My Art Educations ...... 77

Dialectic and Dialogic Relationships ...... 79

Three First Days in Three Distinct Spaces ...... 81

Beacon Street School ...... 85

Sharing Another Teacher’s Room ...... 99

Looking back at getting my own room ...... 110

The Transition to Elementary School...... 113

First years at Beacon Street ...... 118

The Uneventful Middle Years ...... 120

Returning to OSU (again) ...... 121

A Career Milestone ...... 124

The Drive I Made Three Years Ago ...... 128

Doctoral candidacy as an end to liminality? ...... 132

Dr. Walden and Thinking about Artmaking...... 138

Big Ideas (2004) ...... 138

Visual Culture (2007) ...... 141

Image or Meaning (2008) ...... 145

Lacan (2009) ...... 148

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Deleuze and Guatarri (2011 and 2012) ...... 151

Approachable Academics ...... 154

Layers of Proof ...... 158

Can Artman be an Academic? ...... 163

Epiphanies ...... 167

College Epiphany ...... 167

Epiphany about teaching ...... 174

Expanded Arts ...... 177

Summary ...... 180

Chapter 5: Finding and Interpretations ...... 182

Introduction ...... 182

Patterns and Themes...... 182

Dewey Themes ...... 183

Continuity, Interaction, and Purpose ...... 183

Pragmatism ...... 186

Themes of Bakhtin’s Dialogism and Bhabha’s Hybridity ...... 188

Recognizing Dialogue ...... 189

Monologism: Centrifugal and Centripetal Forces ...... 191

Themes of Third Space ...... 191

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Recognizing a Opportunities for a Productive Third Space ...... 192

Addressing Research Questions ...... 193

What are the cultural, site specific understandings that I have placed in intellectually

disconnected and often polemic positions? What are my assumptions about school, graduate

school, and liminal sites? ...... 194

How can I apply dialogic understandings to the three educational cultures (graduate school,

teaching practice, and the liminal space between) I seek to understand? ...... 196

How can I change my perception of the liminal boundary spaces between teaching and

learning into areas for opportunities for co-created knowledge creation in (a) theory and

practice, (b) graduate school and elementary school, and (c) the past and present? ...... 197

Examining My Roles ...... 197

Recommendations for Further Study ...... 198

References ...... 200

List of Figures

Figure 1. Grade School Picture ...... 68

Figure 2. Grade school art award ...... 69

Figure 3. Typical Teacher Comment ...... 70

Figure 4. 60s Industrial Style at Beacon Street and Hopkins Hall...... 86

Figure 5. Safety Glass ...... 88

Figure 6. Art Room Window ...... 91

Figure 7. School Photos from my first year part-time and full-time 1988 and 1991 ...... 96

Figure 8. A. Moffatt. (2005). Ida's Chair. [Acrylic]. and Detail ...... 146

Figure 9. Several Versions of Artman ...... 165

Figure 10. A. Moffatt. (1983). Cat on Bob. [Acrylic]...... 171

Figure 11. A. Moffatt. (1983). Untitled. [Acrylic]...... 172

Figure 12. Opening Reception for Two-person Show at the Ohio Union ...... 172

Chapter 1: Introduction

Overview

The focus of this research is how one practitioner/graduate student navigated art teaching and graduate art education simultaneously. This study will illuminate the dialectic and dialogic aspects of (a) theory and practice, (b) graduate school and elementary school, and (c) the relation between past experience and the present in my art education experiences over three decades. The most familiar settings for my art educations are the school where I teach and the university where

I learn. However, I will explore other less formal non- traditional educational practices that take place in and outside the institutional settings. Educators at varied levels will find commonalities with issues addressed in this study. Having engaged in of decades of art education, I have come to understand art, art education and myself in a manner specific to my experiences. These understandings have been characterized by liminality. This characteristic can be viewed positively if considered dialogically.

I have a long engagement in art education, in a variety of roles. I have been an art student, art education student, art teacher and art education graduate student. Some of my art education experiences are unexceptional. For instance, many art teachers have also experienced an art education similar to mine. Unlike most art teachers I have continued my college art education well beyond the education needed to achieve teaching certification. Thirty years of art teaching experience and close to forty years of college learning experience does not necessarily equate to a dissertation-worthy research study. However, the interplay of the two disparate, yet related education experiences (art teaching practice and graduate art education study) is a significant educational phenomenon.

This research is pertinent because it represents aspects of continuing art education that are navigated by many art teachers and should be of interest to graduate art education programs.

My art education experiences represent a degree of insider/outsider status in two realms. For long periods of time, I was acting simultaneously as teacher and student, and at times experiencing dis-engagement from both roles (my elementary art teaching practice and my graduate art education studies). I often felt less than fully connected with or fully accepted in either culture.

The study was conducted as an autoethnographic narrative inquiry. I address teaching and learning as an art education practitioner and as an art education student. The work of three scholars has influenced this research: Dewey, Bakhtin, and Bhabha. Primarily I depend upon

Dewey (1929, 1938) for his attention to the role of experience in education. I have framed this research to examine the factors that have influenced how I have navigated my art educations over a long period in and around a variety of institutions. Dewey’s analysis of experience inspires and validates my investigation into art education experiences. Bakhtin (1981) is influential in understanding the relativist nature of all knowledge. Bhabha (1994) addresses issues related to the thinking that creates cultural identity. My cultural identity is related to my art education roles which I understand in relation to teaching and learning simultaneously. My educational success is directly related to the degree in which my role as an educator and student has employed dialogic thinking.

This study contributes to a body of knowledge for art education practitioners.

Practitioners regularly navigate the spaces in and between theory and practice. Theoretical learning, graduate school and experience need not function separately from the practice of an

elementary art teacher. Using dialogism as a guiding principle can lead to enhanced, meaningful teaching and learning experiences.

Problem Statement

Two problems exist in art education related to this study. Too few art teachers take advantage of graduate art education experiences, and those who do may fail to take advantage of all the dialogic possibilities of being a teacher/graduate student. A dialogic relationship between teaching and graduate learning may lead to increased participation by practicing teachers in graduate school.

There is a real or imagined chasm separating many practicing art teachers and the university art education programs that provide graduate studies beyond the courses required for teaching licensure. Although art teachers and graduate art education programs would seemingly share the common vision of advancing art education, few practitioners choose to engage meaningfully with the university after their initial teacher training. Art teachers, perhaps most importantly, veteran art teachers, who do not participate in continuing graduate education in their fields, are likely missing opportunities for professional and personal growth. Graduate art education studies provide exposure to current thinking and trends in our field as well as opportunities to delve more deeply into schools of thought that may have only been briefly addressed, or not addressed, in previous teacher training. Also, as pure intellectual exercise, art education in graduate school allows for a multitude of themes and stances to investigate.

A versatile and knowledgeable art teacher is molded through a variety of ongoing formal education experiences and on-the-job experiences. Wilson (2005) and Tavin (2010) examine the three sites of art education (the visual world, school, and a third space between). Students utilize the third space to create meaning. Similar sites exist inside and outside the art classroom and

have applications for examining practice and graduate studies. Bakhtin (1981) and Bhabha

(1994) examine the difficulties and advantages of dual identity, such as that of a practicing teacher engaged in graduate studies. I posit that the element missing in art teaching practice and art education is a dialogic relationship that could exist in the third space.

Both Bakhtin (1981) and Bhabha (1994) support knowledge creation that is dialogic in nature. Ideally, knowledge can be co-constructed, understandings reached from multiple perspectives, and two or more perspectives are genuinely represented. Having often functioned in the dual roles of teacher and student simultaneously, I feel it is important to try to understand issues related to identity and education culture through the lens of Bakhtin and Bhabha and their thoughts on dialogism and third space.

The traditional dissertation format encourages the statement of a problem. This in itself has become a problem for me. My research does not address a problem in the traditional sense.

Receiving an art education is not a problem, nor is a long engagement with art education, such as

I have experienced, a problem. Almost all education is a good thing and I suggest that everyone should get as much education as possible. Although the length of my engagement with art education may be admirable, I have often failed to examine and analyze the dialogic and dialectic nature of my educational interactions.

Statement of Purpose

I feel that my art educations have been an important part of developing who I am as an artist, a teacher and as a thinker. I value my art educations. I would like to think that my teaching, which is in many respects a direct reflection of my art educations, provides a foundation or starting point for the future art educations of my students. Perhaps some of these students will also engage in a lengthy contemporaneous relationship with art education as I have.

However, I and I assume others engage in practice and graduate studies without thoughtful reflection.

The main intent of this study is to examine and understand my dialectic assumptions about learning, school culture, and the three spaces (elementary school, graduate school, and the liminal space between) that characterize my art educations. By identifying opportunities for increasingly dialogic interactions, perhaps recommendations can be made for future teachers and graduate school instructors.

Research Questions

There is a disconnection between facets of art education. Despite having the seemingly common goal of educating students in the realm of art, teaching as a practice and art education in graduate school has a dialectic relationship. Lack of dialogue between teaching practice and graduate learning is detrimental to both the teacher and the graduate art education program.

Possible opportunities for shared knowledge may be unexplored.

The ambiguous nature of my educational identity is not unique. Others are struggling to clarify their identity. Scholars have and continue to address the need to understand existence characterized by multiple roles. Wolf (2000) advocates that third space is the site for investigating cultural identity:

Hybrid identities and the multiplicity of cultural borders are

permanent fixtures of contemporary societies. They call for a state

of knowledge and a state of consciousness that can withstand the

pressure of constantly being called into question. This might be

viewed as our chance to listen to the unsaid in our own and in

others’ discourses, as our chance to be continuously aware of the

power relations governing the limits and the possibilities of

translating between asymmetrical cultures. (Wolf, 2000, p. 140)

When Wolf (2000) refers to listening to others’ discourses, she assumes the other is separate from the teacher she is addressing with this statement. With my dual identities I need to listen to myself. What can I learn from my teacher identity? What can I learn from my student identity?

What are the possibilities created through dialogic interaction between teacher and learner identities?

The liminal third space is a site for dialogism. A strong case can be made for dialogic pedagogy. The principles of dialogism, liminality and third space are appropriate for an investigation of educational cultural identity. I have new tools for understanding my art education experiences. I have dialogism to facilitate constructive interaction between aspects of my experiences in “teacher culture” and in “student culture”. My dual-cultured existence as a collective multifaceted identity often places me in a liminal position. I have a new understanding of a third space between the two cultural identities that is a productive space where meaning is created. The following questions guide my research:

 What are the cultural, site specific understandings that I have placed in

intellectually disconnected and often polemic positions? What are my

assumptions about school, graduate school, and liminal sites?

 How can I apply dialogic understandings to the three educational cultures

(graduate school, teaching practice, and the liminal space between) I seek to

understand?

 How can I change my perception of the liminal boundary spaces between teaching

and learning into areas for opportunities for co-created knowledge creation in (a)

theory and practice, (b) graduate school and elementary school, and (c) the past

and present?

I began this investigation with the premise that I gained tangible, if ambiguous, benefits from continuing to be engaged with the university well beyond the time span of most other art teachers. However, my graduate studies are only one aspect of my continued and ongoing art educations. I feel compelled to examine my experience and the cumulative effects of dialogic art educations on my practice as an art teacher and the overall quality of my life.

Overview of Methodology

In a sense I have conducted decades of pre-research for this study. My research method is categorized as qualitative. Denzin and Lincoln (2011) define qualitative research as a “situated activity that locates the observer in the world. It consists of a set of interpretive, material practices make the world visible” (p. 3). This study is an autoethnographic narrative inquiry. The study addresses aspects of my art educations in reflection. The narratives and analysis relate to my learning and teaching in the realm of art and art education. Methods of data collection and analysis are narrative inquiry, autoethnography and practitioner research.

The research for the study is primarily set in and around formal learning institutions: the elementary, junior and high school I attended as a student, The Ohio State University where I attended as an undergraduate and graduate student, and the two schools where I have taught art.

Rationale and Significance

With varying frequency and focus, many teachers engage in continuing education. There is an incentive for public school teachers, such as myself, to continue their education. A minimal amount of continuing education is required to retain teaching certification or licensure. Most

teachers must engage in some form of professional development. The form that this professional development takes is often at the discretion of the teacher.

The required continuing education for teachers is a directive from the state of Ohio. The

Ohio Department of Education mandates six semester hours of professional development every five years (33 Ohio Rev. Code, 2008). Some art teachers fulfill these requirements by enrolling in university courses or choosing from professional development workshops in other settings.

Others may decide to return to a university art education program to continue their learning in a degree program.

Beyond the minimum requirements, some teachers take university classes to increase their salary. The typical public school salary schedule design states that a teacher’s salary increases each year based on years of service and increases in steps through credit hours earned.

The step increases on the salary schedule are based on credit hours in 15-hour increments. For example, a Bachelor’s degree and 15 hours of graduate credits moves one up a step higher on the salary schedule. These step increases continue for plus 15, 30 and 45 hours for Bachelor’s and

Master’s degrees. There is no step beyond Master’s degree plus 45 hours. This paradigm encourages teachers to accumulate credit hours.

Many practicing art teachers participate in some form of continuing education. Denzin &

Lincoln, 2000 describe non-traditional researchers, like teachers, who find value in creative analytic practices such as narrative inquiry. These non-traditional researchers are not only empowered with a voice, but also may add to academia with a perhaps unheard voice. My research will matter because it will add to the body of experienced researchers the voice of an experienced practitioner. This is not only a voice looking back at a life of teaching, but examining a life of concurrent teaching and learning in art education. Those who opt for courses

in a university art education graduate program may experience the detachment participating in three distinct but overlapping educational spaces. It is appropriate for art educators to seek to understand the spaces they occupy and the learning potential of dialogism related to these spaces.

Role of the Researcher

With the guidance of university advisors, I have planned and conducted this study. My choice to employ narrative inquiry as a research method was not obvious when I began the doctoral process. As my graduate studies occur concurrently with my teaching I have limited availability to involve others in this study. I quickly realized that I was most interested in a self- contained study that was centered around my teaching practice and graduate studies. Rather than investigate the practice or studies of others, I want to better understand my experience, a prolonged engagement in art education, through a dialogic lens. To take advantage of my insider status in the three spaces I investigate, I serve as researched and researcher in this autoethnographic narrative inquiry.

Researcher Assumptions

Primarily, this study assumes the verisimilitude of my narratives and analysis. Although I have no conscious motivation to be less than honest, I understand these recollections and interpretations are biased to my point of view. Thus, I make no claim of objectivity. I assume that readers understand that my experiences as a white, middle-aged, practitioner and graduate student may differ from their experiences. However, I also assume that my experiences and the desire to better understand experience dialogically can be adapted to suit the research needs of a variety of readers.

Definitions of Key Terminology

The following terms are important to this study. I have defined these terms in relation to the context of this study and how each will be utilized in the research.

My art educations- The first person narrative accounts of my experiences as an art student, art education student, and art teacher are generally referred to as “my art educations”. These narratives are the data analyzed for dialectic and dialogic attributes.

Culture- Having a range of meanings and understandings depending upon context and purpose, culture will be defined rather narrowly in this study. For the purposes of this research, culture is defined and the values, customs and beliefs related to my teaching and learning. This educational culture typifies my experiences in and around public school and the university. It spans kindergarten through a graduate school doctoral program.

Discipline Based Art Education (D.B.A.E.)- An approach to art education that was popular and prevalent when I was studying at OSU in the mid nineteen-eighties. This methodology was championed as an attempt to raise art education’s status to that of more “academic” educational disciplines. D.B.A.E. addressed much more than studio art, including history, art criticism, and aesthetics as separate, but related components of a holistic method to teach about art. Eisner

(1990) describes D.B.A.E.:

The approach advocates that art education ought to provide

children with opportunities not only to experience the process of

creating visual images but to also learn to see the images they and

others have created” (p 424).

By incorporating rigorous content, D.B.A.E. proponents strived to override the misconception that a child’s artistic development occurs naturally without education interventions.

Reflexivity- Much of this study is reflective, looking back at my art educations over time.

However, this research is also reflexive, in that by reflecting and examining my reflections I have changed. Reflexivity in the context of this research is the examination of how reflection and analysis has influenced my actions.

Liminality- The state of less than full membership when one exists between two or more educational cultures. Liminality is often characterized as a state experienced when one is temporarily positioned between two states as one moves (often hierarchal) from one group to another. An example of temporary liminality is the student teaching experience. Student teaching is most often a temporary state between being a student and a teacher. The liminality examined in this study differs, as it represents a long term state. My liminality has been decades long as I functioned as both student and teacher concurrently, often as an insider and outsider simultaneously.

Hybridity- Bhabha (2013) describes hybridity as the transformation of both colonizer and colonized when cultures interact. Hybridization is also defined as a unique synthesis created by incorporating multiple sources to create an amalgam. For this study I represent both colonizer and colonized in the sense that I adapt to two distinct educational cultures; elementary school and graduate school. My hybridity encompasses adapting to be a teacher and a learner, while retaining a unique amalgam, teacher/learner.

Dialogism- Bakhtin (1981), a literary theorist, defined dialogism as new understanding created through spoken interaction. This theory has been extrapolated to include many forms of co-

constructed knowledge resulting from social interaction. This research utilizes the expanded definition of dialogism. For this study, dialogism relates to co-constructed knowledge originating from multiple sources. Ideally, each source contributes to knowledge that is not only co- constructed, but also results in a new knowledge that authentically represents both sources. For this study the dialogism between theory and practice, graduate school and elementary school, and past experiences and the present is examined. Ideally, each of these seeming dichotomies can contribute to useful co-constructed knowledge.

Third space- Often conceived as an intellectual site outside formal learning or cultural production sources, third space is defined in a different way for this study. My third space, also an intellectual site, incorporates input from formal teaching and learning sites. The third space represents knowledge construction influenced in a variety of ways from graduate school studies and elementary art teaching practices.

Organization of Dissertation

This dissertation contains five chapters. Following this introductory chapter is a review of relevant literature. The work of John Dewey, Homi Bhabha and Mikhal Bakhtin dominates this literature review in chapter two. Chapter three details the methodology employed in this research. I have utilized a hybrid research method that merges narrative inquiry, autoethnography and practitioner research. Chapter four, utilizing the aforementioned hybrid method, contains narratives describing my long and varied art education experiences. These narratives are interpreted and analyzed to highlight instances of dialectic and dialogic thought. Chapter five contains analysis of my narratives to uncover emergent patterns and themes. Interpretation of narratives to reveal how I have understood my art educations occurs in chapter. My narratives

are examined in respect to the stated research questions. Reflexivity resulting from the research process is examined. Chapter five ends with practical and theoretical implications.

Chapter 2: Review of Literature

This chapter details the scholarly texts incorporated into this study which were employed to address my research questions. As this study is autoethnographic and primarily addresses art education teaching and learning experiences, a portion of this literature is devoted to understanding human experience in education. To develop a conceptual framework in which my experience was analyzed I examined literature about dialogism, liminality, and the concept of third space. The goal of this research is to uncover and explore the dialectic and dialogic aspects of my art educations.

The literature that informs the principal structure of this research is rooted in John

Dewey’s understandings of experience and education. Dewey provides the overarching theme of the educative power and value of life experience, on which this dissertation is based. Although never utilizing the term dialogism, Dewey’s thinking is clearly dialogic as he stresses how past experience influences the present. Dewey also provides insight into pragmatic thought and knowledge construction, both integral to understanding dialogism in my art educations. This literature review includes additional authors who interpret and utilize Dewey’s philosophy.

The work of two scholars, Mikhail Bakhtin and Homi Bhabha, influence how I understand and analyze my art education experiences. Bakhtin theorizes about dialogic understanding in the literary realm, but his theoretical constructs have been expanded beyond literature to include many aspects of human interaction. Bakhtin’s work on dialogic thinking bridges the two cultures, elementary school and graduate school, which I occupy. Dialogic thinking is the key to a pragmatic application of theory and teaching in art education.

Bhabha addresses issues of cultural displacement and colonialization. My understandings of Bhabha’s work helps uncover assumptions I have developed in my engagement in education

and culture inherent in elementary school and graduate school. Although Bhabha addresses global cultural colonization issues, I can adapt his human rights advocacy to unbalanced power relationships in graduate and public education. Bhabha speaks to the colonized and the colonizer, two roles I have played in art education culture. I experience being the “other” when I interact in graduate school as an elementary teacher. Conversely, I treat those involved in graduate school as “others” trespassing in my elementary school domain. These roles represent relationships of unequal power and agency. Bhabha provides insight into understanding of cultural assumptions and disconnections I have experienced. I adapt his theory of cultural hybridization and liminality to specifically address liminal experiences in an educational culture. Bhabha (1994, 2013) and

Soja (1996) write about changing the perception of liminal spaces to productive sites. Their work helps to change perceptions of a third space that is functional and productive rather than transitional limbo. Others authors provide illuminate ideas about dialogism, liminality and third space. These other authors are included in this review of pertinent literature.

This chapter represents literature from these sources, and others who attend to their body of knowledge, that are most appropriate to better articulate and understand my art educations.

Dewey, Bakhtin and Bhabha form the theoretical stance and conceptual framework for this investigation into the underlying assumptions and perceptions in my art educations.

John Dewey

John Dewey has written numerous books and essays on democracy, philosophy, and education (1929, 1938). A thread throughout his work is a concern for improving society though increased personal agency. He saw this achieved through quality public schooling. Although I do not consider myself a Deweyan teacher or scholar, I and most teachers, have John Dewey in our blood. Three of Dewey’s theoretical considerations influence this study. Specifically, Dewey

provides insight into (a) understanding the role of experience in learning, (b) pragmatism, and (c) the nature of knowledge creation. These three issues relate closely to my desire to understand my art educations.

As I am writing about experience and education I would be remiss if not negligent if I did not address the work of Dewey. My somewhat meandering pursuit of art educations neglecting to reflect upon dialectic and dialogic interactions, sounds is akin to Dewey’s critique of traditional education that failed to critically examine its own underlying principles. Whereas

Dewey was discussing theoretical dogma, my lack of self-examination has no basis as of yet.

This lack of self-examination is what I wish to investigate. Dewey (1938) aptly describes my research concern:

Now we have the problem of discovering the connection which

actually exists within experience between achievements of the past

and the issues of the present. We have the problem of ascertaining

how acquaintance with the past may be translated into a potent

instrumentality for dealing effectively with the future. (p. 23)

This too is my problem. My past achievements, my art educations, have a yet unexplored connection to my present. Nor have I reflected upon the dialogic connection between my learning and my practice. Dewey’s theories of experience may provide the tools for identifying these connections and providing insight not only for me, but for other art educators navigating their own art educations, including graduate school and a teaching practice.

Dewey’s pragmatic views on experience and inquiry contribute to a deeper understanding of art teaching and provide a framework for research of teaching and learning. Many scholars have drawn on the work of Dewey to expand and incorporate his ideas into a variety of contexts.

From this wealth of scholarship, by both Dewey and others who address his work, I have gleaned a specifically focused range of topics that are most pertinent to this research. The aspects of

Deweyan discourse that are the most relevant for my purposes are (a) an emphasis on experiential learning (b) the pragmatic foundation of his thought, and understanding, and (c) an approach that honors socially constructed knowledge and provisional conceptions of truth (Reich in Hickman, Neubert, & Reich, 2009). The reflective and autoethnographic nature of my narrative inquiry will rely heavily on experience as an integral component of “data” for analysis.

The philosophy of Pragmatism reflects my relationship with graduate school as I have primarily sought art education theories to be applied to my art education practice. Selection or rejection for these theories has, dialogically or dialectically, characterized my teaching practice. Lastly,

Dewey’s conceptions of knowledge and truth align philosophically to my own in relation to art education. These three elements of Dewey’s standpoint are interlaced throughout his discourse often intersecting. I will use these three standpoints as a conceptual framework for this dissertation.

Dewey’s Emphasis on Experiential Learning

Dewey’s definition of education as a process of social adaptation (1929) underlies his pragmatic thought. The traditional schooling that Dewey criticized was neither social nor helpful for students attempting to adapt to a social world. In terms of practicability, education, for

Dewey, should provide students with the agency to shape and understand their world, rather than provide students with dis-connected facts or obscure skills unrelated to real life.

Dewey (1938) defines experience as “a transaction taking place between an individual and what, at the time constitutes his environment” (p. 43). The teacher has the responsibility of creating an effective environment for the student. He/she must facilitate the experiences in

school to maximize their educative potential. For Dewey this means drawing on personal experience of students. Dewey (1938) characterized traditional education as controlling the environment for learning, while ignoring how the students would internalize what was being taught, thus failing to create an educative situation. My experience is constituted with art educations that include environments in public school and the university. Have I facilitated these experiences to maximize their dialogic potential?

Much of Dewey’s early work in education reform focused on teacher training and subject matter which led to the creation of the Laboratory school. Dewey was concerned with the over- emphasis of classroom management (compliant student behavior) in teacher training. This emphasis reflected a call for quiet orderly classrooms. Dewey understood the ineffectiveness of passive learning. Instead, he called for teacher education that prepared teachers to actively engage their students in learning. The two ways to better prepare teachers were to (a) ensure that they had a deep understanding of the subject they teach and (b) find authentic connections between the subject matter and the lived experience of the students. One could view the call for an authentic connection between school experience and lived experience as a call for dialogism.

Dialogism creates the bridge between theory and practice as it invites one to create new knowledge synthesized from two sources. Dewey (1990) describes education as “the reconstruction or reorganization of experience which adds to the meaning of experience, and which increases ability to direct the course of subsequent experience” (p. 56). The role of the teacher is to guide students to educative experiences.

Dewey (1938) called for development of a theory of experience that would add relevance to education. Historically, schools granted educational authority to the teacher, ignoring the experience of the students. Dewey felt integrating teacher and student experience through this

theory of experience would create meaningful educational connections. As a member of both teacher and student cultures it is imperative that I investigate my experiences in these two cultures.

Dewey (1938) envisioned a theory integrating teacher and student experience and justified his theory by explaining that “basing education upon personal experience may mean more multiplied and more intimate contacts between the mature and immature than ever existed”

(p. 21). The challenge is the “problem of discovering the connection which actually exists within the experience between achievements of the past and the issues of the present” (p. 23). Dewey

(1938) theorized a way to link past and present, explaining that, “every experience influences to some degree the objective conditions under which further experiences are had” (p. 37). He identified continuity and interaction as important qualities of a theory of experience that would bridge the student and teacher experiences. These qualities determine the value of an experience in relation to learning: “continuity and interaction in their active union with each other provide the measure of educative significance and value of an experience” (Dewey, 1938, pp. 44-45).

In his theory of experience, continuity of experience, the first of Dewey’s stated qualities, describes the influence, positive or negative, that all experiences possess. Dewey

(1938) claimed that individuals place themselves in environments based on their earlier experiences, and then consciously set up situations for further experiences based on positive occurrences. His theory of experience leverages continuity to steer students in the right direction.

Dewey (1938) viewed continuity as “a criterion by which to discriminate between experiences that are educative and those which are mis-educative” (p. 37). The teacher, possessing a mature understanding, has the role of guiding students toward experiences that move forward toward educational goals. My art educations, spanning a rather vast time period, reflect my willingness

to continue to consciously place myself in educative situations. Continuity could be considered the hallmark of my art educations.

Interaction, the second quality of experience in Dewey’s (1938) theory of experience, describes how internalized experiences of the past influence and are influenced by immediate experiences. My lack of reflection upon the past and its influence on my current situation are the crux of this research. Dewey (1938) termed the “interplay” of “internal and objective” conditions of an educative type of “situation” (p. 42). His criticism of traditional education is that teacher- dominated contacts with students ignore the internalized (third space) experiences of the student.

If the student lacked personal experiential connections to the subject matter, the experience was less likely to be educative. Whereas Dewey sought to integrate the internal and external experiences of the student, the experiences that I am examining are in the past and the chance to integrate the experiences has expired.

The conceptions of situation and of interaction are inseparable

from each other. An experience is always what it is because of a

transaction taking place between an individual and what, at the

time constitutes his environment…. The environment, in other

words, is whatever conditions interact with personal needs, desires,

purposes, and capacities to create the experience which is had.

(Dewey, 1938, pp. 43-44)

In this description of experience Dewey (1938) explains that the individual has the responsibility to facilitate the conditions of an educative experience or transaction. The effectiveness of the transaction is dependent upon the individual’s reaction to the experience. My research will examine the potential for dialogism that underlies my continued engagement with art education.

Dewey (1938) expanded on the concept of active student participation to describe purpose (p. 67). Purpose is the educational validity of experience. He explained that the student, through active participation in the learner experience, defines his or her purpose for the content being taught. Dewey (1938) outlined three criteria for an educationally valid purpose. He characterized an “educative purpose” as being comprised of (a) contextual observation, (b) a connection to similar past experiences, and (c) a judgment of the past and present to determine future relevance for the learner. As stated in Dewey’s (1938) theory of experience, the student should be able to relate personal experiences to the subject matter. My role as teacher and student is to apply dialogic relevance in my learning and teaching.

Dewey’s Foundational Pragmatism

Cameron (2011), addressing research methodology, identified characteristics of pragmatism as applied to mixed methods research that are valuable for this inquiry. Properties of pragmatism include: (a) practicality, (b) outcome-orientation (c) a flexible, middle position (both philosophically and methodologically), (d) adaptability, (e) useful as a bridge between philosophy and method, (f) useful as a way to judge the quality of “X” by its intended use (pp.

101-2). These properties could also describe the attributes of an effective practicing art teacher.

The qualities that Cameron (2011) identifies also apply to Dewey’s pragmatic position on issues of education. Misak (1999) credits Dewey, James and Pierce as founders of pragmatism and states that the “central thought of pragmatism is that philosophy must be connected to practice” (p. 2). Dewey’s pragmatism promotes empowering students to adapt to and understand the world. A canon of pragmatism is the “interaction of knowledge and practice” (Dewey, 1929, p. 30). Dewey championed thought that was directed towards concrete action. Misak’s (1999) description of Dewey’s stance addresses three aspects I wish to highlight. Dewey’s (a)

pragmatism is directed firmly towards practice which is tied to (b) experience and his conception of (c) ‘truth’ is socially constructed. Practice, experience and socially constructed truth are important elements of the narrative of my art educations.

Dewey embraced pragmatism in response to what he felt was the impractical nature of philosophical discourse of the time. He opposed the burgeoning movement towards epistemological dominance over free thought and how learning was downplayed by rigid adherence to philosophical canons. Dewey also found fault with philosophical dogma that prohibited a change of standpoint within a theoretical system. Pragmatic thought values constant testing of the practicality of ‘truths’. Dewey felt that by ignoring, rather than incorporating divergences from the dogma, epistemologists were ignoring the subjective nature of everyday experience. A practical, usable philosophy is sensible for a practicing art teacher.

Dewey also advocated for the pragmatic notion that the end goal of philosophy was to add relevance and purpose to action. Action, as defined by Dewey was the ongoing process of adapting to the challenges of everyday life, which was not often a topic of his contemporary philosopher peers. Dewey wanted a philosophy that addressed everyday life functions, rather than esoteric pondering. Thus, Dewey helped develop a philosophy that was adaptive to new thinking and practically applicable to the real world, embracing the logic of pragmatism.

Here lies the issue of a theory/practice split that is often addressed in discourse about academia. Does academia care about “real world” applications, or should it? Perhaps an element, a pragmatic element, I find missing from my graduate art education is the functionality of what I have been learning. This lack of functionality or immediate relatability to my teaching practice may be my fault or the nature of advanced art education studies. I may not draw the applications from the coursework, fully grasp the theory, or have the motivation to change my practice to

reflect new learning. As one studies art education and its branches to the highest levels, perhaps the content rises to a complexity above a level appropriate for elementary classroom applications. An investigation of dialogic interactions between graduate art education and art teaching practice is the purpose of this narrative inquiry.

Dewey’s Approach to Knowledge Construction and Truth

The historical context of Dewey’s discourse on truth and knowledge construction reflects his rejection of the epistemological dogma. Earlier I described Dewey’s stance in the context of his pragmatic foundation. Describing pragmatic inquiry, Misak (1999) states that the inquirer avoids striving for an “epistemic ideal” in which truths “mysteriously correspond” by instead opting to “get things right” (p. 135). Dewey’s version of inquiry begins without a predetermined end and is open to answers that go against the ideology of the inquirer. Dewey asserted that truth proves itself to be self-corrective over time (Borchert, 2006). The flexible and adaptable nature of Dewey’s pragmatic views on truth allows inquirers to “critically revise their conclusions in light of further developments” (Seigfried, 1993, p. 2). Again, this contradicts the dogmatic stance of Dewey’s contemporaries who insisted on pigeon-holing concepts of truth into their preconceived theoretical structures or disregarding them as invalid. Dewey, in contrast, allowed the introduction of new understandings to shape his ontology.

The act of teaching involves a problematic relationship with the concept of truth.

Although ideally teachers should honor ‘student constructed’ knowledge, a hierarchy inevitably exists in which the teacher has more power over curriculum. Consciously or unconsciously the teacher decides what is taught, thus what he or she believes is true.

Summary

I have highlighted several elements from Dewey’s vast body of work: (a) experience, (b) pragmatism, and (c) knowledge construction. These conceptions can be applied to art education as well as general education. Many of the issues that Dewey began to address at the turn of the last century are valid today. For example, many teachers are still prone to (a) employ epistemological dogma rather than pragmatism, (b) disregard experience as a factor in education and (c) ignore that knowledge is a social construction.

Dewey’s work dovetails neatly with a theoretical framework that examines dialogism. Experience, an important element of Dewey’s (1938) educational theories is the heart of investigation of dialogism in my art educations. Pragmatism underlies my search a dialogic connection between graduate art education and art teaching practice.

My epistemology is rooted in knowledge as a social construct. Dewey’s (1938) understanding of knowledge reflects my relativist view of how we construct knowledge dialogically.

Understandings of Dialogism

Dialogism is a concept central to my efforts to better understand my art educations. In the context of this study, dialogism is tied to the work of literary theorist/philosopher Mikhail

Bakhtin (1981). For Bakhtin, dialogue refers to interaction between different voices or viewpoints in a text. A dialogic understanding is created as an interaction between speaker and listener. A new understanding is the result of a synthesis of their two viewpoints. Bakhtin theorizes about dialogue in a greater sense than mere conversation. Wortham (2011) explains that those engaged in dialogue are “not merely decontextualized cognizers” (p.74), but instead

incorporate personal ideologies into dialogic understanding. Dialogue is an active, rather than passive, knowledge creation activity.

It is important to understand that Bakhtin wrote about language and writing, but his ideas have been understood in a larger context. Hence, several of the passages I cite explain concepts and ideas may appear to specifically address literature and speech, but they also serve as metaphors for wider applications. Bakhtin (1986) states: “Dialogic boundaries intersect the entire field of living human thought. The monologism of thinking in the human sciences. The linguist is accustomed to perceiving everything in a single closed context” (p. 120). Monologue, a one- sided directive is the opposite of dialogue, the preferred form of communication.

Dialogism is the characteristic epistemological mode of a world

dominated by heteroglossia. Everything means, is understood, as part of a

greater whole – there is a constant interaction between meanings, all of

which have the potential of conditioning others. (Holquist, as cited in

Bakhtin, 1981, p. 426)

Bakhtin (1981) describes the state of communication as “heteroglossia,” an intellectual a space where all utterances occur. Heteroglossia is characterized as ephemeral. Each utterance is unique because the influences of dialogism immediately affect them and they can never be repeated with exactly the same meaning. Within heteroglossia, there is tension from unifying and propelling forces that shape the meaning of the utterance. The centrifugal and centripetal forces (explained later in this chapter) that represent the struggle between the need to preserve status quo and the need to innovate are within the state of heteroglossia. The new dialogic meaning emerges as the product of harnessing these two forces. Bakhtin explains the tension of heteroglossia “preserves the primacy of context over text” (Holquist, 1981, as cited in Bakhtin, 1981, p. 428).

Bakhtin explains the phenomenon of dialogue through the idea of utterance. An utterance is a part of spoken language. When a word or phrase is spoken, what are vocalized are both the intended meaning and the perceived meaning. The speaker and the listener each contribute their own meaning to the utterance, creating a third meaning. Lahteenmaki (1998) explains that a dialogue does not transmit information, but is instead “seen as an interactive process in which both the speaker and the listener play an active role” (p. 78). The dialogue requires two speakers. The speakers exchange utterances which add to the collective meaning of the dialogue.

Bakhtin (1981) explains how an utterance comes to contain an abundance of meaning. Dialogic communication can be seen as a microcosm of all meaning-making. Bakhtin (1981) discussed the vital nature of dialogue by stating:

The living utterance, having taken meaning and shape at a

particular historical moment in a socially specific environment,

cannot fail to brush up against thousands of living dialogic

threads… it cannot fail to become an active participant in social

dialogue. (p. 276)

This constant flow of meanings is integrated into dialogue and hence becomes part of our understanding of the world. The significance of dialogue is that everyone who contributes to the meaning is affected or changed in some way. Lahteenmaki (1998) explains “The dialogical philosophy of language communication is not approached from the point of view of transmission of information, but seen as an interactive process in which both speaker and listener play an active role” (p. 78).

In the context of social justice, dialogue is an important tool to forge shared understandings between cultures. Anti-colonial efforts embrace dialogism because it is

characterized by equal participation. Rather than argue for one side or agree to remain unchanged, Bakhtin’s premise is that a new meaning is created in each dialogue. This new meaning is more than a combination of the two previous meanings, but still contains elements of both. Meaning creation in this vein more democratically distributes the power to make meaning.

Bakhtin’s work can be applied to a variety of ontological and epistemological pursuits.

Theorists have specifically addressed pedagogy from Bakhtinian perspective. Fernandez-Balboa and Marshall (1994) call for dialogic pedagogy as a move towards a more democratic education.

These authors describe dialogue as “a process of sharing mutually held meanings, constructing new realities and knowledge, and ultimately creating opportunities for transformative action” (p.

173). Rather than serving as receptacles for knowledge served to them by teachers, students are active co-creators of knowledge. Fernandez-Balboa and Marshall (1994) identify three benefits of this approach to pedagogy. First, students feel valued as contributors to the learning process.

Secondly, the entire classroom benefits from an “egalitarian, mutually re-educative relationship”

(p. 175) with their peers. Finally, this increased empowerment spreads to the community as students become more social learners.

Specifically applied to art education, Miles (2010) addresses dialogic interactions in the art classroom. Such interactions would foster authentic learning experiences through democratic

(as opposed to authoritative) practices. With students empowered to contribute to their learning,

Miles (2010) describes dialogic interaction with a work of art stating that “the notion of voice is accomplished only when participants in dialogue can produce, rather than repeat (recapitulate) discourses” (p. 376).

Understandings of Liminality and Hybridity

I was first introduced to the concept of liminality while learning about anthropology to provide context to my study of autoethnography. Immediately I was struck by how I often the experienced a liminal state in regard to my teaching and learning experiences.

Although the concept of cultural liminality has been addressed at length by many scholars, Turner (1979) provided my first exposure to the concept. From his perspective liminality represents a state in which one is separated from one culture, yet not fully indoctrinated into another culture. Hence, one is, often temporarily, a member of either culture.

Public reflexivity is also concerned with what I have called

“liminality”. This term literally, “being-on-a-threshold,” means a

state or process which is betwixt-and-between the normal, day-to-

day cultural and social states and processes of getting and

spending, preserving law and order, and registering structural

status. (Turner, 1979, p. 465)

Although this describes a threshold state which implies an eventual full transition, the disruption of normal processes accurately describes my position in the culture of art education. The reflexivity of liminality is akin to the dialogism between teaching and learning that I am examining in the dissertation.

Generally, liminality is understood as a state between two positions. Historically, the liminal experience was a pause interrupting the passage between two states. Ethnographers and cultural theorists have examined liminality to understand what it is like to outside a culture. For this dissertation I am interested in liminality to better understand my position outside and between the educational cultures that I have experienced throughout my art educations.

Related to dialogism (in that dialogue can act as a productive synthesis of multiple positions) liminality, hybridity and third space theories contribute to an understanding of moving past otherness.

There are many ways to understand liminal space. It can be described as a rite of passage when one endures the liminal state to reach the reward after traveling through the passage. The movement through this passage was understood as a progression to a position deemed advantageous. The person positioned in the “in between” status (not fully to one side or the other of the passage) temporarily exists without identity. This liminal space is an unproductive, anxiety-ridden, state of limbo.

Bakhtin and cultural theorist Bhabha (1994) theorized a situation in which two disparate parties interact to create a new co-created understanding. Bakhtin called this action “dialogism,” and Bhabha called it “hybridization.” Both emphasized that the new understanding is comprised of parts of the two previous understandings, yet is unique. Along with Bakhtin and Bhabha, the work of Soja (1996) has contributed to my understanding of liminality, hybridity and third space.

When Bhabha (1994) theorizes meaning creation from two disparate sources he uses the term “hybridity” to explain how encounters between cultures result in new cultural identities.

Hybridity occurs when a culture begins to question preconceptions or traditional assumptions about a culture. When colonizers interact with colonized the interaction allows for new insight by providing increased perspective, a chance to view both cultures in a different way. Bhabha explains how this “sows confusion between opposites” (p. 182). He explains this confusion or ambivalence:

Literally splitting the difference between the binary oppositions or

polarities through which we think cultural difference. It is in the

enunciatory act of splitting that the colonial signifier creates its

strategies of differentiation that produce an undecidability between

contraries or oppositions. (Bhabha, 1994, p. 182-3)

Bhabha contends the reduction of polarity of thought allows for a more sympathetic understanding of another’s culture. Soja (1996) describes an action similar to hybridity that he calls “critical thirding”. This is a productive way of addressing polarity of thought. He describes how thirding is a transformative process in which “the original binary choice is not dismissed entirely but is subjected to a creative process of restructuring that draws selectively and strategically from the two opposing categories to open up new alternatives (p. 5).

Bhabha viewed hybridization as an act of the colonized, which lessens oppression. A way to combat oppression is to imitate the colonizer. If colonized people adopt characteristics of the dominant culture, they remove some of the colonizer’s power that was inherent in their difference. The oppressor now sees a part of his/her self in the colonized. Bhabha explains how hybridization causes ambivalence for the colonizer. The colonizer becomes less driven to oppress those who are now more like him/herself. This act of mimicry is problematic. Bhabha posits both that mimicry is empowering for the colonized, but also an insincere act. I must admit that appropriation of culture characteristics and doubling as imitation remain enigmatic concepts for me, but an examination of dialogism/hybridity must touch upon these ideas.

The border between teacher and student is a self-imposed. Bhabha (2013) describes a strategy to transcend borders is to “deploy the cultural hybridity of their borderline condition to ‘translate’, and… reinscribe” (p. 108). Productively utilizing the liminal borderline experience is to see the border position as an opportunity to be part of two cultures. I view dual participation an asset as

opposed to viewing dual participation as partial participation. My access to two cultures allows unique opportunity to “translate” from a participatory position on the border.

In third space cultural boundaries erode. The boundaries are constantly broken through the act of cultural interaction that produces hybridity. Only outside of third space, where cultures are isolated, do the boundaries exist. My perceived boundaries resulted from lack of inner dialogue between my rigid conceptions of the teaching and learning cultures. Cultural conceptions that I chose to keep segregated. Boundaries in third space are permeable.

Understandings of Third Space

As I initially considered my situation as a teacher and student simultaneously, that is, teaching art in an elementary school and at the same time learning art education in a graduate program, I conceptualized my own movements between these two spaces as boundary-crossing.

The following literature addresses of the concept of “third space,” a term I naively used to describe the area between the two spaces through which I continue to move. A clearer understanding of third space has illuminated for me a more fully formed conception of what I once viewed merely as a boundary.

Bhabha (1994) conceives of a space, not unlike Bakhtin, where meaning is created through interaction. “Third space” refers to where meaning is constructed when dissimilar cultures interact. This is the site where hybridity is manifested. Bhabha explains hybridization as an act of enunciation. The new meaning forged through hybridity is now known, or enunciated.

The intervention of the Third space of enunciation, which makes structure of

meaning and reference an ambivalent process, destroys the mirror of

representation in which cultural knowledge is customarily revealed as an

integrated, open expanding code. Such as intervention quite properly challenges

our sense of historical identity of culture as a homogenizing, unifying force…

kept alive in the traditions of the people. (Bhabha, 1994, p. 54)

Third space is where meaning can be created without regard to inhibiting notions of culture. In third space the context of the interaction takes precedent over any historical notions. Soja (1996) describes Bhabha conception as “a strategic envisioning of the cultural politics of Thirdspace that helps to dislodge its entrapment in hegemonic historiography and historicism” (p. 142).

Literature addressing “third space” concepts in education and pedagogy tend to emphasize social interventionist critical theory as literature from a sociocritical perspective.

Schapiro (2009), Gutierrez (2008), Gutierrez, Larson, and Kreuter (1995), and Wolf (2000) write about the emancipatory aspects of “third space”. The goal of these authors is social equity in classrooms that in turn generates equity in society. A quest for teaching that allows full subjectivity reflects the democratic goals of critical pedagogy, as evidenced in the following quote:

Is it possible to conceive of a pedagogy that is neither teacher-

centered or student-centered, nor even one that seesaws between

the two? Is there a third space outside the binary of teacher and

student that yet allows for the full subjectivity of both? (Schapiro,

2009, p. 423)

Schapiro (2009) asserts this is a space that is created through dialogical teaching.

Schapiro (2009) advises teachers to relinquish their insecurities and fears and to engage in meaningful dialogue with students. A meaningful dialogue would be intersubjective with shared context and meaning. This openness can create a shared “third space” that is less bound to and

characterized by the typical power inequity between teacher and student, a space in which all parties engage in inquiry and the excitement of learning.

Gutierrez, Rymes and Larson, (1995) describe the scripted classroom. The “script” refers to time-worn actions and practices that expose issues of domination and subjugation. Although teachers wield the majority of power in the classroom, Gutierrez et al. (1995, p. 413) state how the scripts are “interactionally co-constructed, maintained, countered, and transcended” by both the teachers and the students. The students have little relation to the dominant script and respond to it mainly because they lack the power to change it and have been institutionalized to accept (or ignore) it. Instead, students create counter-scripts. The two scripts, student and teacher, exist separately independently, rather than contributing to a common understanding. Gutierrez et al. do not use the term “third space,” although they advocate for a dialogism similar to what

Schapiro (2009) discussed earlier. They describe an actual transcription from a classroom that was dominated by the teacher’s monologic script as follows:

Although the practices in this classroom are embedded within a

larger culture, the potential of the classroom as a locus for change

lies in directing this teacher’s discourse away from the

transcendent script and toward the students and their diverse

perspectives and experiences. (Gutierrez et al., 1995, p. 439)

Merging teacher and student scripts, teacher and student voices is a characteristic of third space pedagogy.

Gutierrez (2008), writing 13 years later, includes the term “third space” in her discussion of the classroom environment. The environment she describes is created through engaging students in critical thought to increase their “sociocritical literacy,” a term she coined to describe

“a historicizing literacy that privileges and is contingent upon students’ sociocritical lives.”

Students are encouraged to explore and contest the social realities of their environment. She explains the sociocritical process as the “development of literacies in which everyday and institutional literacies are framed into powerful literacies… oriented toward critical thought”

(Gutierrez, 2008, p. 149). Gutierrez works from the perspective of literacy education and with less-advantaged populations, but her vision of “third space” as a “social situation of development that facilitates a collective social imagination” has wide ranging applications (Gutierrez, 2008, p.

149).

Wolf (2000) describes “third space” as “a sort of ‘in-between’ space located between existing referential systems and antagonisms” (p. 135). In this conception, “third space” is a place for intervention. Wolf’s “third space” addresses the larger concept of culture as she locates it as a site for hybridization. Using translation as a metaphor for hybridization, Wolf (2000, p.

141) states: “translation no longer means bridging a gap between two different cultures but, rather, producing meanings which are characterized by multiculturality.” Rather than present it as an ideal, she admits multiculturalism is itself flawed and does not represent hybridity.

Schapiro (2009), Gutierrez (2008), Gutierrez, Larson, and Kreuter (1995), and Wolf

(2000) conceive of “third space” as a place where a variety of disparate people and ideas come together to create learning environments characterized by co-created knowledge.

Within the realm of education and art education conceptualizations of third site and third space pedagogy have ranged ideas that address classroom practices and curriculum to broader sociocritical justice issues. The applications of third space that address social concerns are most closely related to the theories of Bakhtin and Bhabha.

Literature addressing the concepts of “third space” and “third site” in art education tend to emphasize the relationship of the student and the art teacher or the student and the art program at a school. Stevenson and Deasy (2005), Wilson (1974, 2005, 2008), and Tavin (2010) conceive of the concept of “third space” in the realm of art education quite differently. Stevenson and

Deasy discuss third space as a metaphor representing the role of arts programs in schools. Wilson uses the term “third site” to describe a pedagogical place where students make art beyond the classroom. Tavin expands on Wilson’s definition, using Laconian theories to provide another insight into pedagogical sites.

On behalf of the advocacy group, the Arts Education Partnership, Stevenson and Deasy

(2005) conducted a study of ten schools in an effort to understand the role of arts programming in disadvantaged communities. They targeted their research to discern “whether the arts were playing a role in shaping the community; and if so, to determine what could be learned from the process that could benefit other schools” (Stevenson & Deasy, 2005, p. 4). The authors defined three spaces highlighting a conceived third space, unique to learning in the arts. As they put it,

“In the arts, a third space is opened where students draw on their “lived world” (a first space) and what they have learned from their teachers (a second space) to create and express something new, something no one else could have made” (p. 18). And this “something new” is created in a third space. The results of Stevenson and Deasy’s (2005) study show the benefit of a school art program, but the authors provide little insight into what constitutes the “third space” they claim is occupied by the arts.

Art education theorist Wilson (2005, 2008) identifies three visual cultural sites and designates the third as a pedagogical site that is rich for art teachers to utilize and incorporate into their art classrooms. The sites he identifies are (a) “informal spaces outside of and beyond

classrooms,” (b) “conventional art classrooms in schools,” and (c) “a third site between school classrooms and kids’ self-initiated visual cultural spaces” (Wilson, 2005, p. 18). Wilson (1974) observed and wrote about J. C. Holz, a student who created comic books at home. Interested in child art, Wilson analyzed Holz’s comic books and found that they involved sophisticated thought processes that extended well beyond the formal pedagogy of the child’s school art instruction. Wilson theorized that the artwork created outside the classroom had greater relevance to the student, and hence should be actively addressed by art educators. In his opinion, the student clearly feels that “school art will never do for him what play art does” (p. 6). Wilson explained that the ritualistic nature of art classes in school provides a game-like situation for the student, who often knows how to play along to meet institutional expectations. However, the art he or she creates outside the school culture or the home culture is created in a third site of the student’s making, and is primarily controlled by the student. This third site is free of the pedagogical influences of home-life and school-life – permitting, in Wilson’s opinion, a more authentic and creative environment for art making.

Wilson’s 1974 article in which he discusses Holz does not use the term “third site pedagogy”; but he revisits the child artist 30 years later and coins that phrase (Wilson, 2005).

Updating his terminology to match current trends in art education, Wilson moves from describing child art as artifact; and in this later article, he characterizes their artwork as the visual culture of the child artist. Here, Wilson (2005, pp. 23-24) uses the term “third site,” defining it as “the site that exists between the many contexts in which students produce their self-initiated visual culture creations and the school art classroom – the second pedagogical site.” In addition to the introduction of the third site as a concept, he describes a transactional pedagogy as a

“special form of educational context where proposals and initiatives relating to learning and

teaching may originate with any cultural artifact” (Wilson, 2005, p. 19). In an egalitarian context, the student, teacher, and community value each other equally without any hierarchical designations. Tavin addresses Wilson’s third site pedagogy in an effort to “reassess the three sites through psychoanalytic theories” (Tavin, 2010, p. 49). From a Lacanian perspective, Tavin sees Wilson’s first pedagogical site, the informal spaces outside of school, as related to Lacan’s imaginary psychic order. Whereas Wilson understands the first site as more innocent and free of institutional influence, Tavin, through the Lacanian lens, finds inherent coercion. Children are constantly subjected to coercion because the first site is tied to the Symbolic. The imaginary order is a place of the illusion of wholeness; hence, the child art created there is “sublimating all sorts of unconscious non-sense from the impossible sense of trying to be ourselves in the

Symbolic order” (Tavin, 2010, p. 54). The Symbolic order represents culture and society, including art teachers. So Tavin understands the first site as a site of coercion as the child attempts to fit into society based on standards created by society, rather than based on his or her own actual aims. Although both Wilson (2005) and Tavin (2010) conceive of the second space – the formal education site – as a site of coercion, they differ in how they understand the transition from first to second site. Wilson sees the second site as very different from the first site. The first pedagogical site includes the entirety of visual experiences that student encounters and processes without formal intervention by others. In this site students are free to formulate and create their own art educations. This informal pedagogical site, that is supposedly free of outside influence, allows the child free choice. Tavin (2010, p. 52) disagrees with the characterization of a traumatic transition from first to second pedagogical site when he states: “What Wilson refers to as a derailing of spontaneous and organic artmaking through coercion has already been instilled long before the child enters the art classroom.” Tavin, rejecting the idea of a child who is

uninfluenced, understands both sites as oppressive. He states: “the presupposition of the child making spontaneous art that Wilson critiques as being hijacked in the classroom is the same modernist construct that never existed” (Tavin, 2010, p. 52). Tavin disagrees with Wilson in his understanding of the third site, as well. He characterizes Wilson’s claims about the third site as

“utopian and celebratory” (p. 55), whereas Tavin himself places the third site in Lacan’s order of

“the Real”. Wilson (2005) and Tavin (2010) differ on the qualities of the sites of art experiences, though they both point to the need for art educators as well as other educators to consider the learning that takes place not only inside the classroom, but also outside.

Summary of Literature

The literature examined for this research provides insight into conceptions of my art educations. Dewey provides the overarching themes of (a) experience, (b) pragmatism, and (c) knowledge construction. Experience is the data examined in this study. The stories integral to a narrative inquiry, such as this study, represent our telling and retelling about our experiences.

When the term “storied lives” (Connelly and Clandinin, 2015) is used in narrative inquiry it is referring to experience. Pragmatism seeks to apply knowledge to action. As a pragmatist, Dewey strived to find authentic connections between teaching and learning. Finally, knowledge construction, the third of Dewey’s components addressed in this study is essential to an inquiry into the practice of teaching and learning. If one views knowledge as a social construct, there is not a single truth to be discovered, rather there are multiple valid understandings based on individual interpretation. Understanding knowledge construction is important from a teacher perspective for practical purposes, however the teacher is also a learner at times.

The premise of this dissertation is based on three distinct cultural identities: teacher, graduate student and a liminal teacher/student. The literature of dialogism is applied to the

analysis of experience to understand connections between these identities. If I conceive of cultural difference dialogically I can view my educational identities as hybridized rather than multiple and segregated. Adopting a dialogical stance, these three designations dissolve and I am simply the teacher/student hybrid. The other identities reflect a false binary.

My initial understanding of teacher and student cultures was segregated, and I posited that I existed in a third space between teacher and learner. I characterized that liminal space as a nebulous transient space. The theories of Bakhtin and Bhabha help me understand liminal space as a potentially transformative space to intervene with my historically held ideas about teaching and learning cultures. The goal of this study is to change the perception of liminality from a unproductive state of limited membership to a site of an enhanced multiple viewpoints.

The relationship between the teachings of Dewey and the literature of dialogism, liminality and third space address the concerns of an analysis of teaching and learning. The literature in these diverse fields are adapted to create a solid conceptual framework for an investigation into an art education practice, learning as an art student and learning as an art education student.

Chapter 3: Research Methods

In simple terms, I consider this research a narrative inquiry. This study relies on narrative from an autoethnographic perspective as it will focus on the writer’s experience and address issues of culture as related to art educations. Practitioner research and inquiry as stance perspectives will also be integral to this study. My narrative inquiry will explore the benefits, personal and pedagogical, that I can attribute to my art educations. I seek to understand how art education has influenced my formation as a teacher, learner and artist.

This chapter includes the rationale for this methodology and where narrative inquiry is situated in terms of educational research. The setting and context of this study is delineated in this chapter. Also addressed here are data analysis methods, ethical consideration of this research and the scope and limitations of this study.

Methodological Approach

The teachings of Dewey and the literature of narrative inquiry, autoethnography, and practitioner research form a framework for an analysis of teaching and learning.

Identifying myself as a teacher influences the method, substance, format, and audience of this research project. Teachers are often storytellers. I am most comfortable telling stories. I do it every day. Stories are the means I use to communicate to my students. I will often tell a story about an artist rather than state facts. Students respond to stories and can relate to their experiences creating a more internalized learning experience.

I tell stories about myself and students when I interact with adults at my school.

Conversation in the teachers’ lounge ranges from important school-related discussions to personal accounts with no reference to the teaching profession. Teachers communicate to each

other through stories. I tell stories about students and experiences at school everywhere.

Interactions with and between students often make good stories. When I get home, I tell my wife stories about both the teachers and the students that I interacted with during the day. I am frequently telling stories. It seems natural for me to take a narrative approach to my research.

My methodological approach is best described as a hybrid of narrative inquiry, practitioner research, and autoethnography. Each of these three research methods serves a specific purpose in my study. As a nascent researcher, a hybrid research method based in narrative, practitioner research and autoethnography may seem an illogical choice. Why would I choose research methods in which most literature about them begins with a disclaimer that it is a new and developing form that is often questioned in the realm of social science? Richardson (in

Denzin & Lincoln, 2000) describes writing as inquiry (narrative inquiry) as an alternative to traditional research. Who am I to conduct alternative research having never attempted traditional research? In my defense, utilizing a hybrid of three research methods best suits my goal of better understanding my art educations. I have experiences to write about, and I have enough theoretical understanding to analyze writings about my experiences in a narrative form. The narrative aspect of this inquiry makes sense as I am frequently a storyteller, although not usually a story writer. Most of the writing I have done has been done in college coursework and usually to express an understanding of a subject rather than writing to explore or investigate. Practitioner research is a natural choice as a method as I am addressing my practice. However, my practice is only one aspect of my art educations that I would like to examine. Since practitioner research mainly addresses the teaching elements of my research questions, I need to widen the scope to include my learning experiences as well as my teaching. The third method that composes my three-pronged hybrid research method is autoethnography. The deep tradition of ethnography, of

which autoethnography is a branch, is too deeply steeped in a tradition of social science research for me to confidently tackle a “stand alone” autoethnographic study. I certainly don’t consider myself an ethnographer. Without including elements of narrative inquiry and practitioner research, I would not attempt to study myself for this dissertation. Rationale for a Qualitative

Methodology

Life experience, the Art World, my political attitudes and my engagement in graduate studies has shaped my ontology. Hence, my research is reflective of this ontology. I could describe my ontology under the umbrella of Post-modernism. Existing beneath this broad postmodern standpoint are elements that more specifically describe my research philosophy and approach. The following is an illustration of these elements.

Post-modernism (Ontology) ↓ Post-positivism, Interpretivism and Constructivism (Epistemology) ↓ Qualitative Research (General methodology) ↓ Narrative Inquiry, Autoethnography, Practitioner Research (Methods)

Under the broad paradigm of qualitative research, I take a Post-modern stance. Within the variety of strands that can be considered postmodern I identify most closely with post-positivism, interpretivism, and constructivism. Using these conceptual standpoints I utilize the methods of narrative inquiry, autoethnography, and practitioner research to conduct an inquiry into monologic and dialogic aspects of my art educations.

Two schools of thought have heavy influence my ontological assumptions about the world. Early in my graduate art education I was introduced to feminism. Aspects of feminism that I accepted made it easy to understand and embrace Post-modernism.

Reading and learning about feminism, I began to unlearn many hierarchical assumptions about the art world and eventually the world itself. When I view the world through a feminist lens I can see the hegemony inherent in hierarchy (Garber, 1990). When one values museum art over craft; and painting over a piece of textile, it devalues the maker and perhaps places false value on the painter. Applying this feminist lens to looking at art changed the way I teach about art. I am now very careful not to express any hierarchical statements about the art I that I show to my students. As young people, they come to me with fewer preconceptions about the art world than I had to unlearn before my exposure to feminist thought. I strive to apply my feminist lens and reject hierarchy in everyday life as well.

Relating to my feminist rejection of hierarchy, Post-modernism explains my acceptance of the multiplicity of identity and belief that all knowledge is tentative, perspectival and temporal. This has influenced my understanding of knowledge construction (Lather, 2006).

There are no universal truths.

My epistemological stance is best described as a composite of post-positivist, interpretivist and constructivist. However I hesitate to claim these as guiding paradigms for my thought. I mean that I do not look to these philosophies to form my thoughts, rather I have reflected upon my thoughts and actions and identified post-positivism, interpretivism and constructivism as philosophies that best describe my stance. These philosophies share many elements.

I could describe my understanding of knowledge as post-positivist because I reject the notion of one objective truth. All human understanding is limited and fallible. In the same vein, interpretivist thinking seeks to understand human behavior subjectively. As I described earlier, I am much more interested in multiple interpretations in my art class than teaching my students

one true exemplary response to artwork or artistic expression. The same holds true outside the art classroom. Everyone comes at an issue with different backgrounds and experiences which shape how they consider the world.

My philosophy of knowledge generation can be described as constructivist. I feel that people understand the world through different lenses. Rather than any idea having a universal truth that people come to understand, instead each person’s truth is constructed through their interactions and experiences with an idea. Our understandings are socially constructed. Hence, no one truth exists, nor does everyone need to understand the world in the same way. This stance allows me to investigate my art educations using dialogism as a filter.

I had not needed an understanding of how to conduct research, or the varying standpoints of research, until quite late in my graduate art education. Needing to gain such an understanding to write my dissertation, I took the recommendation of several people to take a class about qualitative research taught by a renowned professor in the education department. An epiphany moment for me concerning qualitative inquiry came in this class. In the art and art education realms the qualifier of “qualitative” is seldom needed. Rarely did I address issues in any art education from a quantitative perspective. Art educators live in the qualitative realm of emotions much more than they depend upon measureable data like facts and figures. I have considered all inquiry in the field of art that I had been exposed to be qualitative. Paintings cannot be measured in terms of effectiveness by any universal criteria. Instead it is generally accepted that each viewer is entitled to an opinion that is as valid as another viewer. My art students are assessed on their own artistic merit and potential rather than direct comparison to another student or other exemplar. Hence, prior to hearing the term “qualitative inquiry” or learning about it, I already was thinking in that mode.

I did not consider the potential tension between qualitative thought and science in research until enrolling in a course titled Qualitative Inquiry in Education Research during an autumn term taught by Dr. Logan. Dr. Logan spent, what I felt, was an inordinate amount of time and energy arguing against positivism and scientism. Positivism relies on objective scientific methods to determine “truths” and scientism is the application of positivism to social concerns. Having no experience conducting research I did not understand the long history of bias against qualitative thought in academia. Nor had I considered any conflict between science and social science. I describe Dr. Logan’s expositions against scientism as inordinate because I felt she was preaching to the choir, in that I had no love or commitment to science or scientific thought.

One day in class we broke into small groups to discuss an article we were assigned to read. I do not recall the article, but it addressed some aspect of the role of qualitative thought in the realm of scientific research. This was the moment when I realized that not everyone in educational academia accepted Post-modern thought. I was accustomed to less open minds outside my educational activities. However, I was surprised when several students in this group voiced their indignation at the prospect of multiple understandings. They wanted one single truth upon which to reply upon. I was taken aback. Since these young, obviously intelligent students came from a range of disciplines, I never would have guessed they would be steeped in such traditional thought.

Throughout the first weeks of the class, Dr. Logan continued to her ideological attack on scientism. As a sensitive and open-minded artist-type, I had no disposition towards scientific thought. I was sympathetic to issues that pitted humans against science. At the same time, I did not question the facts of science. Dr. Logan presented several examples of how science/facts

were interpreted differently by different groups. This was eye-opening. I always appreciated a dichotomous relationship between art and science. Art was interpretive; science represented proven unquestionable facts. Her discussions and assigned readings help me understand that one person’s scientific fact was not always accepted by another person. Dr. Logan described the interactions between an indigenous agricultural community and a chemical corporation. The science of the chemical company contradicted the experience and cultural practices of the native farmers. I realized that two realities, although contradictory, were both valid. The “hard” facts of a scientific study had to coexist with the people actually living the agricultural experience.

Another example given by Dr. Logan that was most closely related to my experience was a description of a remedial reading class in a high school. Students, based on test scores, were placed together in a class designed to raise their reading scores. Contrasted against the facts and figures of test scores and statistics about each student was the question: “How does it feel to be in a last-chance reading class?” The students in this class were reduced to numbers that identified them as below proficiency. However, each student was in fact an individual person with unique experiences and reasons for falling below the mark. No quantitative study could address the reasons the students were placed in the class or how being labeled as failing has affected them.

Even in a caring environment, like the elementary school where I teach, the students are often reduced to numbers of a page. The value of qualitative research is that it moves beyond numbers and favors a more holistic representation of human experience. The statistics may reflect a fact about the failing student, but the emotions of the student are more to the core of who he or she really is and how we can provide the best educational opportunities for this student.

Narrative Inquiry

Narrative inquiry, although not exclusively autobiographic in nature, is a research method that aligns with practitioner research and autoethnography. Examination of lived experience through narrative inquiry may be undertaken by practitioners, by writing autobiographically who analyze stories related to their practice. Narrative inquiry is valued for its ability to address the subtleties and complexities of human experience. Connelly and Clandinin (2015) validate this method of educational research by explaining that “humans are storytelling organisms who … lead storied lives. The study of narrative, therefore, is the study of the ways humans experience the world.” (p. 2).

This rigor and thoughtful introspection is what separates these methods of inquiry from other writing. Stories of experience expressed as practitioner research, autoethnography, and narrative inquiry are research, not memoir.

My reliance on storytelling as a teacher and learner leads me to narrative inquiry as a research method. Connelly and Clandinin (2006, p. 477) describe the necessity of narrative research as a response to the ‘storied lives’ we lead and how narratives shape our understanding of our world. I will employ narrative inquiry to better understand how my storied life in art education has shaped who I am.

At the heart of narrative inquiry is the importance of stories (narratives) in expressing, understanding and creating human experience. Narrative inquiry as a research practice analyzes stories to derive meaning and understand their role in how we experience the world.

Arguments for the development of and use of narrative inquiry

come from out of a view of human experience in which humans,

individually and socially, lead storied lives. People shape their

daily lives by stories of who they and others are and as they

interpret their past in terms of these stories. (Connelly and

Clandinin, in Green, Camilli & Elmore, 2006, p.477)

Connelly and Clandinin (in Green, Camilli & Elmore, 2006) identify three characteristics shared by narrative inquiries: (a) temporality, (b) sociality, and (d) place. Narrative inquiries exist within the past, present and future. Stories can address any of these temporal references.

For my research needs the temporality will reflect stories mainly from the past, told in the present and will reflexively influence my future. The environment, context and human relationships that the stories address demonstrate the social elements of narrative inquiry.

Finally, place is established as a real and existing location within the stories that constitute narrative inquiries. Each of these commonalities helps to create believability, an important feature of a qualitative study such as a narrative inquiry.

People make sense of their lives according to the narratives

available to them. Stories are constantly being restructured in light

of new events, because stories do not exist in a vacuum but are

shaped by lifelong personal and community narratives.

(Webster and Mertova, 2007, p.2)

Connelly and Clandinin (2006) describe the process of self-narration that highlight the experiential, reflective and reflexive nature of narrative inquiry. The authors use the terms (a) living, (b) telling, (c) retelling and (d) reliving. Living describes the life experiences of the narrator. The experiences are the subject of the narrative inquiry. Telling is the actual writing of the texts that relate the life events. These texts can include any artifacts or journals the author has collected. Retelling is the thoughtful analysis of the texts. As narratives are retold, the author is

not passively repeating tales. Instead the author purposefully chooses what to tell and how the tale is told. Reliving describes the inevitable changes that occur through the writing and analysis of one’s personal experience. The self-awareness gained in the retelling process inevitably effects further telling and further actions of the author. It is important to note the elements reflectivity and reflexivity inherent is narrative inquiry. Storied lives occur in the past and the present.

Richardson in (Denzin & Lincoln, 2000) contrasts writing as a method of inquiry to writing that is used to demonstrate knowledge. She describes the processes of “discovery and analysis” involved when one writes to “know” rather than writes to “tell” (p.923). As a method that differs from traditional research, writing as inquiry offers the researcher a unique opportunity to investigate the world.

Writing as a method of inquiry, then, provides a research practice

through which we can investigate how we construct the world,

ourselves, and others, and how standard objectifying practices of

social science unnecessarily limit us and social science.

Richardson (in Denzin & Lincoln, 2000 p. 924)

Goodall (2000) explains the narrative inquiry interpretation process as “using the material of our personal backgrounds and lived experiences to explain why and how we see and interpret the meanings of persons and the things we do” (p.187). This process may uncover before unrealized aspects of our lives for both the reader and author of narrative texts.

Richardson (in Denzin & Lincoln, 2000) characterizes Post-modern nature of the methodology of narrative inquiry by describing “the writing process and the writing product as

deeply intertwined; both privileged (p.930). From a Post-modern perspective all research is doubted. It is important to consider and state the position and intentions of the author/researcher.

Autoethnography

In what follows, I provide a brief overview of three standpoints on autoethnography, a

“form of writing that seeks to unite ethnographic (looking outward at a world beyond one’s own) and autobiographical (gazing inward for a story of one’s self) intentions” (Schwandt, 2007, p.

16). This section provides an in-depth review of scholarship about autoethnography from the perspectives of sociology, anthropology, and communications studies.

Bochner and Ellis have written extensively about autoethnography in journals and texts related to qualitative research and qualitative inquiry (Bochner 2012; Bochner & Ellis 2002; Ellis

& Bochner 1994, 2000, 2006, 2011). Bochner and Ellis are considered authorities on the subject of autoethnography. Schwandt (2007) cites Bochner and Ellis as two of the four key references in his Dictionary of Qualitative Inquiry under the heading of autoethnography. Ellis, Bochner and Adams authored “Autoethnography: An Overview” for the Journal Historical Social

Research in 2011. Denzin has also written about autoethnography from a sociological perspective. Denzin, with Lincoln, co-edited The Handbook of Qualitative Research (1994,

2000, 2011) and numerous journal articles about autoethnography (Denzin, 2006; Denzin &

Lincoln, 1994, 2000, 2001).

Denzin and Lincoln (2000) discuss autoethnography and the researcher as subject as narratives written about experience:

Personal experience reflects the flow of thoughts and meanings

that persons have in their immediate situations. These experiences

can be routine or problematic. They occur within the life of a

person. When they are talked about, they assume the shape of a

story, or a narrative. We cannot study lived experience directly,

because language, speech and systems of discourse mediate and

define the very experience we attempt to describe. We study the

representations of experience, not the experience. (Denzin &

Lincoln, 2000, p. 636)

Ellis, Bochner and Adams (2011) define the goal of autoethnography as “an approach to research and writing that seeks to describe and systematically analyze personal experience in order to understand cultural experience” (p.273). The authors dissect autoethnography into three components: ‘auto’- the self/author/researcher, ‘ethno’-the cultural/social element of the research, and ‘graphy’- the writing and methodology (Ellis et al., 2011, p. 273).

Reed-Danahay’s (1997) definition of autoethnography synthesizes two definitions; (a) the study of one’s own group, and (b) autobiographical work with an ethnographic emphasis.

The concept of autoethnography…synthesizes both a postmodern

ethnography, in which realist conventions and objective observer

position of standard ethnography have been called into question,

and a postmodern autobiography, in which the notion of a

coherent, individual self is similarly called into question. (Reed-

Danahay, 1997, p. 2)

This quote embodies several important concepts for the author. She describes a postmodern ethnography, in contrast to traditional ethnography that values, in her terms, realist conventions and objective observer position. The realist conventions most contested by autoethnography are the objective/non-participant ethnographer and the ability to generalize

ethnographic conclusions to represent an entire culture. For Reed-Danahay, autoethnography creates “a form of self-narrative that places the self within a social context” (p.9). Her definition stresses the writing process and understanding gained through re-writing our multi-positioned identity. Hence the title: Auto/Ethnography: Rewriting the Self and the Social.

Goodall (2000) described recent developments in the field of ethnography in Writing the

New Ethnography from the perspective of communication studies. Goodall’s book focuses on how to become an ethnographer. He breaks this task into learning to do fieldwork, learning to write, learning about who one is as an ethnographer, writer and as a person, and finally learning how all those elements connect (p.7).

Goodall (2000) discusses how ethnography expresses the writer’s identity. He characterizes these developments as “creative narratives shaped out of a writer’s personal experiences within a culture and addressed to academic and public audiences” (p. 9). The qualities that make the writing he describes as autoethnographic is the self-reflective nature he encourages. Rather than simply relate a personal story, Goodall suggests that a writer’s self- examination and empathetic voice be central to his or her research.

Goodall (2000) emphasizes that the purpose of autoethnography is to broaden understanding of both the self and the group being studied. He discusses how the writer presents and understands his or herself in and through the writing that is produced. Understanding the writer is the purpose of autoethnographic writing and the writer is in many ways also the object of analysis. Goodall’s goal is to develop effective ethnographers who create personal narratives.

Those narratives should reflect the writer and the culture to be ethnographic, as opposed to descriptive or autobiographic accounts that do not address the relationship of the writer to his or her subject.

Reed-Danahay edited Auto/Ethnography: rewriting the Self and the Social. Reed-

Danahay (1997) has collected autoethnographies from a variety of Post-modern contexts to bring to light approaches to life-narrative. She identifies a need to respond to the crisis of representation and the trend of reflexivity in cultural studies as motivation to edit this volume

(p.1). In the introduction of that text Reed-Danahay defines autoethnography and discusses its uses.

The goal of her book Reed-Danahay (1997) states, is to respond to “debates about representation (by whom and about whom), and the increasing trend towards self-reflexivity”

(p.1) in the field of cultural studies. Autoethnography addresses both of these concerns. Her stance is clearly postmodern as she advocates for a frame on writing that deals with issues concerned with “multiplicity of identities, of cultural displacement, and shifting axes of power”

(Reed-Danahay, 1997, p. 2). Hence the object of analysis from her view is, like Goodall (2000), both the culture and the researcher. However, for Reed-Danahay, the relationship of culture and researcher are less divided and one of her stated autoethnographic purposes is to explore how the division of these two positions is blurry and subject to change. For her, autoethnographic writing allows one to address to issues of selfhood in a postmodern world that are characterized by the exile caused by an unstable position in any one social or cultural group (Reed-Danahay, 1997, p.

3).

Ellis, Bochner and Adams (2001) state the goal of autoethnographic research is to

“sensitize readers to issues of identity politics, to experiences shrouded in silence, and to forms of representation that deepen our capacity to empathize with people who are different from us”

(p. 274). Ellis et al., (1992), state the purpose of autoethnography is social justice, such as to providing a forum to better understand the disenfranchised. In other words, autoethnography is

an attempt to add the researcher’s empathetic voice to what might otherwise be an unemotional recording of events from an outsider perspective. Like the other authors discussed in this literature review, Ellis et al., give authority to the participants as well as the researchers. An autoethnographer has the unique position as both participant and observer. Whereas traditional empirical research valued a supposedly detached observer/researcher, a certain amount of authority is granted to participant observers for their unique insider status in an autoethnography.

The object of analysis is both the researcher and researched culture.

Autoethnography is an appropriate methodology to compliment narrative inquiry and practitioner research. A common thread among the autoethnographic approaches is a focus on writing narrative about personal experience in a social context. Ellis, Bochner and Adam (2011) describe this as a paradigm shift away from traditional methods to make research more like literature, thus to produce “meaningful, accessible, and evocative research grounded in personal experience” (p.274). Goodall (2000) characterizes these developments as “creative narratives shaped out of a writer’s personal experiences within a culture and addressed to academic and public audiences” (p. 9). Reed-Danahay describes “self-narrative that places the self within a social context (Reed-Danahay, 1997, p. 9). The autoethnographic element of this dissertation will address all the criteria and concerns the aforementioned authors describe.

These authors presented a variety of definitions and purposes for autoethnography that are useful and applicable. I can synthesize the three perspectives into a working definition for the autoethnographic investigation of this research. Goodall’s (2000) general description of autoethnography as personal narrative within a culture written for an academic audience serves as an umbrella over my research.

Watson (2001) characterizes autoethnography as a research form that “questions the population of a coherent community from the perspective of a narrator whose identities are multiple, differently constructed and incompatible” (p. 85). This succinctly describes the existence of many facets of my experiences that I will investigate. She uses this definition to contradict the concept of a self-celebratory writing that I want to avoid.

Furthermore, Ellis, Bochner and Adams (2011) characterize the autoethnographic process as a synthesis of autobiography and ethnography:

When researchers do ethnography, they retrospectively and

selectively write about epiphanies that stem from, or are made

possible by, being a part of a culture and/or possessing a particular

cultural identity (p. 276).

Reed-Danahay (1997) describes the need for autoethnographic writing as a means to deal with the complexity of identity roles of a researcher. She characterizes a state in which “the postmodern/postcolonial conception of self and society is one of a multiplicity of identities, of cultural displacement, and of shifting axes of power” (p.2). This accurately describes the identity of an art educator who is teaching, learning and writing about the experience. As an art educator who also attends graduate school, I shift from teacher to learner regularly. However, between these two positions is the multitude of shifting and blurry distinctions of identity that Reed-

Danahay describes. My study will address the identity and boundary-crossing issues that she characterizes as a teacher/student boundary-crosser.

Reed-Danahay explains the autoethnographic process as one that intersects three types of ethnographic writing (Reed-Danahay, 1997, p. 2). The first genre, “native anthropology” (p. 2), is critically motivated autoethnography in that those who were previously studied become the

writers of their version of the story. This involves a clear boundary-crossing by research subjects into the researcher role. “Ethnic autobiography” (p. 2) is narrative by and about inclusion in an ethnic minority. Like native anthropology those writing in this genre “become ethnographers of their own culture” (p. 2). The third type of writing is “autobiographical ethnography” (p.2). This involves the ethnographers incorporating their own experience by writing reflexively about themselves as well as the subjects of the study. This genre allows non-natives to connect personal social relevance to a study of an outside group. My research will fall loosely into all three of Reed-Danahay’s stated genres. Although I cannot consider myself an anthropologist, by her definition, I will write a native account (as a native to the practice of teaching art) from an insider perspective about a much studied group; teachers. As a white male I do not qualify as an ethnic minority, as Reed-Danahay describes an ethnic autobiography. However, my sustained boundary-crossing between two distinct cultures places me as an insider, yet minority role within each culture. The narrative autoethnography element of my dissertation will adapt native, ethnic and autobiographical stances.

The ability to transcend everyday conceptions of selfhood and

social life is related to the ability to write or do autoethnography.

This is the postmodern condition. It involves a rewriting of the self

and the social. (Reed-Danahay, 1997, p.4)

Reed-Danahay sees the autoethnographer as a boundary-crosser dealing with multiple, flexible identities and with issues of selfhood, voice, and authenticity. The boundary she describes is the separation between researcher and participant that was stressed in traditional ethnography. An autoethnographer assumes the multiple, flexible identities of subject, participant, observer, author researcher and self-critic in the course of the study. Traditional

research has imposed boundaries around each of these roles. As the autoethnographer moves back and forth from studied to studier, it is impossible to disregard either position. Presence in and between these positions displace the researcher from a single identity. She states “whether the autoethnographer is the anthropologist studying his or her own kind, the native telling his or her story, or the native anthropologist, this figure is not completely “at home” (Reed-Danahay,

1997, p.4). Reed-Danahay describes this as a kind of exile, blurring the distinction of participant and observer, placing the autoethnographer as the other at times during the study. I am adapting the ideas of boundary-crossing, multiple identities and exile described by Reed-Danahay to provide insight into my art educations.

I am drawn to this description of method because, as I will do, it explains the autoethnographic process and retrospection about my role in a culture. Ellis et al., describe ethnographic research processes that inform my study (pp. 278-280). Each example of a process incorporates techniques designed to help the researcher understand the self in the cultural context. The methods asserted by Ellis et al., that are most appropriate for my study are (a) narrative ethnography, (b) reflexive ethnography, and (c) personal narratives. Narrative and reflexive ethnographies fit Reed-Danahay’s (1997) definition of work that seeks to understand the self and the social through autoethnographic writing. Personal narratives put the researcher foremost in the research. My research could be characterized as a narrative autoethnography because it will address my personal intersections with the cultural context of my art educations.

Ellis et al., (2011) warn that this type of autoethnography is less accepted by social scientists if it lacks traditional analysis and/or reference to scholarly literature. My research will include analysis and refer to literature thus avoiding this pitfall. The emphasis in this research is on

understanding the self/researcher as much as understanding the culture as the entire study is conducted entirely through the eyes of the researcher.

Practitioner Research

Practitioner research is defined by Cochran-Smith and Lytle (2009) as a process “where the practitioner is simultaneously a researcher who is continuously engaged in inquiry with the ultimate purpose of enriching students’ learning” (viii). This research method differs from forms in which the researcher is examining a subject he/she may be neither a member or with which they may be unfamiliar. The obvious advantage of practitioner research is insider status for the researcher. Practitioner research “allows for theory-research-practice integrations through the development of systematic research procedures and practices that foster critical reflection and action in the context of professional practice’ (Ravitch, 2014). Dadds (2017) takes the definition of practitioner researcher to include a more broad motivation and desired outcome when describing “forms of enquiry which people undertake in their own working contexts and, usually, on their professional work, in whatever sphere they practice. The main purpose of the enquiry is to shed light on aspects of that work with a view to bring about some benevolent change” (p. 41).

This moves practitioner research beyond the local setting to suggest that this research can serve as a step towards more global benefits.

Practitioner research is a burgeoning and diverse methodology. Practitioners have utilized methods such as action research, participatory action research, self study, and have addressed the scholarship of teaching or simply employed their workplace as a site of research (Cochran-

Smith, 2009). Research by practitioners often shares characteristics that differ from traditional forms of research. Some features that are often included in practitioner research are (a) practitioner as researcher, (b) community and collaboration, (c) local knowledge, (d) professional

context as inquiry site and professional practice as inquiry focus, (e) blurred boundaries between inquiry and practice, non-traditional conception of validity and generalizability, (f) systematicity and intentionality, and (g) public and accessibility (p.41-5).

Practitioner inquiry separates itself from research in which the researcher is a non- practitioner, as is often the case in university or government sponsored research studies.

Practitioner research also differs from professional learning communities; a practice often utilized in schools, which focus on research directed towards improving individual schools or school districts.

Three commonly assumed dialectic relationships in educational research are often blurred by practitioner research (Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 2009). First and foremost, practitioner research purposely and purposefully blends rather than separates research and practice. Secondly, the dialectic of researcher and practitioner, traditionally separate roles, are integrated in practitioner research. A third dialectic assumption is between conceptual and theoretical research.

Practitioner research is a hybrid, combining the theory and logic of conceptual research and the utilization of evidence and data of empirical research. Finally, dialectic assumptions about knowledge that draw distinctions between the usefulness of local knowledge and more “formal” knowledge are rejected by practitioner research. In fact, practitioner research can claim to be more applicable than other forms of research because it is rooted in practice. The blurring of the dialectic relationship of theory and practice is important to this study.

Bullough and Pinnegar (2001) outline elements of quality autobiographical research. The authors identify these characteristics of successful self-study: (a) autobiographic accounts that show veracity and to which readers can relate, (b) studies that contribute to understanding, but are open to individual interpretation, (c) are honest about the researcher’s bias and prejudices, (d)

address issues and concerns in teacher education, (e) extend writing beyond the author’s voice to and personal meaning, (f) have the goal of improving teaching and learning, (g) read as interesting and gripping as fiction, (g) take care to develop the context of the characters and settings, and (h) provide a fresh point of view on education (p. 16-9). These guidelines for quality self-study align with features of practitioner research.

Cochran-Smith (2012) describes a component of practitioner research called “inquiry as stance” as:

… a concept we developed a number of years ago to emphasize

that teacher inquiry is a worldview, a critical habit of mind, and a

way of knowing about teaching that carries across the professional

continuum and across educational settings. (p.9)

This explains the goal of global educational reform and inclusion of a range of education topics from teacher education to practice. This includes research traditionally created by and for academic audiences such as dissertations.

Over the years we have learned that it is important not to assume

that the commitments of practitioners need to be reframed or

redirected in order to generate dissertations. Practitioner’s

questions emerge from important and immediate concerns,

engagements, and commitments to their professional settings, even

though these questions may not be perceived by others as

significant for building knowledge in the field. (Cochran-Smith,

(2012, p. 107)

Practitioner Research is not characterized by any particular research method. The methodology of practitioner inquiry honors the insider status of the researcher. A variety of methods can be used to conduct practitioner research, as long as the practitioner is the researcher.

Common among any of method implemented is the focus on practice and the goal of improvement of teaching ranging from the immediate classroom practices to the larger realm of learning at a theoretical level. Thus, practitioner research is an ideal component to include in this hybrid methodology.

Research Design, Strategy and “Data” Collection

The setting of this research is the elementary school where I teach and various classrooms and lecture halls at The Ohio State University where I have attended classes. In addition to these formal spaces I will examine experiences in the hallways between classes, spaces outside the school settings where discussions about education took place and during the time spent traveling between the educational spaces. I will be the main subject of this research. My interactions with and observations of anyone I have encountered who is related to the realm of education may be included as data.

The study will be a narrative inquiry including written accounts of my experiences. The data collection will include journals, notes, timelines and artifacts that I have written and collected about my experience in art education as a teacher, as a student, and graduate student.

Issues of Trustworthiness

Reed-Danahay (1997) advocates for the use of autoethnography as a research method.

She describes it as an alternative to traditional ethnography (p. 2). Inherent in this argument is the unethical nature of a traditional study that would not address native knowledge or include participant input. She states “the voice of the insider is assumed to be more true than that of the

outsider” (Reed-Danahay, 1997, p. 3). Practitioner research and my use autobiographical use of narrative inquiry share much of the” researcher as subject” stance of autoethnography. For Reed-

Danahay validity would be achieved with the inclusion of native, though admittedly tenuous position, in a study.

Reliability, validity and generalizability, in an autoethnographic context, have different meanings from the same terms in traditional research. The same holds true for narrative inquiry.

Foremost, any notion of ‘truth’ is problematized as contingent in many respects. Memory is recognized as imperfect and the inconsistency of multiple viewpoints, even of a single event, are acknowledged as contributing to a shifting and tenuous reality. Reliability is thought of as the credibility of the story being told. Thus the autoethnographer’s credibility is vital to believable research. A valid narrative inquiry should communicate about the culture it is describing in a way that outsiders can gain a better understanding of those outside the culture. Such a text would allow the reader to assume the role of the author and be able to relate to the story almost as an insider, and be able to use the reading experience to empathize with the participants and their culture. Generalizability describes how readers may be able to relate the research to their own lives and/or gain understanding of other cultures. The specific stories will not provide sweeping generalizations for all members of a culture, but instead provide opportunities for connections for the readers. A generalizable text successfully draws the reader in and speaks to him/her on an emotional level. These three terms, (a) reliability, (b) validity, and (c) generalizability, as illustrated, stray vastly from the more scientific definitions that would never include consideration of believability, empathy or emotion.

Ellis, Bochner and Adams (2011) address the ethical issues of autoethnography. A study such as a narrative inquiry or autoethnography that relates stories is subject to “relational ethics”

(p. 281). Relational ethics describes potential issues that may affect persons related, but perhaps not directly involved in the study as well as those otherwise touched by the act of research and eventual disclosure of the study. This includes any persons mentioned in a narrative and those affected by the narrative’s content. All of these people must be respected throughout the research. The authors’ examples of those who must be considered include family, colleagues and friends who may be identified directly or through association to the researcher. The researcher must remain be aware of how participants and others are portrayed in the autoethnography in part because he/she may have continued contact with these people after the research concludes. The authors advise researchers about relational concerns that “must be kept uppermost in their minds throughout the research and writing process” (Ellis et al., 2011, p. 281).

Lichtman (2013) describes ten major principles associated with ethical conduct in regard to research (pp. 52-56).

1) Do No Harm- My intent for this research is to provide insight into dialogism in respect to my art educations. Critical or less than complimentary depictions of others in my narrative will be included in the spirit of learning and as a contribution to art education as a discipline. I anticipate the majority of negative depictions, if any, will be directed inwardly. I am not undertaking this research to find fault in either of the institutions, public school or the university, rather to better understand the cultures of these institutions and myself.

2) Privacy and Anonymity- There are two aspects of privacy and anonymity to consider; individual and institutional. I have the ability in insure some degree of anonymity to the people I will describe in my autoethnography. Since I am utilizing memories of over close to forty years as data, it would be difficult if not impossible to get consent from all parties involved.

Thus I will be using pseudonyms for students and colleagues from my twenty-nine years of

practice at the elementary school. I will still exercise caution as not to reveal identities through specific associations, portrayals or incidents that I write about. These precautions will provide privacy and anonymity.

3) I will identify the Ohio State University as one of the sites in my narratives, but use pseudonyms for the professors whose classes I will describe in my autoethnography.

Although I believe they should be credited for their work which has inspired and helped me for many years, I did not seek permission or member check their depictions in my study. I do not believe that naming OSU will compromise the anonymity of my elementary school participants

4) Confidentiality- My narrative will focus on past events so I could not forewarn participants that they may be included in this research. Instead I will rely on privacy and anonymity to serve as a substitute for confidentiality. Again, I do not anticipate writing anything that would be negative or harmful. That said I also understand that I cannot know how others will react to how they are portrayed and will be try to be mindful to consider confidentiality.

5) Informed Consent- All characterizations of adults are represented with pseudonyms. No children are named in this study to protect privacy and anonymity.

6) Rapport and Friendship- I have no issues of creating false friendships or rapport to gain access to a site or participants. I am studying sites where I have worked or studied long before this study was initiated. Because I am reflecting, I cannot misuse the power inherent in the teacher/student dynamic. Although, I am aware that relationships of power exist. Many of the individuals I will write about in my study are considered friends. I am friends with several parents of former students. Some of the colleagues at my school and university instructors and staff who may be included in my writing could also be considered my friends. Again,

friendships that have developed and may develop in the course of this study are coincidental and genuine.

7) Intrusiveness- Intrusiveness should not be an issue in the study because I am primarily reflecting on past events. If I ask for input from college professors I will need to be aware of their time restraints and workloads. I will try to respect the good nature of those who choose to participate in my research.

8) Inappropriate Behavior- I have been teaching children for thirty years and attending college for close to forty years. My behavior in both of these settings has always been appropriate. I understand that acceptable behavior is different is the elementary school and college environment and see no reason why conducting this research would alter my ability to act appropriately and responsibly.

9) Data Interpretation- Lichtman (2013) cautions to avoid misstatements, misinterpretation and fraudulent analysis of data (p.55). My analysis will be totally subjective and I can only hope to honestly represent what I have experienced and express it as earnestly as possible. My goal is to create a study that is transferable, not generalizable, but in the end readers will decide if my interpretations are relevant to their settings and practices.

10) Data Ownership and Rewards- I am initiating and undertaking this research by and for myself. The university may retain any usual and ordinary rights to my dissertation. I do not anticipate any financial gains from publication.

11) Other Issues- Lichtman (2013) included this heading to address the political nature of research. I believe that no activity or thought is free of political influence. Thus, no research is innocent. I will attempt to remain aware of issues of power and influence throughout this study.

I completed the basic Human Research Curriculum course of the Collaborative Institutional

Training Initiative (CITI) in June of 2012. Completion of the refresher to this course is was completed March, 2018.

Summary

In the end, Dewey’s views on experience, and the practices of narrative inquiry, autoethnography, and practitioner research, facilitate the methods for telling and analyzing stories. The literature of these disciplines share experience and narrative as important components. Although Dewey does not specifically mention narrative inquiry, Dewey’s work validates the focus on experience. Practitioner inquiry validates the importance of practice integrated with research. Narrative inquiry validates story as a means to construct understanding.

Finally, autoethnography validates the self as the best source for knowledge and understanding.

Dewey provides the overarching themes of (a) pragmatism, (b) experience, and (c) knowledge construction. Practitioner research, autoethnography, and narrative inquiry can be considered pragmatic research methods. Practitioner research is clearly pragmatic as it addresses classroom and practical teaching concerns, but also expands to broader global concerns of education from the practitioner perspective. Autoethnography shares the pragmatic characteristic of questioning dogma. The autoethnographer seeks to understand and illuminate by asking why rather than recording or reporting phenomena. Narrative inquiry, through reflexivity, characterizes the pragmatic stance. Pragmatism seeks to apply knowledge to action. Narrative inquiry asks the researcher to consider the actions created from the reflecting upon and analyzing the stories we tell. Dewey’s thinking concerning experience, is an element shared by practitioner research, autoethnography, and narrative inquiry. Experience, though not integral to practitioner research is implied since all practice reflects the experience of the practitioner. A teacher cannot

ignore the role of experience in practice. Autoethnography gives voice to those with insider/participant status, often providing an outlet for stories of experience for those who have may not been previously heard or their stories valued. The stories integral to narrative inquiry represent our telling and retelling about our experiences. When the term “storied lives” is used in narrative inquiry it is referring to experience. Finally, knowledge construction, the third of

Dewey’s components addressed in this study is found in practitioner research, autoethnography, and narrative inquiry. Although knowledge in practitioner research is primarily generated to improve the field of teaching it can attend to how knowledge in constructed. Any inquiry into the practice of teaching and learning must attend to how learners construct knowledge. In some cases the learner is the student, but could the teacher is also a learner at times. Autoethnography and narrative inquiry place a premium on investigating how experience shapes our understanding of the world. Both methods are concerned with how we have constructed our ontologies.

Autoethnography and narrative inquiry share the idea that knowledge is created and understood through social interaction. There is not a single truth to be discovered, rather there are multiple valid understandings based on individual interpretation.

The relationship between the teachings of Dewey and the literature of practitioner research, autoethnography and narrative inquiry address the concerns of an analysis of teaching and learning. The literature in these diverse fields can be adapted to create a solid conceptual framework for an investigation into the monologic and dialogic qualities of an art education practice, learning as an art student and learning as an art education student.

Chapter 4: Research Findings (My Narratives)

Overview

For nearly as long as I can recall my identity has revolved around art. The many elements that have contributed to how this artistic identity was formed can be termed “my art educations”.

My early art education initiated my interest in participating in art. My success must have inspired my continuous engagement in artistic endeavors. Gradually my engagement with art shifted from hands-on art creation to more cerebral pursuits in which I considered the nature of art and spent more energy teaching others to appreciate art. For most of the past thirty years my art educations have formally manifested through learning at the university level and teaching at the elementary level.

Figure 1. Grade School Picture

In elementary school I was a chubby, glasses-wearing little boy with a good sense of humor, but a terrible student. I can’t pinpoint the exact moment, but around first or second grade

I began to display a talent for drawing. That talent became my sole connection to any academic activity in grade school. At an early age I lost interest in most subjects in school and focused solely on art. My only connection to these subjects was made through finding a way to add drawings to projects or assignments. My elementary school did not have an art teacher.

Figure 2. Grade school art award Without much formal instruction in the arts early in my life, I still developed a lifelong interest in many aspects of art. Through junior high school, I was still a poor student trying not to stand out in any way. The big difference was that I had my first real art class and first real art teacher. Now I had a reason to put some effort forth in school and began to see some value in formal education beyond the social aspects. I recall only one semester of junior high school art.

In high school, I took all the art classes available and visited the art room whenever I had a free period. Still uninterested in the required subjects, I used high school as a social rather than academic resource. I didn’t study much, did the minimum to get by, and was delighted to get a C in any non-art class. I was voted class clown my senior year. Hence, my high school grades were quite poor.

Throughout high school I was identifying as an artist and was sure that somehow I was going to become a working artist although I had no idea what that meant. The outlandish hope of becoming an artist was not very different from saying that I wanted to be a professional football player, having only played on the junior varsity squad my sophomore year.

Figure 3. Typical Teacher Comment How did I end up at OSU after such a miserable high school performance? Several factors lead me there. I was talked out of attending an art school after graduation. Attending

Columbus College of Art and Design (CCAD) was always my goal. I used that goal as an excuse for my poor academics. I assumed I would be accepted since I was clearly one of the best artists in my high school. I didn’t have a portfolio or any real understanding of what it would take to get into an art school. CCAD tuition was very expensive. My father taught electrical engineering at

OSU, a job that included a 50% tuition discount for children of employees. Without a clear plan

for getting into any art school and the appeal of considerably less expensive tuition, OSU seemed like a better choice for a lackluster student such as me. Perhaps the most decisive factor in my higher education choice was the policy of OSU to accept almost any high school graduate from the state of Ohio, regardless of SAT score or grade point average. I met their ridiculously low standard at that time. By autumn quarter I was a college student in the Fine Arts program with an emphasis on painting, drawing and printmaking.

Career impracticality wasn’t enough of a roadblock to keep me from majoring in art in college. I spent from 1979-1983 as a Fine Art major at The Ohio State University. Two years after graduating with a BFA, I finally came to realize that I needed a job that was related to art. I also realized that probably wasn’t being an artist.

Here my art education shifted from receiving an education about art that I could apply to my artmaking, to learning about how to teach art. Coming back to The Ohio State University many times for the next thirty years, I focused my studies primarily within the Art Education department.

Beginning in 1988, and for most of the next thirty years, I was both a practicing art teacher and a part-time graduate student at OSU. My art educations occurred simultaneously as a teacher and as a student. From that point forward I received my art education through both formal instruction at the university and the informal education of experience. As a practicing art teacher, I have spent the last thirty years dispensing art education. My extended engagement in these two arenas may provide insight into both.

My story is actually a compilation of many varied stories of my experiences. The common thread throughout these stories is the setting (OSU and Beacon Street school), the main character (me), and the theme (art education). I have almost four decades of my education to

describe, and even in this overview, I may also need to go back and forth in time. Much has happened and I will go off on many tangents to cover all the different aspects of my experiences that I want to address. I am attempting to organize and express the numerous moving parts that are my stories, my life, my experiences, and my emotions. I hope to shape my experiences into stories that are comprehensible, interesting and touch on all the elements of my art education that have profoundly impacted my life and may also do so for other art educators.

This narrative inquiry will explore the phases of my education that helped form my identity as an artist, art teacher and art student; the three aspects of my life most related to my education and career as an art educator. The stages of my art educations can be identified as (a.) elementary and junior high school experiences, (b.) high school experiences, (c.) undergraduate experiences at OSU, (d.) graduate school experiences at OSU, and (e) the personally educational aspects of my varied art education experiences. The goal of this narrative is to illuminate the influences on my development as an art educator, in other words what has made me the teacher that I am today? But, I am more than a teacher. I am a thinking person, an acting person, and an artist. This narrative and subsequent analysis sheds light on the dialogic interactions and lost

(monologic) interactions that distinguish my art educations and the person I have become.

Teaching and Learning

I am an art elementary art teacher and a graduate art education student. I have performed both of these roles, mostly concurrently, for a very long time. Schooling and education has been a constant in my life. I was a Columbus Public Schools student in Columbus, Ohio from 1966 to

1979. From 1979 to the present I have been attended The Ohio State University, also in

Columbus, Ohio. I have not been continuously enrolled all of that time, but with the exception of only a few years away from OSU when I landed my first teaching assignment, I have stayed

connected to the university. Some of this time at OSU I was working towards a degree and other time was spent taking courses more for my personal enrichment. From 1988 until now I have also been an art teacher at Wetherfield City Schools in Wetherfield, Ohio. Although I teach art and continue to attend the university, I have not satisfied my quest for an art education. With all of this time spent involved in art education as an art teacher and as a graduate art education student, why would I still feel compelled to continue an art education journey?

I am currently struggling through the dissertation writing process with two major roadblocks: (a) identifying a topic that will add to and represent new outlooks to the vast and scholarly body of knowledge that presently exists in art education and (b) feeling as though I lack the academic chops to write about any topic with any sense of authority. I know that I want to examine how art education has shaped my life and my teaching. A newfound understanding of

“inquiry as stance” (Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 2009) as applied to practitioner research may have resolved this dilemma. I feel validated by the definition of practitioner inquiry that defines it analysis that is “constructed by practitioners committed to long-term and highly systematic observation and documentation of learners and their sensemaking” (Cochran-Smith & Lytle,

2009, p. 44). My validation comes from being a practitioner, generating detailed research encompassing decades of art education experience, and my simultaneous positions as teacher/learner and participant/researcher.

I have in the past been frustrated by attempts to apply a theoretical lens to any aspect of my art educations. Whenever I tried to apply a theory to my educational experiences I would delve into the theoretical predecessors and sub-theories related to the original. Each attempt would reveal a seemingly endless new body of knowledge. I could spend the rest of my life following the references and cross-references offered in the articles I am finding related to my art

educational experiences. I cannot possibly learn about all of this. I just want to use what I already know apply it in a new way to better understand my journey. Although it also offers a myriad of usages and offshoots, the lens of dialogism is the most appropriate filter through which to analyze my art educations.

Although I have been a near constant state of being formally educated from age 5 to 57, I have never felt like an expert. Ironically, being a teacher (as my profession) I have always felt like a student. I identify myself as a student rather than a “life-long learner” to emphasize the rather passive, receptive role I have assumed. This is my own choice. I could have stopped attending OSU after receiving my teaching credentials in 1988, and taught for 30 years without returning for more college courses. I could have taken a minimal amount of professional development, and not necessarily in an art education department or at OSU (a rigorous and highly demanding site to satisfy minimum credit hour certification requirements) No one has forced me to continue graduate studies in art education, or to do it as I have over such a long period.

Nonetheless, for many years I have chosen to engage in an activity that often makes me question many of my teaching practices and feel jealous of and lacking compared to the scholarly, well-read graduate students and professors I meet at the university. Although I was often the only pupil in these graduate art education classes with any art teaching experience, I tended to feel vastly inadequate. Either the instructor was extolling a current art education movement that I had never addressed in my own classroom, which left me feeling as though I was ignoring important developments in my field, or the class would focus on some deep theoretical topic or theme that the professor did not connect to any classroom applications. I rarely felt that I possessed the academic foundation or literary background to do more than try to

keep up in these classes. Obviously, there were exceptions. Dr. Walden found a way to weave challenging schools of thought into accessible courses, which I was able to connect to my practice without feeling my current teaching method was trivial or that my academic experience was lacking. I will say more about her and her classes later.

Regardless of the relevancy or difficulty of the coursework, and through the highs and lows of art education courses that seemingly had little value to me professionally, I returned to

OSU again and again. Attending graduate school while teaching full-time put a strain on my personal life and it was often hard to determine if the stress caused by my graduate studies was worth the intellectual gains but, I returned to OSU again and again.

An early draft of my dissertation proposal addressed my role as a boundary-crosser dealing with the tensions present when I transitioned from elementary school to college, from teacher to student, on a regular basis. In retrospect, the tension caused by these dual roles was greatly exaggerated. I am in a highly privileged position to be able to complain about my roles as full-time teacher in wonderful school district and graduate student at a prestigious university.

Also, my engagement at the university is totally voluntary. If it was so taxing or such a hardship

I could simply discontinue my graduate classes at any time. The truth is I loved every minute of my time at OSU, even during the most arcane and challenging classes.

I do not want to let the many years I have spent engaged in art education, including graduate studies at OSU, go unexamined. Reed-Danahay (1997) describes the trend in cultural studies towards debates about representation and self-reflexivity. I would support her claim that

“important cultural reproduction occurs in the realm of written texts” and that my writing about elementary school and graduate school qualify as text representing experience in these areas. I am creating first-person narrative scholarship (writing) which Bochner (2012) describes as

“usefully conceived as a material intervention into people’s lives, one that not only represents but also creates experience, putting meaning into motion” (p. 157). There is substantive understanding to be gained from investigating the motivations and benefits of my art educations.

Teaching is often quite a solitary pursuit. Although I have interaction with students every day, I am of my own when it comes to planning, evaluating and revising my practice. As the only art teacher in the building I don’t have anyone with which to discuss art-related teaching issues. I see other art teachers almost every month, but these voluntary meetings hardly address the many concerns that arise. I do, however, have a core group of colleagues at school with whom I can freely talk about any non-art-related issues. This is very important to me. I am the only adult in the room for the majority of the day and it is a welcome change to have close friends to talk to at school. I could teach completely independent of other teachers, in my own little world, but it would be difficult. I am very lucky to be at least tolerant of everyone on the staff and elated that I have developed close friendships with a few colleagues. The only person who has gotten under my skin was very early in my career. I briefly worked with Mr. Smock. If I had to live with his constant scrutiny and derision, it would be unbearable.

My move to elementary from middle school teaching was based on the offer of a full- time position. I was happy with the middle school students. My original desire was a high school position. This was almost certainly tied to my memories of my own high school art experiences.

When I decided to become a teacher, my mental picture was of my high school art teacher, Mrs.

Hazel. I too would be a serious artist who just happened to be a teacher. I too would look, act and fully commit to the role of an artist. No one would mistake me for a Spanish or Physical

Education teacher. It is hard to speculate how my art educations would have differed had I stayed at the middle school or moved to teach art at the high school. Perhaps I would have been more

fulfilled in terms of teaching higher level art ideas. I wonder if I stayed connected to graduate art education to fill an intellectual void left by working with such a young population. Had I been able to share and interact with older students, I might have been able to exercise that part of my brain. If I had moved to a position teaching older students, the need to keep up with current art education thinking and trends within the field would be even more vital. However, I don’t know if I would have gone back to OSU and stayed as long wasn’t engaged with the 5-12 year olds.

Dialogism, creating a new meaning from the disparate sites of the elementary school and the college classroom, has fostered my continued engagement in both sites. Taking understandings I have learned in graduate school, I can expound about higher level concepts and theories that may never have direct application to my art teaching practice at the elementary school. Even if these mental exercises are primarily for my benefit, to occupy my need for academic challenge, the process of thinking about these concepts makes me a better art teacher.

The grounding of my art teaching practice put me in a unique position in graduate classes. I have the “boots on the ground” experience in the field being theorized about in the graduate classroom. This factor alone makes me an outlier among professors and graduate students with far less art classroom experience. To effectively utilize dialogism in my two sites of art education I must suspend polemic understanding I have about both sites, I stated earlier that although both sites are in the realm of art education, the sites are often at odds with each other.

My Art Educations

I have had numerous art educations. When I speak of art educations I am referring the multifaceted learning experiences in which I have engaged from my first art instruction in grade school to the day I wrote this passage. As Dewey (1938) stated “every experience is a moving

force. Its value can be judged only on the ground of what it moves toward and into” (p.37). My art education experiences moved me towards a lifelong involvement in art education.

My formal art educations have included public schooling as I grew up in suburban

Columbus, Ohio, and a college education in fine art. I have also studied art education to become an art teacher and later to enhance my teaching and for personal enrichment. I continued graduate studies in art education well beyond what is required for my job. My art educations also include learning outside the academic setting while on the job. Although I learn every day, my first few years as a teacher provided a unique experiential learning environment. Dewey (1904) describes the process of a beginning teacher learning from an experienced mentor. Observing three different art teachers during my first three years of teaching I felt, as Dewey describes, that

I was able to “translate the practical devices which are such an important part of the equipment of a good teacher over into their psychological equivalents… to know how and why they work.

Thus… be an independent judge and critic of their proper use and adaptation” (p. 19). The early years in my teaching career are perhaps the strongest instances of dialogic interaction related to the art education I received and my art teaching practice.

In addition to receiving art educations through the formal and informal education settings that I just described, for the last thirty years I have been providing art education as an elementary art teacher. I am both an art teacher and a student of art education, a position that has provided numerous personal and pedagogical benefits.

Prior to my acceptance into the doctoral program, what I most enjoyed about the graduate courses was the intellectual challenge. Serious students were in these classes, discussing complex issues and ideas. My elementary art teaching routine is fulfilling but also mind-numbing at times. Much of the teaching of art to children aged five and twelve years old has surprising little

to do with art. More energy is spent trying to get students to sit down and listen than facilitating thoughtful discussion or art production in many cases. My typical school day involves more classroom management, preparation of materials, and cleaning up after classes than teaching about art. My job is often as physically demanding as it is mentally. Preparing for and cleaning up after six classes each day is hard work. The graduate classes I took were a welcome respite from elementary school life and a chance to interact on a high intellectual level.

My experience in educational settings as a student from kindergarten through PhD candidacy, and as a teacher over a long period of time has provided me with both data and a means for analysis. My thirty years of teaching in elementary school has provided me with ample data to investigate. My research will employ autoethnographic, narrative inquiry and practitioner research methods to investigate how my art educations did or did not utilize dialogism as both a teacher and a student. I have taught about art, shared my enthusiasm for art and cared about my students in what some may describe as an unceremonious and unexceptional manner. My research may reflect experiences of the majority of art teachers who also diligently perform an important, yet at times, unremarkable job.

Dialectic and Dialogic Relationships

It is not difficult to imagine how dialectic/monologic relationships can arise between teaching and learning for practicing teachers who attend graduate school. The common theme of education does not always integrate the two sites. First, the physical locations are different and to an elementary teacher the graduate school classroom probably looks very different than the classrooms at their school. In addition to leaving one school location to attend class at another school, the teacher also reverses their role. When the teacher attends class they relinquish the authority they may wield in their teaching environment.

Physically, I have a desk located where all my students can see me, but I am separated from the students’ tables. During classes I often circulate around the room interacting with students. When I attend graduate classes I sit with the other students. Most of my graduate classes consist of listening to instructors or discussing class material. Almost all of this is done in a seated position, sometimes for hours.

Along with the difference in physicality, the mental engagement in the graduate classroom differs greatly from the elementary teacher role. Although I am not moving around a graduate school classroom, I am an active learner. It is simply far less physical to learn in a graduate classroom than to teach art to children. My participation in learning in a graduate class has vast differences from my elementary teaching role. I go from being totally responsible for the safety, wellbeing and learning for a class of nearly thirty students, to a focus on me. I can choose to actively participate in discussions and ask a multitude of questions or sit back and learn more passively from the instructor and students’ activity and interaction. Passivity is a luxury I rarely have an opportunity to exercise at my school. Even when my older students are to the point in an assignment when they are actively engaged in artmaking, they are children and they seek or require my constant watchfulness and engagement.

Transitioning regularly from a teacher role and a student/learner role can be intellectually and emotionally challenging. I often find myself performing opposite intellectual tasks. In my teaching role, I spend time and energy taking complex art ideas and breaking them down and simplifying them in a way that my young students can understand. Conversely, in graduate school the ideas are already complex, so we spend time and energy “troubling” concepts to flesh out as many conceptions and understandings as possible.

I often found returning to OSU as a student, relinquishing my authority as a teacher, and reversing my usual role was humbling. The small amount of clout I enjoy as an elementary art teacher is replaced with the unfamiliarity of much of the content of graduate school. However, this displacement allows me to relate authentically with the experiences of my students by adopting the role of learner in an institutional setting. This displacement is a rich source for potential dialogic thinking. The liminal position between teacher and learner is where meaningful knowledge can be created I am able to set aside polemic assumptions.

These acts; separating myself physically and often intellectually from my art room may have influenced how I integrated, or did not integrate, my graduate school experiences into my practice. Although I came to depend upon both my practice and my graduate school endeavors to feel fulfilled, I did not always use these two realms to full advantage. Instead, I often segregated the experiences, treating each as equal but unrelated contributions to my epistemology and ontology.

Thinking dialogically, one can view my educational situation as existing in three distinct locations, rather than two (the school where I teach and the university where I learn). The third space, an intellectual space, is where I have a unique opportunity to synthesize two related educational experiences into new knowledge and understandings informed by insider status in two realms.

Three First Days in Three Distinct Spaces

The first day of school is not a typical day for an elementary art teacher. I am more of a tour guide or finder-of-lost-lunch bags on that day. Although it is technically my first contact with students, I don’t count this as a first day. The true first day of school for me is when I meet a kindergarten or first grade class in the art room for the first time. As I see students throughout

their elementary years, I have multiple years to get to know them. Hence, at the beginning of each school year I know a majority of the students quite well. The exceptions are the few students who move into the district over the summer, a small number of first grade students who attended a private kindergarten, and every kindergarten student. I am too old and seasoned to get nervous about the first day. I got over that a long time ago. I can look over the class lists and get a general feeling about each class. This will probably be a loud group. These two kids should probably be separated into different homerooms. Why does this class have four girls named

Emily? Couldn’t they have been spread out so I didn’t have to use their last initial? However, each kindergarten class is truly an unknown and does cause some anxious curiosity until I get to know them.

My sneakers might be as shiny and new, like most of the kids, but I can never compete with the parade of new fashions that walk in on day one. Almost everyone looks good. Even the grimiest sandbox dweller or collar chewer can keep it together for the first week. The first day is revealing. I can usually tell the attitude of each kid as he or she enters. Confident, chin up, smiling with a few missing teeth? Strolling in touching every surface like a health inspector?

Busting in with a loud story before everyone has had a chance to say hi? Or, shuffling in and still hasn’t made a friend in class although it’s almost the time to go home. It sets the tone for the year in many ways. A few excited kids can create an environment that carries some of the less motivated kids over their trepidation about making art or talking about art in front of a group. If even a few of the students seem excited and enthusiastic I can build on that and channel it into more active participation in lessons. The same could be said about respectfulness and focus. It only takes a few acting out students to lay the groundwork for an environment that is much less friendly to me as a teacher and other students who want a safe place to learn

Since the first day is important, I want to get it right the first time. That’s not always easy to keep perky for all of the twenty-two first art classes that I meet the first week of school. I wonder how I look to the kids by the end of week one? I probably greet them with the same range of postures that I used earlier to describe them.

The first day of a college class only happened once a semester for me. As a part-time graduate student, I could usually only manage one class at a time. A rather small department like art education gets even smaller when you get to graduate school. The average class size has been around twelve students. It would make sense that I would know many of my classmates since

I’ve been at OSU for such a long time. In reality, graduate students graduate, get exciting new faculty positions and move to exotic locales. Every year we gain a few and lose a few, so I only see several people I know each semester.

The graduate classroom is usually arranged with long tables pushed together to form a rectangle. The students trickle in. Sometimes the professor is the first to arrive and greets everyone as they enter. Rarely is the professor the last to enter. It’s almost always a student crashing in with a giant backpack and a coffee or bottle of water, apologizing and panting.

Sometimes the professor sets up shop right away and begins passing out papers as soon anyone starts to sit down. Other times the materials are kept in a pile until the clock strikes the hour.

Most always the postures and voices of the professors are very similar as the students. We are all sitting around the giant table talking like adults. At least a few students have laptops out and type away as we talk.

Obviously, almost everything about the first day of a graduate class differs from my day with grade school students. I participate in the seat finding activity. I am the wide-eyed student scanning for a familiar face. Some of my fellow students arrive alone, like me. Others enter in

pairs, obviously coming directly from another class. The ritual of entering the college classroom has little variation from every subsequent class session each day of that class for that semester. I may sit in exactly the same location for every class.

Often the first graduate class session involves some introductions. This usually gives me information about my classmates. Sometimes, especially in the non-summer semesters, I am the only practicing teacher among full-time graduate students. At times there is a mixture of

Master’s and Doctoral students. Within the art education department some students are focusing more on arts policy or museum education than art teaching. So, often relatively small class can represent a wide range of students.

After introductions, the syllabus is usually discussed and I get an idea how this particular course will be conducted. Since classes meet one or two times per week, the first session almost always rolls right into a productive, working environment. This varies from the undergraduate classes I remember in which the instructor handed out the syllabus and everyone turned to the required text section and then sprinted to the bookstore to buy one of the few used copies.

The first day that I cross the boundary between elementary school and graduate school is more of a compilation of short experiences than a single event. My identity as a hybrid

“teacher/student” rather than “teacher” or “student” is irregularly timed. The act of boundary- crossing occurs sporadically, but more often than once a year or once a semester. It is the first day of boundary-crossing when I drive from my school to OSU. It might be a leisurely drive followed by a stroll, or a crazy drive followed by a frantic screeching spiral around the parking garage and then, a jog to the classroom. It is the first day of boundary-crossing when someone asks me about school and I don’t know if they mean teaching or graduate school. The first of boundary-crossing occurs when I am teaching and type a paper or read a book during my

planning period. The first day of boundary-crossing is when I have to decide between attending a graduate class or an elementary school function

Between when I leave my classroom and when I sit down in a college classroom, I assume a liminal identity. At times this liminality is frustrating. Why can’t I be a teacher and focus on teaching? Why can’t I fully engage in graduate school without splitting my time and energy between two physical and intellectual sites? But, if I think dialogically, I can take advantage of my rather unique position inside, yet outside two realms.

Beacon Street School

Much of the narrative that follows takes place at Beacon Street Elementary School in

Wetherfield, Ohio. It is worth taking the time to paint a visual picture in the reader’s mind of the physical site of a major portion of my art education.

When I landed a job at Beacon Street I had completed my third year teaching part-time. I taught a cartooning class in the district’s summer school program to add a little more income. I shared the news of my new position with everyone who would listen. I vividly recall the summer school principal, a dapper older man, stopping by to congratulate me during one of my cartooning classes. He sang the praises of the student population, neighborhood and traditions of my new school. I was already ecstatic about getting a full-time teaching position and finally having my own art room. On top of all that, I was going to be at the best school.

Figure 4. 60s Industrial Style at Beacon Street and Hopkins Hall

This is what that ‘best school’ looks and feels like. As I try to paint a mental picture for you of my school, my room and how it looks; I have to step back in time and step back from what has become all too familiar to me. I am now describing a place I have inhabited for twenty- seven years and which has changed very little in that time. I need to both recall how it looked to me then and how it made me feel. The school was built in 1963. As I think harder about the school I clearly identify the 60’s non-aesthetic. The design features stress utility in ways that I never recognized until I began this written description. The exterior of the building is uniformly covered in brick. No variations of color or pattern were attempted in laying the hundreds of thousands of orange/red rectangles. Every window in the school is made up of two panes. A large stationary pane sits above a smaller rectangle that tilts out slightly to allow a small amount of air to flow. This window configuration is repeated in all of the upstairs classrooms, downstairs classrooms, the library, art room, music room, and when they added a new building wing, decades later, the rooms that were added have the same windows. The windows and doors in the schools are all trimmed in either aluminum or steel. Everything is cut at a right angle with no

decoration or embellishment. It is as if an iron-worker with a Shaker aesthetic did all the interior trim work.

Ironically, having spent many years in institutional settings (grade schools, high schools, college) I didn’t notice how hauntingly familiar this setting was for me. I knew the school was built in the 1960’s and I recalled a fiftieth anniversary celebrated a few years back, but I still needed to go to the lobby to check the date on a plaque mounted there to verify the exact year.

When I did that, I began to think more about the plain, uninspired architectural features of the building that I had been writing about. Then I remembered another plain, uninspired, institutional building that I had frequented, Hopkins Hall at The Ohio State University. My school and

Hopkins Hall were both build built in the 1960’s. Both are predominantly brick, although

Hopkins has some concrete. (Flashy!) Both feature numerous right angles and semi-functioning windows.

Not that I was expecting to teach art in the Louvre, but in retrospect, a life-changing transition, my promotion to full-time employment, basically put me right back where I started, in another dingy non-descript building. I had already spent all of my public school years, and now six years of college in buildings just like this. These accommodations had become so familiar that I took this setting for granted until looking back to write this narrative description.

The school is made up of several “blocks” of learning spaces. The main block is two stories tall and houses the majority of the classrooms. That block connects to another that contains the lobby, office, art room, music room, library and a few other classrooms. A newer addition is connected to that block and houses the gym, cafeteria and a few more classrooms.

The front door to our school faces a street with no parking. The back door faces the playground.

Like a ‘shotgun’ style home, you can see right through from the front door to the back. The art room is located at corner of the lobby back door.

When I “moved in” to Beacon Street school, I was oblivious to aesthetics of function or connections to Hopkins Hall, it was an exciting feeling to enter the art room for the first time, not as a visitor, but as the ‘owner’ of this room. Let's begin by entering my room from a hallway in with the principal’s office and the nurse’s offices are directly across from the room. That hallway intersects another hallway that runs from the lobby and to a door right outside my room that exits to the playground. This places my room at the corner of ‘letter L’ shape. This also strategically places my room between an oft-used exit and the principal’s office. There are often noise issues for my art classes because it can be very loud and distracting when students are leaving for recess. Conversely, I also have to frequently monitor the noise level of my students while they're working as not to disrupt meetings held in the principal’s office.

Figure 5. Safety Glass

The art room door itself is covered with a chipped laminate plastic which is an industrial color of turquoise blue, now faded to be a little more of a pale green. At eye-level, the door contains a 6” x 18” rectangle window that has reinforced wire inside giving it quite an institutional look. The window looks like chicken wire sandwiched between two panes of tempered glass. In this friendly, bustling school building, which during a typical has smiling kids skipping and talking past my door, this window seemed out of place. Although it was quite small, it still seemed out of place amongst the many other institutional elements of the building.

The special reinforcement appeared to exist to prevent thwart some potential intruder. Twenty- six years ago, when I first entered the room, security wasn’t a consideration, and ‘lock-down’ wasn’t a term anyone had heard. Now lock-down drills occur regularly, like fire drills.

Walking through the doorway in 1991 and entering the room as I did, the colors are the first things that you would notice. Most of the room is pale, but some of it is vibrant. The concrete block and porcelain tile walls are a non-descript beige, but the wooden shelving along the longest wall is bright blue. The wall behind the shelves is bright yellow, making the shelving almost vibrate from the contrast. Although we are in elementary school and have no sports teams to be outfitting, we still have school colors. So unfortunately, given my OSU roots, the only color in my room was yellow and blue; the University of Michigan colors.

On the wall facing the door I saw a mural painted on a bulletin board. It was painted by students and after investigation it was determined they attended the school in the mid-1970s.

This not only dated my room, but also hinted to the familiarity of the student population. I would later experience how no one seemed to move away from this neighborhood. One of the artists, who I identified from her signature on the mural, was both the mother to one of my students and the daughter of a social studies teacher from the middle school where I had previously taught.

They all lived a few blocks from the school. These familial connections continue to this day.

Having no political significance at the time the mural depicts a giant rainbow. Beneath the rainbow are various art supplies painted in the style of a still life. I’m not sure why, but one of the supplies included with paint, brushes and pencils, is a box of toothpicks. Apparently, toothpicks were an important art media in the 60’s; at least important enough to select as one of the few depicted on the mural.

As you walk towards the mural you pass two other dingy brown bulletin boards. The edges of these bulletin boards are so worn that thumbtacks will not even stick as the surface is pock marked and crumbling. The chalkboard between the two bulletin boards is only a chalkboard in name because it is so smooth from constant use that only the softest chalk will leave a mark. I have spent many hours searching stores and testing the chalk to see if it was of the softest and of the poorest quality which is the only kind that would work on my chalkboard.

On either side of the ancient mural are two large sets of windows. One of the windows has a small conical depression and a small hole that was the result of what I describe as BB gun shot. Of course, a BB gun is the best case scenario if a weapon was fired at the school. The hole has been there my entire career so I never have an accurate answer for the students who have asked me hundreds of times what happened to cause the hole.

Figure 6. Art Room Window Large windows would seem like an asset to have in an art room, but location (like in real estate) is everything. As we are on the first floor, we have an excellent view of the playground equipment called a “big toy”, which includes a large slide, set of rings to swing across and other features to run, climb and play upon. When the playground is not being used, the natural light source is an asset, but when recess overlaps a time when I have classes, the windows can be a huge distraction. For reasons I cannot explain about 50% of the children that exit to the playground find it necessary to scream as they loudly as they can as they push the exit door open.

Sometimes the scream is short and abrupt, and other times an extended howl that is left behind in a Doppler effect as they run to the playground equipment. In either case, the screaming is likely to reoccur frequently as the children play outside the window to the art room. Although every child in the school attends art class every week, some feel the need to peek in the window to see if I am still there or if someone they know who might be in class and they would have an opportunity to say ‘hi’. If the outside student recognizes a friend, sibling or even an acquaintance

it is necessary to knock on the window to get their attention whether their friend is working quietly or I am addressing the class from the front of the room (even if I am trying in vain to make a mark on the ultra-smooth chalkboard). Of course this attention-getting arrangement is reciprocal. If an art student spots anyone on the playground they often feel the need to attempt to fight any of the laws of physics related to sound waves, by either standing near the window and shouting out towards the playground, or knocking on the window to alert someone outside who is 10 yards away. Neither of these attention-getting methods has any chance of producing anything that could be heard on the noisy playground. Yet the attempts continue.

Past the wall with the windows and murals is the wall where I have positioned my desk in the corner. In that corner a large wooden cabinet is bolted to the wall. Inside the cabinet are three rows of ten compartments. Each compartment holds a peach colored plastic bin of art supplies. I have student artwork, notes, and postcards from art exhibits tacked to the front of this cabinet.

The gray rectangle analog clock/speaker on the wall behind my desk, and my desk would fit in any 1950’s government office or the back room of a gas station.

The counter tops that borders two of the walls are faded beige plastic laminate. You could tell the areas of greatest use because the color has been worn from repeated scrubbing. A sink is located on each of the two counter surfaces. Unlike most school rooms, the sinks are single stainless steel suited more for a kitchen than an art room. Most school sinks are the standup version where the students walk up and step on a switch to activate the water. Those sinks are either half or full circle shaped so the several students can use it. My sink accommodates one student at a time, often causing a line to form. Nothing spells trouble more than a line of young kids in a line either holding paint-coated brushes or clay-covered hands. Often the most fastidious hand/brush washer is the first in line, so the wait is even longer.

Most of the counters have cabinets beneath except for two sets of wide wooden drawers.

The cabinets have the heavy doors that are supposed to slide open. Over the years, dirt, wear and corrosion have greatly lessened the slide-ability. So, you carefully pick and choose where you store supplies based on the ability to open the doors. Who knows what ancient materials are behind the stationary doors? Maybe one of Rembrandt’s pencils, or chalk used on the Lascaux cave drawings?

Speaking of materials worthy of archeological exploration, the floor of the art room had already seen decades of use before I laid eyes upon it, and it showed. The floor was made of the typical industrial linoleum twelve-inch square tiles used in most public institutions built in the

1960’s. The color of the tiles, meant to be inoffensive, universally compatible with any color scheme, and hypothetically able to conceal dirt, was composed of variations of tans, beiges and brown. Instead of the interesting type of tile that is made from small random shaped specks (that you can stare at and imagine something, like finding a face in the grain of wood), these tiles were made so that the different colors were streaked in one direction across the entire length of the tiles. The floor was laid in an alternating pattern, so one saw a barely contrasting beige/brown checkerboard.

There are six rectangular tables large enough to accommodate four or five students. Each table is edged with wooden strips that are beginning to chip and separate at the corners which now snag smocks and clothing as the kids brush against as they walk by. The table legs are welded steel tubes. They look as if they were designed and built by one of the guys from the maintenance department. Someone selected sturdy, functional, and useable pieces of furniture with little concern for aesthetics.

Over the last 27 years that I have inhabited this room only a few changes or improvements have taken place. The maize and blue walls and shelves were coated with a pale pink, reminiscent of the hue used to calm prisoners. The countertops were resurfaced with a laminate material, and new doors were added to the cabinets. The new ones open with hinges, rather than the impractical bypass sliding doors. The same pale beige laminate counter material was used to resurface the table tops. These new table tops were a huge improvement until the edges began to come loose. Then the strips of laminate on the edges snapped and cracked, catching on everything that rubbed against them, which was just about everything in the room that moved. At the same time these improvements were made, more counter tops were added to the side of the room where the windows were located. This wall had the metal HVAC unit which stood alone until the counter was added. This made the footprint of the room a little smaller, but added more storage in the shelving added under the counters.

The linoleum tile floor remained, but each year a few more tiles popped out or cracked and were replaced with ones that had the closest color match. Before the entire floor was resurfaced in 2014, five different tile colors were scattered around the room in various locations.

The gray metal stools were eventually replaced with shiny chrome models with ridiculously top heavy ones. These new stools tip over quite easily, usually about once or twice per class, creating an ungodly smashing sound that I have never gotten used to. One fall, when I returned to school after the summer cleaning and waxing the floor I was taken aback by the floors appearance. The shiny wax revealed thousands of little crescent shaped indentations in the floor. The room is sometimes used by camps or organizations over the summer, so I tried to imagine the cause of these marks. Who would have hammered on the floor in such a way make all these dents? What

could have made these marks? I don’t recall exactly when I realized that one of these dents was created every time a stool tipped over.

For a long time, my teaching was frequently interrupted by the hideous squeaking noise the stools made when they were moved across the linoleum floor. All a student had to do was fidget or move the stool without picking it up and a loud shrill noise was made. The solution to the stools squeaking was solved by another art teacher. Visiting another building for a monthly meeting of elementary art teachers, I saw tennis balls that were sliced open and placed on the feet of the stools. Modified this way the stools scooted silently. However, the tennis balls picked up and held every bit of dust, lint, yarn and dirt that they touched. After equipping the stools in my room, the balls were quickly filthy. Eventually some salesman was touring the building with the school secretary and pointed out that the tennis balls were found to release some unpleasant chemical into the air when they were sliced open to fit over the stool feet. Whether this was true or not, I soon received a box of rubber caps with felt bottoms and a tool to use for installation.

The new caps are much more attractive than the tennis balls, but of course I didn’t receive enough to outfit all the stools and the installation was frustrating and time consuming, even with the specialized tool which consisted of a wire shaped like spring-loaded salad tongs.

This description of my art room may seem to paint it in a bad light. However, it has always served its purpose and most of my kids have never had another art room, so they don't know any better. Although my student population is quite privileged and affluent, my modest room reflects the somewhat traditional nature of my school building. My school is one of 11 elementary buildings in the district. Perhaps as a reflection of the city’s New England heritage, the affluent families at my school tend to opt for tradition over innovation. Many of the parents of my current students were themselves students at this school, which may explain why they seek

the comfort of consistency. The community that makes up Beacon Street’s population is not anxious to see big changes to the educational experiences for their children or to the building itself. They want the same educational experience for their children that they fondly remember from this building. This speaks to the quality and efficacy of the teachers, and extends to the physical building itself. So if what I'm describing seems dingy or poorly maintained it is not at all out of place with the rest of the building which has become a beloved monument within the community.

I have spent so much time in the art room that I could be considered a part of the room.

Most of the younger students seem so surprised to see a teacher outside the school at a store or a restaurant that I assume that they believed you did stay in the room perpetually, as a desk or chair would. Readers may wish to try to imagine what I may have looked like as I was as omnipresent as one of the fixtures in the art room.

Figure 7. School Photos from my first year part-time and full-time 1988 and 1991

When I first walked into my own art room in 1991 my idea of a ‘teacher’s uniform’ was always some version of “business casual” plus sneakers. If you were to add a neck-tie and substitute leather slip-on shoes to my outfit, I could have been working at any office whose dress code was one step below a suit. Most days I was probably wearing pleated Dockers pants, an oxford button-down shirt or polo shirt, and a pair of white sneakers and was sporting a modified

Dorothy Hamill haircut. At thirty years of age, my hair was in the early stages of premature graying, but mostly blonde. I was about fifty pounds heavier than I am today, not that I’m thin now. Clean-shaven with a rounded face, I looked quite cherubic. I remember a fourth-grade girl who appointed herself my fashion consultant. When I saw her each morning in the lobby she would look me over and offer a quick critique. I mostly remember her suggesting that I ‘blouse out’ my shirt, meaning that it was pulled tight against my protruding belly and that I should pull the shirt out a little bit to relieve the tension. I definitely needed and appreciated fashion advice from this sweet, but brutally honest young girl. I wanted the students to like and accept me and dressing the part was important. I wanted to look professional enough to command some level of respect, without looking too aloof.

Throughout my teaching career I kept a very similar fashion sense: khakis, polo shirts, and sneakers. Almost my entire wardrobe was quickly ruined by students coming to greet me with a paint brush extended in their hand, the unavoidable spills and splashes, and basis wear and tear. For this reason, my wife and I enacted a $15 rule. This meant buying inferior or drastically marked down clothing for quite a few years. I strived to pay $15 or less for each item I wore to school. Eventually two changes occurred. I grew tired of wearing crappy clothes that didn’t fit well or wore out too soon. I began to buy better quality, although no more dressy, clothes and I learned to live with many a shirt, pants or shoes with a spot of paint that would never come out.

After all, I was the art teacher. Decades later the styles may have changed slightly (no more pleated pants). I still wear some color of chino pants or jeans, a polo or casual button-down shirt,

(untucked to avoid the blousing issue) or long sleeve crew neck shirt when it’s cold. Several years ago, decades standing and walking on the hard floor in the art room began to take their toll on my feet. Stylish or inexpensive sneakers are out of the question after three foot surgeries and probably at least one more in the near future. Instead, top of the line orthopedic-looking sneakers, orthotic sole inserts and special socks are required daily. That said, my basic “art teacher uniform” has remained rather consistent.

Aside from my first three years teaching part-time, my art teaching career is characterized by exceptional consistency. I have always been happily satisfied in whatever situation I was placed. My satisfaction, or complacency, stopped me from seeking other teaching positions or teaching locations. Over twenty-seven years many opportunities have arisen to move to another elementary school that would offer a different student population and administration. There have also been opportunities to change to the high school level or move back to the middle school. All these opportunities existed within my school district and would have taken minimal effort for which to apply. The chance to move to another district passed many years ago because of money.

School districts allow experienced teachers to bring with them a limited number of years to the pay scale chart. This equates to a pay cut for teachers changing districts after around ten years.

I never felt compelled to move out of my building. Like an older car, my room has idiosyncrasies. I remember once loaning my car to a friend, but only before explaining what made it special. Pump the gas three times before starting. Don’t even think about rolling down the back windows. Ignore the red indicator light that says “check engine”. In my art room I have learned to live with any imperfections or inadequacies. Do not try to open that drawer. That table

wobbles a bit. I suppose that my students have come to see me in a similar light. Their art teacher certainly is not perfect in appearance or performance. But, unlike me they don’t even have the option of seeking a new situation. They’re stuck with me.

Sharing Another Teacher’s Room

One of my most important art educations was my first few years as an art teacher. My time as a beginning teacher was somewhat extended because I was first hired part-time and then transitioned from teaching middle school students to elementary students. These factors prolonged my evolution from college student to art teacher, but allowed me more contact with three influential art teachers in that span. Another outcome of working part-time was delaying the milestone achievement of getting an art classroom to call my own.

To explain how I got my first art room is a long, complicated tale that circles around and doubles back along a decidedly non-linear path. It is relevant to express the significance of getting my own teaching space. I’m not sure how typical it is for a teacher in a new position to move into their own classroom over the summer prior to their first school year, but it didn’t work out that way for me. Instead, I substitute taught in literally every art room in my district, shared two, then three rooms before getting my own space. It was as if I was auditioning for the role of art teacher and the casting director was trying desperately to find a place for me. (Luckily, a better actor didn’t audition before I was hired)

When you teach in a typical classroom situation you have a certain level of autonomy.

There are factors that are beyond your control, but you are usually the only adult in the room and get to call the shots. When you share a room or another adult is in the room you lose some of that autonomy as you become aware of the needs of another. It is always a little odd to be observed or consider the opinions of anyone other than your students. Whereas you generally teach for the

benefit of the kids in the class or to satisfy the need to express some idea out loud, the presence of another adult causes you to either censor yourself or amp up your performance to be both informative for the students and entertaining to the adult. So, it is hard to minimize the significance of a teacher having a space that is dedicated to his or her own practice, allowing for a sense of ownership rather than borrowing, rather than visiting a room belonging to another teacher. Imagine the difference between how you feel cooking at home versus cooking in a friend’s, or God forbid, a stranger’s kitchen. At home you know where everything is located, you feel comfortable making the dish as spicy or bland as you desire, and you know you can clean-up after the preparation as thoroughly as you wish at your convenience. Contrast that to trying to cook in an unfamiliar space, constantly aware of the fact that you are borrowing tools and using up someone else’s ingredients. After you are finished cooking, rather than enjoying your creation, you must immediately clean-up the kitchen to someone else’s (real or imagined) standards of cleanliness. That particular feeling of disorientation and self-consciousness disappeared as soon as I had an art room of my own.

Before I began teaching art I hadn’t considered how significant a personal teaching space is to a teacher. I took that for granted, because all my previous art teachers had their own rooms and I didn’t know how they got them. Of course, the student teaching experience magnifies the feelings of scrutiny and lack of ownership. That experience is considered a rite of passage, and at the end you hopefully get your own room and teach as you wish. Landing a job ideally equates to a room. A room equals autonomy and freedom.

I felt fortunate that very little time elapsed between my graduation with an art education degree and beginning to teach, although my first three years teaching were without my own art room. Graduating from the Art Education department was a very different experience from

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graduating with a BFA which lacked a clear path towards a career. Although I wouldn’t trade my

BFA experience for anything, I was never able to parlay that skill set into a job related in any way to my fine art degree. Finances required that I worked outside my chosen discipline.

Graduation from the art education department reaped almost immediate results. With a new degree and a teaching certificate from the State of Ohio, I applied for jobs in several districts.

Within a month I was offered a substitute teaching job in two districts. One district never called me to work; the other is where I have been teaching for thirty years.

I stayed busy as a substitute teacher. In a little over three months of substitute teaching I was quite familiar with the school district because I had substitute taught at every building, including my eventual ‘home’. My career as a substitute teacher lasted only three months. This short experience allowed me to visit every school in the district. I got to see all the art rooms, see examples of students work and meet many staff members. I was a substitute teacher, almost always in art classes from February 29, 1988 to mid-June of 1988. In those few months I felt that this district was where I wanted to stay for a long time. I also got a good idea about how I would set up my art room, if I ever got one.

While I was subbing, I waited to hear back from the six or seven districts to which I had applied. The school year ended and over the summer I continued to wait. I was still working at the warehouse job that I kept while I worked on my BFA and my newly earned BAE. I had been working there at night while I attended classes during the day. After graduation I was substitute teaching during the day and continued at warehouse albeit part-time. The 1988 school year ended and so did my substitute teaching job.

My career at the warehouse which spanned both of my undergraduate degrees followed a

’bell curve’ of status in terms of positions of responsibility. I began working there unloading

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trucks part-time. I was promoted to a full-time and more supervisory role during the two years when I was between the two degree programs at OSU. In order to student teach I had to go part- time again and then lost all my clout in the hierarchy of warehouse workers. The last months that

I was there I worked 5:00-9:00 every weeknight doing the most menial tasks imaginable. My job status had fallen from completing paperwork and assigning tasks to others, to folding boxes for shipping. This incredibly mind-numbing task involved standing among countless stacks of flattened cardboard boxes, folding and taping them, then placing them on a track that carried them to another part of the warehouse. The work was intolerable and I quit, hoping that a teaching job would soon materialize.

Two months into the summer of 1988 I was disappointed that I hadn’t received a job offer or even heard from any of the districts, including the one where I had subbed regularly. I concluded that I probably wasn’t going to land an art teaching job for the upcoming school year or near future. As insurance against not finding a teaching position, I took a job working for the county recorder’s office. With no typing skill or knowledge of legally-binding documents, I was entering deeds and other real estate transactions into a computer. My friend from high school got me the job. He never found a job as a physical education teacher and coach, so he well understood my plight. When I gave my notice and quit to start my teaching job the county recorder made a huge deal out of it. He didn’t seem to understand that I was quitting a data entry job to pursue the career for which I prepared for in college for six years. In his defense, I might have made it sound like I had given up on teaching when I applied for the job. Then, almost immediately after I conceded defeat, as if from a hackneyed movie script, I received a call for an interview.

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So, what does one take into consideration during a job offer? I was twenty-seven years old. Most of my friends were already well established in the careers they followed directly from college graduation four years earlier. Lisa and I had been married for two years and we had just bought a house. Lisa had followed the more traditional career path after college and used her business degree to move up into a retail management position. But, the long hours and stress of that job wasn’t a good fit for her, so she had recently quit and was working part-time. If you feel that the previous statements (my age, time to get serious, my financial responsibility, time to be the bread winner) point to the need for a well-compensated, full-time position, then I made a mistake thirty years ago.

I accepted a half-time or .5 position teaching art traveling each day to two different middle schools. The contract was for less than $10,000. To add insult to injury, as part-time employee I had to pay for half of the insurance premiums, a benefit that full-time employees have paid for them. I’d already be making half of the base salary of a beginning teacher and an extra portion will be deducted each month for insurance. As pitiful as this offer sounds, I didn’t just agree to this contract, I was elated!

Initially, I was just happy to have a ‘real’ art teaching job, not as a substitute, and had little concern for getting an art room of my own. It was unusual for the district to hire a teacher without experience. The district seemed to want new teachers to cut their teeth elsewhere and come to them having worked out the majority of the ‘new teacher’ bugs that most of us suffer.

They made an exception for me. I imagine this was not because I was an outstanding candidate, but more about with the fact that I was willing to be hired just a week before school started, for a part-time position that paid less than $10,000. I saw this opportunity as a foot in the door, and was delighted to accept a part-time position.

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There was no pressure to write lessons, because the graded course of study was written more like lesson plans than content objectives. Since the lesson planning aspect of teaching was taken away, it allowed me to concentrate on delivery of instruction. I could focus on both my instruction and the instruction of the teachers whose room I shared. Rather than diving in head- first, I felt like I was testing the water by slowly learning to teach with the help and guidance of two teaching veterans.

The potentially awkward, volatile and emotional situation of using another teacher’s art room was never much of an issue until a third school was added to my schedule. The first two years, when I traveled between two schools were not problematic, but rather was quite pleasant.

In my role as traveling art teacher I began each day in the late morning in the art room of Mr.

Fastidious. The school had been open only a few years and everything was still pristine. Rather than looking like the stereotypical messy, cluttered art room, Mr. F’s art room looked like either it had not yet been used by anyone, or it had been scrubbed and polished thoroughly and then hermetically sealed. The room was spacious and gleamingly clean. The entire room was the same bland color. The bulletin boards, countertops and cabinets, floors, and walls were slight variations of light grays. The lack of color and emphasis on functional, straight edged furnishings gave the room the feel of a doctor’s office or commercial laboratory. This was enhanced by the lack of decoration. If it wasn’t an example or sign related directly to a lesson it was not displayed. After each lesson, these few sparse visuals were packed away until needed again.

Mr. F was a very talented artist, had a great sense of humor (I still use some of his jokes with my kids) and had an obsession with cleanliness and organization. Whenever a student sits with a blank white piece of paper looking puzzled about what to draw, he or she has always

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already drawn a picture of a white cow, drinking a glass of milk in a snowstorm. I heard Mr. F say it many times and adopted it as part of my own repertoire.

Mr. F may have been disapprovingly described as the teacher who has “taught the same year twenty times”, rather than having “taught for twenty years”. That phase is often used as a criticism, but Mr. F used this repetition to revise and refine every aspect of his instruction. After teaching the same lessons repeatedly, he found short-cuts and improvements. He reorganized his room to match the specific needs of each lesson. Materials and tools were clearly identified

(sometimes labeled) and located for easy student access. Clean-up and storage of artwork was streamlined and convenient, leaving the room tidy and organized after each class. What this method sacrificed in spontaneity was made up for in efficiency. There is certainly something to be said for keeping 7th and 8th graders on task, and with his classroom structure and method, that is exactly what Mr. F was able to do.

I am a self-confessed recovering slob. I have evolved from a child whose bedroom floor was barely navigable from clutter to someone who keeps a dust cloth in his car to use at red lights. Having said that, an art room is a space where a certain level of mess and chaos is to be expected. How much mess and how much chaos is tolerated differ greatly among teachers. This difference in most cases is of little consequence because teachers are separated from each other.

Two art teachers with very different ideas about neatness can impose their ideas freely in their individual sites to their hearts content. However, when two teachers share a space, materials, and spend time observing each other in action the dissimilarities might become an issue. Such is the case with Mr. F and me.

Returning to the kitchen analogy; cooking in a friend’s kitchen is better than cooking in a stranger’s kitchen, but not as good as cooking at home. Mr. F was a really nice guy, but other

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than our sense of humor, we were total opposites. For instance, I would never number each ruler for the purpose of matching each to a particular student. Mr. F did this with many art tools so he could determine who did or did not return each tool to its proper space. I’d rather go around and pick up a stray ruler. I could also never bring myself to clean the art room to the ‘operating room’ level of cleanliness, just to have a mess made again later. But, because I was a visitor in

Mr. F’s room, I was always a guest chef, uncomfortable about using his utensils and ingredients.

Consequently, I never felt that any of the customers there were served my best dishes.

Each day, after teaching one class at the first school, I would travel a few miles to the second school on my schedule which was considered my ‘home’ school. The principal there hired me and I attended his staff meetings. Mrs. Somewhat Insecure was the art teacher there.

Mrs. SI was a very friendly young woman with curly blonde hair. I call her ‘somewhat insecure’ because she always seemed a bit unsure of herself although she had been teaching a few years and was quite competent. Her art room was older and smaller, maybe a quarter the size of Mr.

F’s spacious room. The square room had a large bank of windows on one wall that made the room very bright. Build in the 1960’s the entire school interior, including the art room, was concrete block painted a bland pastel color. Like Mr. F’s room, her room was rather plain and showed few clues to what subject was taught. There were no reproductions of famous paintings or student work on the walls, which were painted a uniform light blue like a hospital. The floor, cabinets, shelves and tables showed normal wear. Mrs. SI was not fanatical about cleanliness, but the room was always tidy.

Mrs. SI never imposed any ideas or suggestions about teaching to me. She was very encouraging and made me feel valued and that I was a capable art teacher. Whereas Mr. F would never hesitate to tell what I should or should not be doing (in or out of school), Mrs. SI seemed

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to be seeking information or approval when she spoke. This is not to say that I didn’t learn from her. She had a great rapport with the students and staff. She knew how to teach and was very good at it, but she never appeared confident. Where Mr. F would serve as an unquestionable mentor, it was much easier to have a conversation with Mrs. SI. I enjoyed and learned much from our talks. She would model teaching for me rather than tell me how to teach.

Although Mrs. SI’s space was smaller and older it was a much more inviting art room. It was like a kitchen that was used to having meals prepared and enjoyed within its walls. As it should be, more concern is placed on the meal, not how the kitchen looks before or after the meal is prepared. This art room is about making art.

Considered more like a peer than a less experienced teacher or a visitor, I felt trusted to treat the room responsibly. I don’t recall Mrs. SI ever expressing a concern about the cleanliness of the room or the condition of any materials that I used. This might account for why I felt most connected to the students and staff at this building. This was my ‘home’ school.

Although I was now officially a teacher, I also continued to substitute teach. My ‘home’ school had really become a home. I began coaching the track team in the spring, attended not only staff meetings, but other social events and extracurricular activities. I became friends with quite a few staff members. Since I was only working in the afternoon, teachers began to request me to sub for them if they were going to be absent in the morning. When I had subbed before, there was always a slight sense of dread walking into an unfamiliar place and not knowing the students. Subbing in my home building was a delight even though I was teaching subjects other than art. With a half-time contract, it was helpful to supplement my salary with substitute teaching pay.

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My situation as traveling art teacher continued for two years in much the same manner.

My contract increased from .5 to .85 with the addition of two more classes. The new contract raised my salary, but made it impossible to substitute teach in the mornings. I was becoming quite comfortable with the instruction, the students and the staff at both buildings. I felt like a real art teacher.

My newfound confidence, familiarity and sense of belonging were derailed before I got my own art room. Going into my third year as a part-time teacher my contract was bumped up to

.92, meaning I was one class short of full-time. The addition this year was a third school, also a middle school, located roughly between my other two destinations. This was where I began each day.

Mr. Smock (who always wore a smock) was the art teacher at this building. I have a problematic history with Mr. Smock that only began with sharing his art room that year. I will discuss Mr. Smock in detail later. His art room was like a combination of my other two teaching sites. Still devoid of unnecessary decoration, this art room was nearly as old as the older middle school where I taught each day, but was kept as meticulously as Mr. F kept his room. He was nearly as fanatic about cleanliness as Mr. Fastidious, and indeed they were friends, (although I can’t imagine the two of them doing anything but cleaning together). It was an older room with older tables and cabinets, but more like a museum of mid-century art room furnishings, because nothing showed normal signs of wear and tear. As you can imagine, any middle school art teacher who would wear a smock would also care enough about cleanliness to keep an immaculate room.

During my first semester at this added building I shared Mr. Smock’s room. Sharing a room with Mr. Smock was very uncomfortable. Though he and Mr. F shared the same high

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standards for upkeep of their room and care for materials, unlike Mr. F, Mr. Smock would bark orders and assert his disapproval with me as if I were one of his seventh-grade students. Mr.

Smock’s teaching and interpersonal communication style were similar to a coach who demeans his or her athletes to get them to work harder. Either that or he was just an asshole.

After the first semester my class was moved to an empty room that was at the end of a long corridor. This was an unused classroom, far from the “real” art room. I don’t recall exactly why I was moved to the other room for my class second semester. It could have been due to a scheduling conflict or Mr. Smock requested that I was moved to spite me for rocking the boat.

Unintentionally, and unbeknownst to me at the time, I was causing tension between us by working on the committee rewriting the district’s graded course of study for fine art. My presence on the committee or the direction I wanted the document to take seemed to offend him.

Regardless, the physical separation of my location at the end of the hall, far from the ‘real’ art room, did not relieve the tension between us. A tray of rubber cement jars that I had borrowed from him were stolen from my makeshift art room. I had left the tray in ‘my’ room rather than return it to Mr. Smock’s room since I was going to use the cement for several days. When I reported it missing I was interrogated by Mr. Smock as if I was in on some heist or perhaps I was the stupidest person alive for thinking supplies could be left in a classroom. I bit my tongue and took his verbal abuse since I was hoping to remain employed in this district and didn’t want to make waves engaging an experienced teacher over his caustic personality. A bigger battle with

Mr. Smock was to come and fortunately, I grew more confident and assertive towards the end of my part-time teaching stint.

Teaching part-time and subbing was still not bringing home much money. As my unofficial mentor, Mr. Fastidious gave me some helpful advice the first year we taught together.

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He had taught a summer school art class for many years and he encouraged me to do the same.

The elementary summer school program was structured with remedial courses and enrichment courses. I proposed a cartooning class which was accepted by the school administration and the minimum number of students enrolled. Parents would often bribe their children with an enrichment class such as mine, if they also took a math or reading class as well. During the first three years of my career, I was also a summer school teacher, as well as a part-time art teacher.

The site of summer school rotated to different school buildings, so I was returning to the same rooms that I had visited when I was subbing.

During my third summer I interviewed for and was hired for a full-time elementary art teaching position in the district. A new building had opened and approximately half the staff at one building was following their principal to open the new school. This left a vacancy in the art room of the oldest, and I would learn later, most respected of the ten elementary schools in the district. At this point my career in art education has evolved from substitute, to part-time traveling middle school teacher to full-time elementary teacher with my own room! Obviously, I was happy about this positive change in my career path, but I was also very happy to be getting away from the negativity of Mr. Smock.

Looking back at getting my own room

Had I been hired into a full-time art teaching position instead of part-time, and if I had started in my own art room instead of traveling and sharing a room, my development as an art teacher would have been quite different. My student-teaching experience was done entirely at the

7th grade level, so my experiences were limited to that grade level curriculum and 12- and 13- year old students. If I had been hired directly into my current elementary position, my learning

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curve would have been short and abrupt. I feel it was a distinct advantage to “ease into” teaching.

If my first few years teaching experiences had taken place in isolation, instead of under the tutelage of my three mentors (maybe only two), I would not have had as much interaction and direct contact with other practicing art teachers. I would not have seen other art teachers in action, nor been able to ask questions based on my observations.

In retrospect, if I began teaching in my own room, full-time I also would not have been observed by veteran teachers. Since I was sharing a teaching space not only was I able to observe, but also allowed these colleagues to see me teach. I don’t recall any specific feedback I received, other than Mr. Smock’s admonitions. But, I’m sure along the way the other two, more helpful colleagues, gave me plenty of advice.

There was certainly a sense of community working with other art teachers during my first few years. Had I been plopped directly into my first full-time position in my own art room, I could have been the only art teacher in the building. As the lone art teacher, I would not have been able to learn and share about art teaching on a daily basis. My contact with other art teachers would be limited to occasional meetings, perhaps monthly. That would not have been as effective as the close relationships I formed as a beginning art teacher.

Obviously, my situation was somewhat unique and every beginning art teacher cannot be expected find or seek out positions with shared space and contact with another art teacher as I have. However, there was a clear benefit for me to begin teaching in this manner. Other beginning teachers may find it valuable to try to work as closely as possible with another teacher in the same subject area and grade level.

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This was clearly a time period when I applied and benefited from dialogic understandings about art, teaching, and art educations. As a very new, inexperienced teacher I had not developed some of the polemic understandings about theory and practice. This may be because I felt great usefulness of the theories, primarily D.B.A.E., (see definitions of key terms) and was actively applying the theory every day. I was trying very hard to use an approach that honored the four distinct disciplines represented in D.B.A.E. with each lesson I taught. At the same time, I was working with three teachers who did not know or apply this approach in their teaching. What they had that I needed was experience and expertise working with kids. I had the knowledge, but no practical experience applying what I knew. When I look back, this is a time when instead of doing what they did, I employed what these veteran teachers were teaching me about how to teach, while utilizing my own knowledge about what to teach. I assumed the role of teacher which offered a degree of autonomy about what to teach, yet I acted as though a university supervisor was still assessing my lesson plans as they did prior and during my student teaching.

At first it may seem that I was merely using my understanding of teaching art that I had learned.

But I feel it is more dialogic because I was truly trying to function in two different worlds; the world of theory and the world of practice. D.B.A.E. lesson plans often look better on paper that in practice (as with many lessons), a factor that made administering such lessons problematic.

Exacerbated by my inexperience, this attitude was prevalent even in the excellent educational setting where I located.

Often a perception about art education assumes each minute of every class should involve hands-on artmaking activities. This perception comes from almost all fronts, including the art teacher at times. I am a semi-practicing artist with far more art classes under my belt than art education or teaching methods classes. My first inclination is always to have the students create.

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Maybe I would show them an artist or demonstrate a technique to start a lesson, but the path of least resistance would be to make art. This would have been quite easy the first three years when

I taught at the middle school level. I doubt anyone would have said a word if D.B.A.E. never played any role in my art teaching at that time.

I was essentially unsupervised, except for the other art teachers who would never look for

D.B.A.E. elements in my lessons or teaching. The building principals mainly cared that students were safe and relatively quiet in my class. As a part-time teacher, I was not evaluated or observed formally that I recall.

With this freedom, I could have taught the exact same lessons that my teacher/mentors were teaching. This would have been much easier than tinkering with the lessons to include

D.B.A.E. content. It also would have been easier to write new lessons that ignored the district graded course of study and have my students learning about how to make the art that I enjoy most.

What I did was eventually find a way meld the existing lessons into something that appeased all my requisites. My lessons evolved into versions of the existing middle school curricula, with added content to satisfy my need to continue to address D.B.A.E. in spirit. I also did this without alienating the teacher/mentors who I respected. This commitment to applying my college art education did eventually become a problem, which was revealed in my interaction with Mr. Smock.

The Transition to Elementary School

My first teaching job, travelling between two middle schools teaching art to seventh and eighth graders lasted three years. Each building had its own full-time art teacher, so my role was to teach a few classes so these teachers would have planning time. At the time, seventh grade

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students were required to take one semester of art every other day. Eighth grade art was an elective, also one semester long. Not only was the curriculum the same at both schools, it was exactly the same four projects. The middle school graded course of study not only outlined which material was to be covered, it spelled out the lessons. For a new teacher it was ideal. But, by the second semester I was already bored with these lessons and began to make my own changes. Ironically, these changes would later become contentious.

During the time I taught part-time middle school art, the visual art graded course of study document was due to be updated as required by the state of Ohio department of Education. At the time, the district was required to submit a revised and updated document every five years. None of the three full-time middle school art teachers wanted to work on the revision. Actually, the middle school art graded course of study had been frozen in time. The two senior art teachers made it clear that it was perfected over time and there was no room for improvement. I felt blessed to be able to revise the document. It seemed like an honor for me, as a part-time third year teacher to be able to work on an important piece of curricular writing. I was also looking forward to loosening the constraints of the rigid document and get to the heart of what the graded course of study was about; art concepts, not art lesson planes. The simplicity and clarity of the curriculum initially seemed like a blessing as a beginning teacher. A few years later the middle school art curriculum caused a major conflict between me, my colleagues, and the school administration. I will explain more about that later.

As I said earlier, I was writing a revision of the middle school art graded course of study.

I knew the two more veteran teachers loved the current document and wanted no changes. So, I took the lessons listed in the old document and distilled the essential art concepts that were represented in the lessons. For instance, one content goal was for seventh grade art students to

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use the grid method of enlargement to recreate an image. This entails drawing squares over an existing picture and drawing larger squares on a piece of paper. Then the student, rather than simply redraw the image, uses the squares as proportional guides. Once the students understand this process, they can often make a fairly accurate recreation of the original image. It is a good lesson for middle school students who are often beginning to feel self-conscious about the quality of their artwork. At this age some students emerge as better at drawing accurate representations. This activity allows for a high level of success, so it serves as a good project for middle school students.

Having recently learned about D.B.A.E. (see definitions of key terms) in college I felt this lesson was lacking in some areas. While researching and designing the many lesson plans I wrote at OSU, I was drilled to meticulously address criticism, art history, and aesthetics as well as the studio/production aspect of each learning experience. The first issue I had with the grid enlargement lesson was that it was taught as a skill without any historical context. Students were unaware that this was a technique used by artists for many years. It was also taught as a skill without much input from the students. Typically, the art teacher would lay out some newspaper comics sections and the students would choose the funniest or simplest panel from a cartoon. I developed a serious hatred for Garfield the cat during my first three years teaching.

After teaching the grid lesson one semester, I felt compelled to change it. I showed images to the students by Superrealist artists like Chuck Close, Ralph Goings, and Richard Estes

I explained that these rather obsessive artists tended to select single subject matter and stick with it for their careers. Estes paints reflections in building windows, Goings paints a series of only silver Airstream travel trailers, and Close specializes in portraits. This prompted many discussions about why an artist would choose to specialize in one subject and about the nature of

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art as a whole. Students often shared opinions which I could use to facilitate discussions about these issues. When I showed images from these Superrealist artists, I explained that they used similar techniques to create drawings of a variety of subject matter that are accurately proportioned. I also felt the students would benefit from being allowed to show some creativity.

To spend several weeks and a sizable portion of their art instruction for the year making an

“artwork” in which the students did little more than select existing cartoons to enlarge seemed limiting and uncreative. I didn’t feel it was appropriate to teach these middle school students about the postmodern concept of appropriation. So, I began making examples of images of collaged comics. I would take characters from different comic strips and have them interact on the page. Garfield would be talking to Snoopy. When students made their own blended original images, it seemed more authentic and the students had fun.

When I looked at the grid enlargement lesson and broke it down, it needed more “meat” to qualify as content on a graded course of study. I carefully worded new learning objectives for the grid lesson and all the others. I was very careful to word each goal and standard to allow the lessons to be taught exactly as they had in the past. I knew the older teachers would not want some new kid coming in and changing things. When I sent draft of my revisions to each teacher,

I explained how this version allowed the lesson to be taught as always, but also allowed for teachers to elaborate or modify the lessons. In other words, the grid enlargement lesson could allow the students to modify the image or learn how the technique is actually used in the art world, rather than as a trick to re-draw comics.

Two of the middle school teachers, Mr. Fastidious and Mrs. Somewhat Insecure, were open to the changes. Or, at least they didn’t state any objections to me in person. Mr. Smock, on the other hand, was not as open. In fact, he had a fit. In his typical fashion, he didn’t want to

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discuss the issues that he had with my revision, but instead sent a copy of my document with a multitude of words scratched out aggressively and comments written in the margins. His edited copy was sent to me, the other full-time middle school teachers, and several district administrators. He wanted nothing to do with the writing process of the document revision, but was more than happy to share his feedback emphatically Mr. Smock went as far as to say if my revision was not altered he would go to a board of education meeting and fight to have it denied.

I am not comfortable with confrontation, but, I was not going to let this go. I felt that I had done the right thing and was proud of what I had written. A meeting was planned by some administrators to address concerns of both sides. At this meeting, Mr. Smock, the other two middle school art teachers, the assistant superintendent, and I would work out the issues with my document.

This meeting was a huge turning point in my teaching career. But, not in the way I expected. I had recently applied for the open position at Beacon Street elementary school. A new elementary building was opening in the fall and the Beacon Street art teacher was following her principal to the new building. I was prepared to battle the formidable Mr. Smock at the meeting.

I had OSU class materials to provide evidence for my view of the new graded course of study. I had notes from my writing and listed the shortcomings of the current document. I was mentally braced, but not looking forward to this potentially volatile confrontation. Instead, the administrator began the meeting by telling me I had the position at Beacon Street that I had interviewed for and that I should now focus on working on the elementary graded course of study revision. I need not be concerned with the middle school document. He told me thanks for coming, but this wasn’t my concern anymore. Soon after the meeting, I began to meet with a lovely, kind, intelligent elementary teacher and collaborated with her on the elementary graded

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course of study for art. In the fall I began my new elementary art teaching position. When the new graded course of study for art was released, it was identical to the previous version.

The experience of writing for the district confirmed that I was applying what I had learned in my art education classes at OSU. But, in a way it also confirmed that I was different. I was not ready to accept the norms of teaching art that were expressed by my teaching mentors at the middle school. I had a clear alliance with the university. This alliance would prove to remain for close to forty years.

First years at Beacon Street

My first years at Beacon Street after moving from the middle school put me in the midst of a tumultuous transition period at my new school. I was busy designing a teaching space, writing plans for a new age of students, and getting to know a new staff. I soon learned that a few of my new colleagues were in a similar situation. I was not the only new-hire that year.

The Wethersfield school district saw an influx of new students several years earlier so the district was building new schools to accommodate the increased population. My position was created because a new school building had opened. The principal at Beacon Street was asked to move to the new school. Almost half of the teaching staff moved with her. I was only one of about ten teachers who were new to Beacon Street for the 1991-1992 school year. The entire related arts (art, music, library, and P.E.) team had moved with the principal, so my closest colleagues were new as well. I had the least teaching experience on the new team.

As a relatively new teacher in a new environment I continued my sponge-like accumulation of knowledge from my peers. Teaching at the elementary level was quite different from teaching middle. At the middle school there were only two grade levels, seventh and eighth grade, who had art for one semester (one half of the school year). There were only two grades to

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plan for, and as I stated earlier the middle school curriculum was prescribed with little opportunity for my input. At Beacon Street, I had kindergarten through sixth grade which represented seven unique sets of lesson plans. The elementary curriculum was more loosely defined and I pretty much started from scratch with my own lesson plans. My new colleagues were very helpful, but they taught other subjects.

Another factor that added tension to this transition to a new school was unrelated to issues of teaching. After a short time at Beacon Street I sensed that there was a reason why some teachers chose to follow the former principal to the new school. A chasm had begun to form among staff that felt a kinship for the principal and those who felt they had fallen out of favor with her. The teachers who remained were happy to get a fresh start with a new principal, but some of their resentment continued. There was also skepticism from the parents about these new staff members. Most of them were perfectly content with the former principal and staff. Our new principal was unfairly scrutinized for a few years before she was eventually accepted. When she retired a huge party was held in the gymnasium where many former students and their showered her with gifts and praise.

I developed a friendship with the physical education teacher who served as my unofficial mentor. He was one of the most respected teachers in the district and brought many innovations to the P. E. program that were adopted by the entire school district. His teaching skills were unrivaled, but he was a problematic mentor. He had earned a degree of status in the district and had twenty-five years when I began working with him. He was at the point in his career when did whatever he wanted. We took long lunches that I could barely afford. He had developed an attitude of “it’s better to ask forgiveness, than to ask permission”. He would order equipment or supplies for the gym without having the funds. He was an expert at finding money somewhere if

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his P. E. budget was depleted. All of this dubious spending was done to create new and exciting experiences for his students. As a new, untenured teacher I had to be very careful about following his example too closely.

I also developed a friendship with two fourth grade teachers who took me under their wings. These teachers were also highly skilled, caring teachers, but less than optimal mentors.

They were firmly members of the “have-nots” in regard to the chasm among the Beacon Street staff. One of their first comments to me was how glad they were that I was teaching with them.

When they elaborated, it was much less about glad I was there as it was they were glad to be rid of the teacher I was replacing. This back-handed compliment was typical for them when addressing those they disagreed with or who had some over way had fallen out of their favor.

This aspect of their attitude and behavior belied their commitment to teaching and their students.

I observed these two teachers on many occasions going over and above their assigned duties to assist students. Just as I had to be cautious of my P. E. teacher being my role model, I had to be careful to learn from these teachers compassion, but ignore their negativity. With my unofficial mentors and guidance from a very strong principal, I survived and eventually thrived as an elementary art teacher.

The Uneventful Middle Years

After settling into my role as art teacher at Beacon Street I experienced a bit of complacency. Year after year my teaching became more natural. I developed relationships with students and their families. My overarching classroom management plan is for the students to like me and be happy about attending art class. This became easier to achieve as the students and

I knew each other. Not every child enjoys art class but I strive to create positive experiences.

Creating positive experiences became easier as I built a collection of lesson plans that were

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effective at balancing my expectations about art content and the students’ expectations of an enjoyable environment. Teaching with compassion and a sense of humor helps create that balance. Without fanfare I continued my art teaching practice. My teaching gradually evolved closer to what it is today. Slow incremental changes in teaching technique and curriculum writing marked this period in my career.

From 1991 to 1993 I focused on teaching elementary art. These two are years of the six years that I did not attend The Ohio State University since 1979. Having taught several years, I earned the district benefit of tuition waivers to attend OSU. In 1993 I began to work on my

Master’s degree in art education.

Returning to OSU (again)

Only one of the ten elementary art teachers who are currently my colleagues went to

OSU for her Master’s degree. She is the only art teacher I have worked with since 1988 who has taken that path. Most teachers, including art teachers, either (a) earn some credits in miscellaneous subjects in order to move up the salary schedule, but never intend on obtaining a degree or (b) obtain a Master’s of Education that is not specific to art education. Many teachers enroll in a local branch of a university that offers general education-themed courses designed specifically for practicing classroom teachers, not specifically art teachers. This option is quicker than a traditional Master’s degree, but rather expensive. Cynically, I viewed teachers who took this route as lazy for sacrificing the rigor and specificity of an OSU Master’s degree that included writing a thesis. My elitist notion was that these teachers were in essence buying a degree mainly to increase their pay, rather than learning more about their field. Until recently, I did not consider that many practicing teachers have neither the desire nor the freedom to maintain the lengthy engagement with a university as I have done.

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After teaching three years part-time and a few years full-time I felt comfortable in my teaching role. I was constantly learning a newer teacher informally through interaction with a variety of more experienced teachers and by simply navigating the waters of public education as a practitioner. Feeling secure as a teacher allowed me to return, formally, to student role.

After teaching a few years, I returned to OSU. At first taking a few classes that seemed interesting, then in the Master’s program in the Art Education department. Working and going to school was only possible after becoming more comfortable as a teacher. Many of the same professors were still in the department and I was able to understand more about scholarship by working with these individuals. Graduate school focused less on teacher training concerns and I was introduced to theory more for the sake of theory than how it applied to the classroom. This is when I learned about Feminism, my eventual Master’s thesis topic. Scholars, who I now began consider role models, introduced a different way of thinking about art education. Art education was not solely about learning to teach art, but as a vehicle to address and investigate a multitude of social and societal concerns.

The take-away from studying Feminist theory changed my ontology and epistemology.

My early art education championed primarily male artists. These men were trend-setting geniuses. This paradigm also positioned particular art forms above others. Reviewing my art curricula revealed a heavy reliance on the work of American or European deceased white males.

An understanding of Feminism prompted me to simply ask “why”. Why did I use these particular exemplars of art? Was it that I actually felt that these artists best expressed the essence of what I wanted my students to know? Was is how I had been taught? Or, was it the easiest resource to find? Rather than an epiphany, my understanding of hierarchy prompted me to gradually think differently. I began to think about how I came to understand the artists and artwork whose

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discipline largely represented the “D” in D.B.A.E. I didn’t immediately discard eight years’ worth of lesson plans, but instead gradually replaced and included lessons that had less emphasis on art simply because it was famous or note-worthy.

I have found that few of my colleagues have chosen to engage with the university as I have. I also do not see much active recruitment of art teachers by the graduate school to pull them into an active engagement with the university. I most often attended classes in the summer when I was not teaching. When I started taking these summer workshop-style classes in the early

2000s I would see a wider range of students. Back then, a typical class would be composed of a mix of Master’s and PhD students from thee Art Education department (mostly Master’s), a few students from other departments such as Dance or Comparative Studies, and a handful of practicing teachers. Sadly, the change over the last decades has been a decline in participation by practicing art teachers. Lately, most of the practicing art teachers are enrolled in an online

Master’s program that requires a few courses in which physical attendance is required. The upside to these online students is getting to meet teachers from districts outside the immediate area.

I felt more like an academic after working through the thesis writing process. My focus on Feminist theory and how it could be applied to art education was not directly related to my art teaching. I found an interesting topic and ran with it. This is a time when I found graduate studies a welcome offset to my art teaching practice. I would not say I was bored with teaching, but I obviously felt I was lacking some intellectual stimulation. Graduate studies provided that stimulation. This also marked the realization that I did not need my education to serve as an enhancement to my art teaching practice. I could have found other educational opportunities that

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related directly to instruction or curriculum. Instead I opted for an approach to continuing education that mirrored the art education program at OSU. This trend continues today.

A Career Milestone

Several years ago I reached a dubious milestone in my life. On January 29, 2015 I turned

54 years old. At this point I had taught 27 years. At that point, exactly half of my life had been spent teaching. That was three years ago and little has changed in my teaching career. All of these years have been spent in the same school district. The majority of these years have been spent in the same building, and same art room. I have always lived within a few miles of where I was born. I have maintained friendships with guys I knew in grade school. I married my high school sweetheart who was also my first serious girlfriend. I have attended The Ohio State

University for almost forty years. One could label this as consistency. Sometimes I feel the need to put a good spin on or find a positive way to characterize this inaction or inertia.

I mostly feel burdened by this inertia when I meet someone who has made a conscious choice to attend OSU who is from another state or another country. I also feel jealous of acquaintances that have higher status jobs come with enviable perks such as high salary or travel benefits. It seems somewhat lazy of me not to have pursued other education or career options.

In retrospect, this inertia closely matches the rest of my life and has served me well. It is probably an asset that I have maintained friendships for over 40 years, a marriage for over 30 years, and a career for 30 years. Why relocate? Why change teaching assignments when I am satisfied? My long relationship with OSU could be considered inertia as well. I have never seriously considered attending any other graduate school. OSU's reputation in the area of art education was unknown to me as an undergraduate. I gave little thought to attending another college after my BFA. I soon learned that I stumbled into an excellent, highly respected program

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in the discipline of art education. Important thinking in the field was evolving in a few art education departments, including OSU. I based the decision on the quality of the faculty that drew me back to OSU again and again for post-Master’s classes, workshops and independent study classes.

When I returned to OSU for the third time to work on my Master’s degree I was quite aware that I was in the midst of something very special. During my first graduate class, an introduction to the art education graduate program, the professor mentioned that an art education degree from OSU could open doors for those interested in teaching at the college level because of OSU’s reputation. He added to this endorsement by stating some accomplishments of current and past faculty. To affirm these statements, he named several important books in the field written by OSU faculty, mentioning how each added to the field. Having worked with such esteemed scholars had clout in academic circles.

Although I did not vet other graduate programs before enrolling in 1993, to be quite honest, attending these classes is made easier since the school district in which I work offers some tuition waivers in turn for willingness of district teachers to take student teachers and student observers from OSU. Without much forethought or financial stress, I have been able to attend a high quality graduate program.

Perhaps, without too much conscious deliberation, I again remained engaged with something very familiar to me. The Ohio State University has become an integral part of my life.

Much like staying married to my high school girlfriend, and remaining in the same art teaching position, continuing at OSU has been quite beneficial to my overall wellbeing.

Consistency also marks my teaching career. Retirement was the last thing on my mind when I started teaching in 1988. When I signed my first teaching contract, I did not know how

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the retirement system worked nor did I care. I was just happy to get a job teaching art. But it wasn’t long before it was probably the most common topic of conversation among fellow teachers and often others. Before too long, you know how many years each teacher in the building has put in and consequently, how many years they had left. You become aware of other teachers in the district who have ridiculous amount of years of service and which teachers are close to retirement.

Thirty used to be the magic number in a teaching career. After teaching thirty years one can retire with “full” salary benefits. That means the maximum percent of the highest three year’s salary is averaged, and becomes one’s retirement income. Most everyone used that benchmark, except overachievers who worked years past the point of added compensation. At that time any years after thirty were without addition salary or percentage point towards added retirement income. A few years back the state retirement system began to entice teachers to stay five more years and get a few additional percentage points. That was the case until more recent changes were made in the state teachers retirement system, the magic number is no longer thirty.

The retirement system adjusted its forecast and decided that 35 years was the new minimum years of service required to get the “full” retirement salary benefit. The system needed more teachers to pay into the retirement pool and delay retirement to insure adequate funds to pay the retirement benefits.

I was not fortunate enough to be “grandfathered” in to 30 year program. However, I was lucky enough to fall between two programs and exist on a sliding scale that determined I have to teach 33 years. This good news/bad news scenario felt much like I approached the finish line of a long race, only to find it had been moved a few miles further away. In this analogy I want to still finish strong in my teaching career race. I do not want to limp in or have to be carried to the

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finish line. Sometimes I feel like a dogged runner, on my last leg, barely making it when I see the finish line and get a burst of energy. Then, I see the finish moved back and have to dig deep to find the stamina to finish respectably.

It was five years after graduating with a BFA before I finished my art education degree and achieved certification to teach. So, I was already five years behind colleagues who got a job directly after graduation. I was pleased with the path that I took which involved several years looking for an art-related job and then returning to OSU to study art education. I also felt that my BFA gave me a deeper understanding of art than art education degree holders. The five-year delay, although it may have aided in getting hired, because I was seen as more mature than other candidates, has increasingly become an issue as I age. My kindergarten students are now forty- seven years younger than me, as opposed to twenty-two years when I began. Also, I never imagined teaching for thirty years.

When I began teaching in 1988, I certainly did not picture myself as a retiree in 2021.

Once I grasped the retirement system, I assumed I would probably teach 20 or 25 years, retire with a reduced salary benefit and find another career. This prediction was mostly based on how much later my teaching career began than most of my peers. Had I initially enrolled directly at

OSU in art education rather than fine art, graduated in four years and found a job, I would be in my 38th year of teaching rather than my 30th. Instead, my first degree was in fine art. That, working two years and then returning to OSU for my teaching degree “cost” me eight years. This eight-year delay, after getting comfortable with the ins and outs of retirement, made me feel that

I would be too old to go the distance. Of course, as the ends approaches one sees everything from a different perspective. Retiring after 20 or 30 years and looking for another career are the

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actions of a risk-taker, someone I am not. I did not get into teaching for the money, but the security of a steady income and attractive retirement make any drastic change improbable.

The Drive I Made Three Years Ago

Since September of 1979 I have driven about ten miles to go to The Ohio State

University. For my undergrad degrees I made the drive five days a week. Many of the graduate classes met two or three times a week. Some of the later graduate classes met once a week and as

I approached and eventually obtained doctoral candidacy, I would travel to campus much less often. Sometimes I would only meet with a professor a few times each semester. As a part-time student, I take only one class at a time. Most recently, as a doctoral student, I am mostly working on my own and driving to campus infrequently.

I have always been a commuting student at OSU. It is probably fruitless to speculate too much about how my experiences would have differed had I live on campus rather than commute to OSU. I needed to live at home to save money. Getting an apartment or living in a dorm didn’t make much sense when I could drive to school in less than 30 minutes. The social aspects of being a campus resident were outweighed by financial concerns. And, it isn’t like I missed too many opportunities to party. I just did my partying in the suburbs.

Obviously if I had chosen a different academic path my life and career would be very different. Still, even though it took quite a while to settle into my first full-time teaching assignment, I am happy with my meandering path. I wouldn’t trade my experiences in the fine art department for anything although the BFA I received did nothing for my job search. Being a good artist, with or without the degree, is what gets you a commercial art job. Had I gone the commercial art route I would have missed many life-changing experiences. My BFA was impractical, but invaluable.

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Having previously earned my BFA before working on my art education degree freed me to concentrate on the “educational” concerns of OSU’s art education curriculum. My classmates without a BFA had to learn about art in a shortened, concentrated curriculum compared to my four years of fine art instruction. Had I gone directly into an art education program I would have had a rather immature understanding of art and my role as an artist. Similarly, had I discontinued my engagement with OSU after my earning teaching credentials I would have a rather immature understanding of art education.

These factors: (a) mostly esoteric academic pursuits, (b) focusing on art over other content, and (c) feeling like a visitor on campus continue to some degree today. Eventually earning three degrees in art and art education does not equate to me being a more effective teacher. Not in the way that an engineering student would probably become a markedly better engineer after a similarly long engagement with the university. Thirty-eight years at Ohio State have been narrowly focused in my study of art or art education. Ironically, I advise every young person who begins college to keep an open mind and not go in with a predetermined path. I tell them that there will be new ideas and directions that they never could have known about. I advise them to try classes that seem interesting and perhaps they will find a path they had not considered. Of course, I did not do that. Maybe it worked out for me because I followed a path that interested me, not one that promised any career or financial rewards. Except for 1979-1983,

I have been a part-time at OSU. I never lived on campus or partied or socialized there very much.

I attended many summer courses at OSU. My pet peeve and source of scorn was directed towards the other practicing teachers, who attended without realizing the high quality of instruction they were receiving. I could usually, on the first day of class, identify the teachers who were going to take the experience for granted. As we would go around the room for

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introductions when we stated our names, our majors and areas of interest, and why we chose this course. I would bristle whenever I heard “I need the credit hours to keep my certification” or “I was already in town this week and needed the credit hours”. These statements make me cringe.

They are almost as bad as “Is this going to be on the exam?” I am both angered at and embarrassed for the one making these statements. Instructors, by contrast, always took comments like this in stride. Most treated all the students equally, whether they were writing their thesis on the topic that was the focus of the course or if they were in the class by mere happenstance. As a long-time graduate student in the OSU art education department, I am aware of the reputation of the department, and distinction of the faculty and I tried very hard to value each and every educational experience.

On one particular day three years ago it was essentially the same drive down I-71 that I’d taken many times. This time was not as frantic as it is sometimes. For the last several years my trip to the OSU campus usually occurred immediately after my day ended after teaching. On this day, I left from Beacon Street School feeling relaxed. The drive was more relaxed because I was able to leave school without any huge mess to clean in my room and no children missed the bus home. So, I took my time driving I-71 south to Hudson, stay to the right past Summit because someone is always turning left, left on High Street all the way to campus. Where I park once I arrive has varied over the years. Now I almost always park in a garage or pay lot. One benefit of my extended engagement with the university is that I am driving increasingly better cars and have the financial resources to afford to park close to my destination without worrying too much about the cost. Although my eight-year old Honda is no show car, it’s a far cry from the Pinto that made the same commute years ago. It’s not a big deal to pay five dollars to park in the garage right next door to Sullivant Hall. It which sure beats the experience as an undergrad,

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driving down every day then spending thirty minutes roaming around and around looking for a free space to park, let alone anywhere near my destination.

Of course, the drive to campus is followed with the drive back home. About thirty-seven years after first making this commute to campus, the drive home feels different. The previous three semesters at OSU have been the most stressful of my long engagement with the university.

Working toward the dissertation, I have begun to feel grossly inadequate intellectually. My proposal has been scrutinized, calling into question both the topic I wish to explore and the validity of the research I wish to conduct. Until today, I feel quite out of place in a setting that had been familiar for decades.

After about two years of trying to identify what I want to do, how to do it and then justify why it is valid, I can finally begin. I got the “go ahead” to begin writing about my experiences at

OSU. But, the reason the drive home feels different is not just because I progressed to the next stage of my doctoral process, but because of one word that was spoken. My new doctoral committee co-chair, Dr. Savage and I met to discuss how to proceed with my dissertation. Today

I was recognized at OSU and for the first time in a long time. Amidst my silent, internal jubilation I don’t recall which term was used, but Dr. Savage referred to me as either a scholar or academic. I am elated to be considered either and have wanted very badly to be seriously considered in that context.

For someone connected to OSU for such a long time, my identity as an OSU student has always been problematic. While most my high school friends and acquaintances who came to

OSU studied business (including my girlfriend/now wife), I studied fine art. No one ever considered my academic endeavor quite as serious as theirs. I was a dubious student in high school (other than in art class), and this trend continued early in my college career. Much of the

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course load of a beginning undergraduate is outside their major interest. I saw many of the basic educational requirements, “BERs”, as obstacles to cross rather than seeing them as additions to my body of knowledge that would benefit my later.

Sometimes my commuter status made me envious of those students living on campus.

I’m sure my housing was much more comfortable and my home-cooked meals were superior to dorm or apartment life. However, when classmates spoke of social events or bar-hopping on campus I would be envious. I vividly remember walking to my car past raucous groups of students on bar patios and fraternity house porches. It was one of the first warm sunny days in the spring while I worked on my art education undergraduate degree. At the time I was working in a warehouse from 3:00- midnight. It was around 1:00 in the afternoon on a Friday. Seemingly, every other student on campus was enjoying themselves and starting their weekend. Meanwhile I was heading to work about to put in eight hours pulling boxes out of tractor trailers.

Until now, despite my long engagement with the graduate art education program at Ohio

State, I almost always felt like an art teacher in program full of graduate students. My experience in the class carried little or no clout in this academic setting. Now, with a simple statement by

Dr. Savage, I finally felt like a serious graduate student with meaningful knowledge to share.

Doctoral candidacy as an end to liminality?

With this degree of validation from Dr. Savage I felt more accepted in the academic setting, but did move towards a dialogic understanding? No, in the years that followed her statement I continued to see my teaching and learning as separate exercises in art education.

Bolstered by my new found recognition as a nascent academic, I wrote more narratives recounting my different art education experiences. I analyzed these narratives to find attributes and benefits from my continued engagement with art education. I extrapolated how I had gained

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pedagogical benefits from the many art education courses, graduate and undergraduate, I had taken. I was able to identify and write about personal benefits from art educations. My artistic and postmodern sensibilities were rooted in how I had invested time and energy in art education over the years. I was able to explain how graduate school learning provided an intellectual outlet when teaching young children seemed like a very menial occupation.

What I failed to do is find dialogic opportunities or instances throughout the decades I was writing about. Scratching the surface to identify benefits of my art educations seems very simplistic now. Who would argue against taking advantage of every educational opportunity possible? “Art education is good” is hardly a thesis statement. I was very stubborn about staying focused on keeping my study centered on my experiences. I truly felt that representing a long span of educational activities that had with commonalities with many other teachers and students was worthy of a dissertation.

I characterize my writing endeavors as stubborn, not because I refused to widen my focus, but because for a long time I ignored input about how to frame a study about my experience. When my dissertation proposal was reviewed and my Doctoral candidacy exam was administered, I was given four questions to explore and write about. I took this academic challenge seriously, but I was seriously overwhelmed. Each of the four questions had a different theme. One question had two parts and could easily been a third stand-alone question. Two of the candidacy questions involved that I read three rather daunting texts. These texts were not directly related to art or education which troubled me. In retrospect the greatest challenge to successfully completing the task of answering these candidacy questions was my polemic assumptions about academia.

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I had a defensive attitude about the candidacy questions. Without basis, I felt the committee did not understand what I wanted to do with my study. I had never conducted a study or produced any other academic writing of note since my Master’s thesis twenty years earlier, yet somehow I was emboldened to feign a superior understanding. Unfortunately I continued this resistance through most of my dissertation writing. Although I was often advised to revisit my candidacy exam, I was reluctant to refer back as I designed and wrote my dissertation. I fell back on the polemic assumption that academia was not connected to my practical experiences. I assumed this puzzling stance although a cornerstone of what I was writing about then was that I found graduate school so beneficial. Why was I so resistant to the guidance I was getting from trusted, scholarly sources? The questions posed to me for my candidacy exam were drawn from my dissertation proposal, but it took a long time for some of these questions to find their way into my research.

One question asked me to examine theory and practice from the perspective of writing by

John Dewey. The questions posed for this essay were the most directly related to my experience and my dissertation proposal. Although I did not want to address the theory/practice split, which

I felt was an overused theme, the issues of theory and practice are inescapable when a teacher continues graduate studies. Dewey was at times a difficult author to read and apply to contemporary times. Dewey’s groundbreaking work was largely focused on teacher training.

Nonetheless, I found great value in how he analyzed teaching. Dewey was able to break teaching into identifiable components that could be examined. He also wrote about experience which is a cornerstone of my study.

My dissertation proposal mentioned the various cultures I felt I was navigating. I wrote about my teaching culture, my graduate learning culture, and the liminal culture I fell into when I

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was neither teaching nor taking graduate classes. Another candidacy question called me out on these sweeping generalizations about culture. I was asked to examine the idea of culture.

Obviously, this could be an unattainable task given the range of definitions, understandings and usages of culture. If I was going to use the term culture, I had to at least define it as I was going to use it in my study. This question guided me to texts that provided an overview of culture and asked me to use these texts to create a working definition of culture that I could use. I quickly learned to choose my words carefully as many are loaded with meaning that I may not intend.

My proposal was framed as an autoethnography. A candidacy question that addressed autoethnography asked me to consider teaching as performance. This question posed how performance theory could relate to my roles of teacher, student and teacher/student hybrid.

Answering this question forced to examine my teaching more closely than I had earlier. The performance aspect of how I presented myself and viewed my self was enlightening. But, the most impactful part of this question was the request for a brief writing sample that would clarify how I would present my experiences in a study.

I wrote a representation of a portion of my day as a teacher and how performance played a role in my teaching and interacting with students. I learned from viewing teaching as performance, but I found that describing my experience in narrative form had great appeal. I continue to be more comfortable and a more competent narrative writer than ethnographer.

Although my study has autoenthnographic elements, my research is foremost a narrative inquiry.

Writing responses to candidacy questions is challenging. In a relatively short period of time one is asked to complete the task of writing thoughtful, pertinent responses to four questions. One is required to read and understand a number of texts, as well as identify and consume any other texts that seem applicable. After studying the texts, the potential candidate

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writes an encompassing response to the questions in twenty pages. For me the process consisted of furious reading sessions, following often insignificant or tangential leads to supplemental texts, and a problematic distillation of this information into a twenty-page response.

Additionally, I added the problem of wanting to immediately apply this new knowledge in the context of my study. I was often tempted to write how Dewey’s view of experience could be applied to my study rather than write about Dewey’s concepts. Ingesting a volume of unfamiliar texts, writing coherently and with specificity, and meeting a deadline was daunting.

The last question I describe was the most problematic for me. In retrospect it provided the much-needed rigor that my proposal lacked. As with my casual use of culture as a term in my proposal, I also used the term “third space”. I meant to simply describe the site between my teaching practice and graduate studies. I named this liminal space third space without knowing it was a term loaded with meaning and an entire body of knowledge devoted to understanding and utilizing third space. Unfortunately, the lessons learned from this candidacy question were the last to find their way into my research. I found these two texts the most difficult to internalize.

When I earlier described my reaction to a question devoted to culture, I stated that I was taken to task about using a term without providing a working definition or describing how I would use it. I failed to mention that I was also disheartened that I had to devote so much time and energy to clarify a term that I had taken for granted. I now see value in attempting to develop understandings culture and the important role of culture in any educational study. My ignorance of third space produced a similar but elevated sense of distress. I initially felt this question mistakenly assumed that I intended to address the concept of third space in my study, when instead I had used the term totally without any academic or scholarly context. Coincidentally, the

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term I thought I had coined was widely used and had close relation to the issues I wished to address.

To examine third space, I was asked to study texts by Mikhail Bakhtin and Homi Bhabha.

Dewey addressed issues of democracy and empowerment, but largely through the lens of education. The two primary texts for this candidacy question did not blatantly address art, education, or art education. Bakhtin’s (1981) text was written specifically in the literary context and expanded to address larger contexts later by others. Bhabha’s (1994) text addressed culture in respect to colonialism. Although the work of both authors can usefully be applied to the context of my art educations, the breadth and depth of content that I needed to glean was daunting.

The specific elements from these authors that was applicable were (a) understandings of dialogism in respect to analyzing interaction between my two (three?) disparate cultures, (b) a blended understanding how dialogism meshes with hybridization, and (c) an understanding of how the liminality created by my co-habitation in two cultures can be viewed as a positive environment for meaning-making.

I do not have any clear reasoning for why I was resistant to applying my candidacy research to my dissertation. Bakhtin (1986) writes of centrifugal and centripetal forces that are in opposition to dialogue. One force attempts to maintain a status quo, to unify all language

(knowledge) into a neat single ideology. In contrast, another force fights against unification.

Ironically, my reluctance to include new understandings in my academic ideology was a rejection of dialogic interaction. Dialogic interaction is now an important element of this research.

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Dr. Walden and Thinking about Artmaking

An important and consequential benefit of my graduate art education is centered on one figure. I was drawn to courses taught by Dr. Walden. In my long career at OSU, I took more courses with Dr. Walden than any other instructor in any department. She provided instruction that addressed the often disparate needs and backgrounds of her students.

Initially I was drawn to her work because it addressed artmaking and artists. Also, although I have been unable to produce much art myself, I still fancy myself an artist and yearn to hone my art practice. Courses that address art production also appealed to me pragmatically because they directly related to my art teaching practice more than most graduate courses in the art education department.

The work I did in Dr. Walden’s courses highlight the potential for dialogic understandings applicable to graduate art education and an art teaching practice. Although I did not always apply dialogism, Dr. Walden’s courses, in retrospect, allowed ample opportunities to do so.

Big Ideas (2004)

In the winter of 2004 I took a course in advertised to local art teachers that was hosted by a local art council and was taught by Dr. Walden from OSU. The course addressed designing curriculum for artmaking. I followed up with an independent study in the fall to further flesh out and expand on the concepts I was learning. At this time, I was not enrolled in the graduate program in art education at OSU and these courses were my attempt to enrich and contemporize my teaching practice.

I cannot recall if this was my first formal contact with Dr. Walden. I was quite familiar with her as I had seen her many times around the art education department during my

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undergraduate and graduate studies. The door to her office was always interestingly decorated with funky photos and quotes. These decorations revealed the playful side of a serious academic.

I seldom used contemporary artists in my curriculum.

Although the course was generally titled “designing artmaking curriculum” the focus was specifically focused on teaching the ideas represented in artwork. During this class the process of several contemporary artists was explored, not for the physical or technical aspects of their art creation, but for the idea behind the process and intended outcome of the artwork. I personally enjoy many artists whose work emphasizes idea over image, yet my teaching rarely reflected this interest. Out of laziness and habit I usually fall back on the typical artists when I teach. Also, I tend to address the visual aspects of these “tried and true” artists’ work, often ignoring the

“why?” and “what does it mean?” issues in the art we examine.

This course was very different from most graduate classes I had taken. It met offsite at the art council building which was located on a picturesque riverbank. The class met on

Saturdays during the school year as opposed to the one-week intensive course I usually took.

Perhaps the most unique feature of this class was that it was entirely composed of practicing art teachers from the area. Most classes I had at OSU in the summer were made up of mostly full- time graduate students, a few students working in an online Master’s degree program that were required some face-to-face courses, and maybe a few practicing teachers such as myself. So, the demographic of this class allowed Dr. Walden to teach directly to those who could immediately apply what they learned. This was one of the few instances when I did not experience liminality.

I was among art teaching peers.

This course asked us to apply artmaking concepts we learned in hands-on projects and write about how we understood and could eventually apply these concepts to our curriculum. I

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would later learn that Dr. Walden often included artmaking in her courses which may be one of the reasons I enjoyed her courses.

We viewed and discussed artwork with a general theme such as “identity”, then examined how each artist chose to address the concept. After seeing the variety of ways the theme could be confronted we learned about the ways artists presented themselves with self-imposed restrictions or problems. This was illuminating and continued to be a theme in later courses with Dr.

Walden. I often described artmaking to my students in terms of solving a visual problem, but never as creating a problem.

Although this was one of the most teacher-friendly graduate courses I would take, it still made me somewhat ashamed of my own curriculum. How had I left so many excellent contemporary artists out my teaching? How had I ignored so much of the intellectual process in artmaking to focus so solely on the visual aspects? This does not reflect my experience with and understanding of art, so why is it lacking in my teaching?

In the end, I was able to begin to find ways to introduce more big ideas into my curriculum with the artists I was already teaching about. I began to examine more of the reasons for creating and thought process during creation into my teaching. I did not feel entirely confident about proceeding without guidance and continued this exploration during the next semester in an independent study with Dr. Walden.

This example of directly pragmatic graduate study blended my theory and practice rather seamlessly. My sense of lack, based on my emphasis on mostly traditional curriculum and practices, inspired my growth. In retrospect this course merely scratched the surface of the level of theoretical content, with varying degree of practical application, which I would experience in the OSU art education department.

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Visual Culture (2007)

My D.B.A.E. mentality was further challenged in another summer intensive course addressing visual culture. Dr. Walden widened both my concept of appropriate art to teach and how to address the conceptual nature of art and artmaking. This particular summer course addressed visual culture, an alternative to traditional fine art as subject matter. The class was team-taught by Dr. Taylor and Dr. Donner, who I later learned had literally written the book on visual culture in art education.

Dr. Taylor was a young OSU art education department member. Dr. Donner was a visiting scholar. Together they introduced me to the concept of visual culture in the realm of art education. The main idea behind visual culture in art education is that we are all bombarded with a huge variety of visual images from many sources every day, and that these images often have much more relevance to our art students. Students, and all of us, encounter visual culture more often than the fine art addressed in most art classes. Thus these images, visual culture, deserve scrutiny. My background in feminist theory raised my awareness of misogyny and hegemony in the realm of fine art, so I was open to applying a similar critical lens to visual culture.

This concept of visual culture was not entirely new to me. I had heard the idea of visual literacy to validate the need for art education in general. At various times, even in my teaching career, the idea of art education being non-essential or frivolous has been brought forward in my school district. This mostly occurs when budgets are reviewed or school funding levies are on the ballot. Often the threat of cutting art, music, physical education, and sports is used to encourage voters to pass a levy. My understanding of visual literacy as an advocacy point is similar to that of visual culture. The point is that art is omnipresent and has been throughout history, so it deserves attention. In addition, the processes for understanding art can be applied to engage other

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visual images thoughtfully. The difference I see between visual literacy and visual culture is that rather than simply “reading” visual images, visual culture studies see these images as less than innocent. Visual culture proponents seek to teach students to critically examine the images for hegemonic intent. Their goal is students who can thoughtfully and critically investigate the multitude of images that surround them constantly. The context of the image, its purpose and power relations related to the image become central to visual culture pedagogy.

Reviewing notes, texts and other materials from this visual culture class nine years ago revealed many connections to the present. I frequently attended these summer intensive courses to exercise my brain and as an attempt to stay current with thinking in the field of art education. I learned much from these classes and added what I learned, to some degree, in my art teaching practice. However, as I look back, I fell short of taking full advantage of these unique and powerful opportunities. As a part-time, unfocused graduate student I viewed these courses very differently than I do as a doctoral candidate. For instance, my notes from this visual culture class have “Laconde?” scribbled at the top of one page. In retrospect, Dr. Taylor must have mentioned

Jacques Lacan in reference to something about viewing images. The one week, all day workshop classes have a mix of students. The full-time graduate students probably noted how Lacanian theories applied to the discussion we were having. Practicing teachers and those from other departments may have written a mis-spelled note or totally ignored the reference. The readings assigned for this class included several authors and texts that I would encounter later in my graduate career.

Dr. Taylor and Dr. Donner designed this class to include a variety of learning modes. I appreciate when a graduate course includes models effective teaching strategies. In this class we participated in lectures and discussions, viewed and discussed visual images and videos, worked

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collaboratively with other students. Each afternoon we worked on a group presentation that linked a visual culture component to other forms within the same theme or question. I am not that familiar with group work at any level of education. Working collaboratively was not common in my high school, as occurs more commonly now. Both of my undergraduate degrees, in art and art education, rarely called for group projects. I do not recall any group work in my

Master’s program. I know a flaw in my own art teaching practice is lack of collaborative activities for my students. The small group that worked together for our visual culture presentation functioned as I had imagined it would. We had time set aside for us to work together, which alleviated the need to organize common work time. I remember the few times I had to collaborate in college involved extensive planning to accommodate every member’s schedule. For this summer class everyone in my group contributed almost equally. Luckily one group member was proficient with computer which made the process much easier. I recall that after we discussed the theme and direction of the assignment as a whole group we combined portions of the presentation that we created individually.

The culminating project for our group presentation was required to contain hypertext links. The digital/computer element of this course furthered the reality that most of our students were engaging with electronic media most of the time. This prophetic course planning foresaw the ubiquitous nature of the smartphone by many years.

Participation in this visual culture class was successful in a pragmatic way. Visual culture is not as much as a buzzword as it was a few years ago. However, learning about visual culture is integrated into my curriculum. My younger students may not be ready to critically examine the commercial images that they cling to, but I try to teach them about images beyond the realm of fine art. At the elementary level I have to attend to a range of curricular components, so I cannot

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devote too much time to critical analysis. My students begin to address critical concerns and I attempt to model how important context is when developing an understanding of any image.

When I attended a course like this I was clearly an art teacher taking a graduate art education class. I did not use this class as a transition to further studies about visual culture. I had not yet transitioned to a point where I felt like a legitimate graduate student. The classes I took were mainly in the summer, so I was not concurrently teaching and learning. These classes were primarily for my personal benefit. I did not feel disappointed or unfulfilled if the graduate class did not result in new lesson plans or innovative strategies to address art. I lacked the motivation to begin to connect this mélange of courses into a purposeful plan of action in graduate studies. I was enjoying learning for learning’s sake.

Since I was not yet considering myself a true “graduate student” I did not experience a liminal state. Although I was often returning to OSU with a Master’s degree I had earned ten years earlier, my affiliation with the university remained casual. In retrospect, courses like these that began to challenge my confidence as a thoughtful art teacher. Around this time, and after several years of teaching, I must have begun to question if I was taking my art teaching career seriously. Was I content to continue to teach as I had been teaching or did I want to make my teaching more of an intellectual exercise? Again, I am not claiming that I was directly applying any of the knowledge I was acquiring from post-Master’s graduate classes, but I was building a body of knowledge. This body of knowledge included theoretical concepts and perhaps more importantly interaction with university faculty. I was beginning to interact with a group of people that were committed to thinking about, teaching about, and writing about aspects of art education that were new to me. I liked being around these people. I often felt inferior, but I was inspired to learn more. This may be the turning point in my academic career.

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Image or Meaning (2008)

I enrolled in several courses Dr. Walden taught that focused on the idea that artists, especially contemporary artists, are meaning-makers as well as visual image makers. This places art ideas on equal footing as the image itself. The concept of art as meaning-making was both inspiring and intimidating. I was inspired to address the ideas in the art made by others as well as art that I made. But, it made much of the teaching I had done seem trite and superficial.

Dr. Walden’s classes encourage student interaction and were a mix of art education and fine art students. I was pleased to get to discuss art and artmaking with peers, some of whom who would soon be teaching their own college classes. I was even more excited about working in proximity to “real” artists which I had not had the opportunity to do that since my undergraduate studio critiques. The little artmaking I had been doing was in a vacuum. I missed the comradery and intellectual challenge of conversing with other artists.

In this summer intensive course, Dr. Walden identified within the artistic process several practices that contemporary artists utilized. The goal of the class was build a better understanding of the artistic process so we could better design artmaking activities for our students. The class watched artists who explained how they worked, read about and discussed the creative process. This provided new insight into how artists create and gave me insight into how

I had created in the past and how I might create in the future. The learning was both reflective and reflexive.

It was refreshing to learn about a concept and almost immediately apply that concept to a work of art. It was also intimidating to work alongside MFA students since I had not created much art in a long time. I was, at the time, working on two paintings.

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Figure 8. A. Moffatt. (2005). Ida's Chair. [Acrylic]. and Detail I was transported back to the undergraduate art studio and I found someone whose work had a common thread to mine. My paintings incorporated photo-copied images with painted images. A fellow student also painted with a collage-like technique. Her work looked and had very different meaning from mine, but I had not engaged in a thoughtful conversation about my art with another artist in many years.

Dr. Walden showed us images and videos that featured contemporary artists. She provided us with an envelope with artists’ biographic information, reproductions, articles about the artists and lists and charts of strategies. The strategies were actions that the artists utilized to aid, or perhaps, hinder their artmaking process. We analyzed the artwork to determine the purpose of the art, the idea behind the art, and how the artist used. After we studied the artists,

Dr. Walden gave us studio assignments related to the ideas, processes, or techniques we discussed. The week-long class culminated with a presentation and critique of an artwork that we created. The artwork was displayed in various rooms and in the gallery in Hopkins Hall. All of 146

my undergraduate art classes were held in Hopkins and this class exhibition brought back many memories. The building was deserted for the summer, so it lacked the buzz I remember from my studio classes in the early 1980’s. Back then the classroom/studios were full and students spilled out into the hallways. It seemed that someone was always carrying an enormous canvas down the hall. For our art education class, we did our artmaking in a classroom on the art education floor of Hopkins. For this art show on the last day of class we spread out all over the building to display our work. I do not recall all of the pieces but a few stood out. One student took over an empty room and created an installation of objects that resembled a tabletop shrine. She explained how each item related to a different aspect of her family. She talked about some very personal and somewhat troubling feelings evoked from creating this piece. I was impressed with her willingness to share this with the class. Another student used the empty downstairs gallery space to create a huge assemblage of found objects. She explained how she collected the objects and the process behind building the large sculpture. As we discussed her piece and she explained more about it, she revealed that she regularly scavenged food from dumpsters. At first, I felt bad for her being in a situation where she had to get her food that way. As she explained further it was clear that her “urban harvesting”, as she called it, was more of a lifestyle choice than a necessity. She did this as an extension of a recycle, waste-nothing philosophy. Again, I was taken back by the honesty these students displayed to others that they barely knew.

I did not put myself “out there” as some of the others did. I thought about the process I was using to create my collage-like paintings. I began to think more about how and why I was selecting the images for my paintings. Each of the two completed paintings were about my family. The images I painted and the photos I collaged in were representative of some aspect of the people in the painting. Dr. Walden spoke and we discussed the ideas behind the images,

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processes and intent of the artworks we viewed. My two paintings lacked layers of meaning.

They were too obvious. The images meant little more than their face value. For the collage I made for the final assignment I tried to add more depth to the meaning I was representing. Dr.

Walden explained a list of verbs that Richard Sierra used to stimulate ideas for his artwork. The list included words like: bend, rotate, weave, and spread. The list also included less straight- forward words like: entropy, surfeit, ionize, and modulate. I experimented with different ways to alter my collages images. The cutting and arranging of images became more deliberate. This added step of thinking about process in turn allowed me to look deeper into the images I was choosing.

Pragmatically, this course was one of the most applicable of all my post-Master’s classes.

However, the usefulness was almost entirely selfish. The introduction to these new artists was helpful and expanded my repertoire to use with my students. Looking deeply into the artistic process, the meaning-making, was more applied to my own work.

Lacan (2009)

Somewhat blindly following two of the professors I most respected, I enrolled in a summer intensive course that addressed Lacanian theory. Dr. Taylor and Dr. Walden co-taught this class. The course description revealed little to me about the content, but I trusted the instructors to provide a meaningful experience, I entered uncharted waters. Lacan (2006), a post-

Freud psychoanalytic theorist, wrote about identity, and desire which has been used by scholars to better understand issues within art education and other disciplines.

This course was my introduction to very difficult conceptual thinking that initially had no connection to art or art education. Again, the skill and enthusiasm of the instructors overrode any misgivings I had about the subject matter. Judging from the interest and engagement of the other

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students in the class, Lacanian theory was an important component of current academic thought in art education. The course was described as an introduction for those without prior experience with Lacan, but roughly half the class had obviously had some exposure to his work. That said, my total ignorance was never looked upon negatively by the professors or classmates. It was generally understood that this was challenging content. At this point I was a post-Master’s student, not yet formally accepted into the Doctoral program. This was another course that I took to enrich my educational experiences and stay current with thinking in the field.

The general theme of this class was identity formation. Much of the subject matter we examined would be considered visual culture rather than fine art. So, after learning about visual culture several years earlier I was developing more tools with which to analyze images. The class was conducted as a blend of lecture, discussion, viewing, and small group work. Lacan could be considered a post-Freudian psychoanalyst. The concepts we were learning about such as the symbolic, imaginary, and real registers were quite difficult to grasp for me. For instance, the symbolic and the imaginary were explained and signifiers and the signified. The terms Lacan used were often common, but in the context of his theory they had different meanings from my naïve understandings. Another example is “the real” is different from “reality”. Changing my long-accepted meaning of certain words slowed my progress towards understanding Lacan. I took most of the week to develop even a working understanding of these concepts. It was helpful to hear fellow students ask questions and request clarification about what we were learning. First,

I felt less isolated and uneducated, since others were struggling. Secondly, it usually helps to clarify confusion if one hears questions from another perspective, or that I was afraid to ask aloud. Thankfully, Dr. Taylor and Dr. Walden reassured the class quite often that this was difficult material and that it was okay to still be confused.

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Our final in-class project was a short video we created to demonstrate Lacan’s three registers. We worked in a small group to write, script, and act out a scene that demonstrated the symbolic, the imaginary, and the real. Our video involved a character hiding in a bathroom stall as other characters come in and out. We tried to demonstrate the laws designated by the “Men’s” sign, voyeurism in the person hiding, and reaction to discovering the hiding person. Each small group produced a video. Part of the presentation of the video was for other small groups to imagine dialogue for the other’s video.

Many of the examples we were shown to explain Lacanian theories were clips from movies. Popular culture, like movies, were seen as an entry point to understanding Lacan by

Zizek (1991) who wrote about films through a Lacanian lens. The film clips were both entertaining and helpful for me. These difficult concepts were easier to understand when applied to more concrete examples.

The final paper for this Lacanian theory class was an analysis of a film of our choice. We were asked to examine the film to determine instances of the three registers. I enjoyed this opportunity to apply theory to a concrete example. I am sure that I over-simplified the concepts to adapt them to fit my needs. I was able to create a coherent analysis and the process got me closer to understanding Lacan.

Like Dr. Walden’s visual culture class the summer before, this class did not overtly find its way into my art teaching. It did begin to solidify my need to continue my graduate art education. By 2010, I had taken six summer classes in the last seven years. The 2010 class with a visiting professor with whom I was quite familiar was the point when I decided to fully engage in graduate art education. While he was teaching at OSU he had taught several of my undergraduate art education classes in the mid-1980s and the introductory class when I began my

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master’s coursework in 1993. The 2010 summer class was a mixture of full-time graduate students and a few practicing art teachers like me. At this point, eight years ago, I had not yet begun to feel as ancient in comparison to the other students as I do now. On this first day of the summer class the students were taking turns introducing ourselves. Most students stated where they stood in terms of their degree program, such as “I’m a third-year master’s student.” When it was my turn the instructor acknowledged that I looked familiar and asked about my circumstance. I stated that I was not in a degree program, just taking classes each summer. He asked me why. I answered that my previous three degrees were from OSU and perhaps it was best to move to another institution if and when I worked towards a doctorate. He asked if I would feel the same way about four degrees from Harvard. It struck me that I needed to take full advantage of a rich resource that was close to home. This moment prompted me to focus my continued academic pursuits towards the doctoral program at The Ohio State University.

Deleuze and Guatarri (2011 and 2012)

I participated in two consecutive summer courses in 2011 and 2012. At this point I had completed the necessary steps to be accepted into the Doctoral program in art education at OSU.

The application, essay and grueling GRE were behind me now and I was unrealistically searching for a research topic. I say unrealistically because I did not have the knowledge base to effectively choose a topic. I had so much to learn before a decision of such importance could be made. These two courses were again taught by Dr. Walden. Her colleague, Dr. Taylor, had moved to another university. Dr. Richman was now her co-instructor. I found him a fitting replacement. Dr. Richman was a bit more personable than Dr. Taylor and I enjoy his sense of humor. He and Dr. Walden were a great team.

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These two summer classes were centered on artmaking through the philosophical work of

Deleuze and Guattari (1987). Dr. Walden and Dr. Richman, instead of having us read the 632- page book upon much of the course content was based provided us with small envelopes containing key phrases and short texts related to each concept. Even in this condensed and annotated form the work of Deleuze was difficult to understand at times. The goal of the class was to begin to look everyday at experiences differently using strategies from Deleuze and

Guattari. We were asked to apply the concepts we were learning to artmaking encounters in the

OSU main library. Along with concepts from Deleuze and Guattari, we learned about artists and groups of artists who used encounters in public spaces as their art form.

Like the course on Lacan from two years earlier, this class utilized a variety of learning activities to along us to learn, apply our learning and express ourselves in a way that demonstrated what we learned. It was an effective strategy to teach difficult concepts. Thinking about my practice was fitting for this course. We were engaged in artmaking to apply and demonstrate the concepts we were learning, but the concepts had relevance beyond artmaking and beyond academic thinking. As obtuse as Deleuze and Guattari’s writing was, I was beginning to grasp the concepts as explained by Dr. Walden and Dr. Richman.

In my cumulative essay at the end of the course the first summer I mentioned that I had really only begun to understand this philosophy, but I was able to apply some of the concepts in my own thinking and that it would likely find its way into my teaching. The concept from

Deleuze and Guattari that I chose to focus on was smooth/striated. Deleuze and Guattari used these terms to describe spaces. The examples that stuck with me were of a public park. A park with open grassy areas could be considered smooth in that it allows visitors to choose their own activity without direction from the park structure. A park with delineated pathways and

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recreation structures like a slide or swings would be striated. This park is striated because the physical structures attempt to direct the visitors as to what activity in which to engage. In my paper I considered my classroom. How was I directing my students into my own choices when it would be more appropriate to allow them the freedom to choose?

The second summer that Dr. Walden and Dr. Richman taught about Deleuze and

Guattari’s writing also involved artmaking. This time we used the OSU student union building as inspiration for our art encounters that demonstrated what we had learned. Again, we were provided with based provided with small envelopes containing key phrases and short texts related to each concept. Although much of the content of this course was the same as last summer, it did not seem repetitive. It was refreshing that the concepts we discussed were not completely new to me as is the case most summers. Still, I did not feel like a fluent French- speaker taking a beginning French language class. The content remained demanding.

These two classes were important in my development as a graduate student. They were the first summer courses that I took as a doctoral student, not a post-Master’s continuing education student. I felt the responsibility to take the classes more seriously. Plus, I was on a constant hunt for a research topic. It was still too early to settle on a topic, but I looked at everything related to OSU differently now. I was much more interested in the direction of my fellow students. Before I would acknowledge the class ranking, major, and area of interest when students spoke, but it was a casual interest. Now, I was intensely interested in what each student was doing in an academic sense. If you were a first or second year doctoral student in the art education department, I definitely wanted to know more about you.

Along with a more determined sense of purpose, I also looked more closely at how I was being taught. I was envious and in awe of most of the instructors I encountered. I never saw a

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problem with content of any of my courses. I value learning from someone passionate and committed to the subject they are teaching, even if I do not buy into the standpoint the instructor represents. Exposure to challenging or opposing viewpoints either widens my perspective or solidifies my stance. Some of my friends, some with college age children, often complain about the cost of a college education and how graduates are not prepared for careers when they leave to university. As a long-time learner with no aspirations to advancing my career, only aspirations to gain knowledge, I disagree, but have difficulty arguing the case for pure learning. With an open mind and open heart, I value my graduate learning as personal enrichment. Undoubtedly, enrichment for my students is a byproduct of self-enrichment.

Approachable Academics

Dr. Walden, often team-teaching with Dr. Taylor or Dr. Richmond, modelled what I would call the “approachable academic”. After many years engaged in graduate art education, I am obviously enamored with the academic lifestyle. I have encountered and worked directly with many instructors. It is hard to imagine some instructors functioning outside the university classroom. This no different than any profession when you see someone so utterly engaged with their profession that they seem to be unaware of the rest of the world. I knew elementary teachers that wore the denim jumper with a picture of the slate appliqued on the front. The slate was embroidered “ABC” and “1+1=2”. These teachers looked so much like a stereotypical teacher that it was difficult to imagine them doing anything other than teach young children. How could one drink a glass of wine or watch an R-rated movie dressed like that? Of course, this was a narrow-minded, uninformed perception of both my elementary teaching peers and university staff. In retrospect I was probably intimidated by professors who engaged with academics so completely that I could not see beyond them existing beyond that realm.

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Dr. Walden and the professors who co-taught with her did not intimidate me, they were far more accessible. She could address the most esoteric and difficult subjects with humor and humility. Obviously armed with a brilliant mind and vast body of knowledge, Dr. Walden never talked down to students or made anyone feel inferior. She seemed to see knowledge as a gift to be shared among all participants, often including participating in revelatory discussions. It wouldn’t be unusual for her to praise a student for pointing out another way of looking at something we were learning. She facilitated classes rather than lectured. She created an environment of cooperation and discovery. This is not to say the content of her courses was easy or simple.

Dr. Walden’s classes placed me into a culture that I often inhabit. Her courses always connected to the art world more than the content of other instructor I experienced in my graduate art education experiences. The core and substance of the courses I took with Dr. Walden was art or art-making. After a long absence from participating in serious discussion of art, and an even longer absence from any meaningful art production of my own, it was refreshing to fully immerse in all issues art related. I missed talking about art with the depth with peers (artists and art educators).

There is much to be gained from engaging in discussion with a learned professor, scholarly graduate students from a variety of academic foci, and at times visual art students who normally focus on art production. These class participants represented a very different culture from my day-to-day practice. The elementary school culture, even amongst other art teachers, does not rival the depth and substance of in terms of a discussion among graduate students.

It is in these classes that dichotomy of my school/work existence is brought to my attention. Much of my elementary teaching time is spent breaking down and explaining ideas

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about art into smaller simplified, often tokenized, concepts. A representation of the vast and complicated realm of art is often watered down to match the experiences and developmental level of younger students. On the other side of my existence, many graduate level classes not only involved complicated topics, but also spend much time complicating or troubling those topics and other adding layers of sophistication to seemingly easier topics. Simplifying and complicating are the two actions that typify my two roles as teacher and student. As a result of the attention and depth I have had to apply to graduate work, I feel obligated to raise the conceptual level of my elementary school art lesson. I like to think that my curriculum goes beyond designing art “activities” and begins to touch on more meaningful concepts. I try to address thoughtful issues in my class and have my students create artwork that is meaningful.

Working with Dr. Walden highlights some of the many instances when graduate study asks one to complicate an outwardly simply concept. By complicating a concept, I mean the active analysis from multi-perspectival viewpoints and troubling common notions. From this analytical perspective, nothing is simple and nothing should be taken for granted.

As much as I enjoyed the variety of summer graduate classes I attended, I’m not sure my interest would have been sustained without Dr. Walden. Courses that strayed far from my practice and/or addressed subjects that seemingly were foreign only to me would have been unbearable. Dr. Walden had an ability to teach difficult material without dumbing it down and making it assessable to students such as myself without any background in that content. On several occasions students in the class had already spent a semester or two on the topic we addressed in class. I enrolled in a course based on the professor teaching the course and sometimes didn’t discover what the topic was until the first class session. Often the course titles were rather cryptic. Had I not trusted Dr. Walden I would never signed up to learn about

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Lacanian theory or two different courses addressing Deleuze and Guattari. Had I not taken these courses I would have missed great opportunities to challenge myself academically, experience true scholarly discourse, and appreciate the state of advanced thinking in contemporary art education. I can thank Dr. Walden, Dr. Taylor, and Dr. Richman for facilitating inclusive, welcoming, and challenging courses. Without these professors I may not have sustained my long engagement in graduate art education. Consequently, I would be a very different teacher and thinker.

Dr. Walden’s classes exemplified dialogic interaction. I entered her courses with a mindset somewhat fixed about art and artmaking. Her teaching often touched on concepts far beyond my intellectual grasp, at least without serious attention devoted on my part. Yet through communication we, and the other students, worked through difficult material to reach understandings unique to each of us. I did not leave her courses thinking as she did, nor did I think as I had in the past. The artmaking classes were optimal for dialogism because each artist brings so much of their own thinking to the artmaking process. Each artist has their style, technique, and intent, among many variables in art creation. The contemporary art concepts I learned in Dr. Walden’s courses synthesized with my personal artistic thinking created a new, unique conception of art creation. My past conceptions are still in existence, not replaced by new ideas, but instead blended with the aspects of the new thinking I deemed most appropriate.

The instances of dialogism also apply to my learning in the graduate art education department. At times I wish that instead of taking many ideas from varied sources to form my art educational ontology, that I had a dominant ideology the guided my thinking. If I were strongly aligned with a single foundational philosophy it might simplify how I address art education

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issues. But, as a postmodern thinker I more often enjoy ambiguity. My ontology is constantly evolving based on new knowledge I acquire.

Layers of Proof

What began as a semi-obligatory visit to see a high school play turned into a multilayered experience of self-discovery with great relevance to my research. I was fairly deep into the writing process that would eventually become my dissertation and I had begun to doubt the exploratory nature of the narrative inquiry. Until this point, I had been thinking and writing about my educational experiences without uncovering much that I had not already known. Granted, much of what I had written was first and second drafts and I had not spent much time analyzing or looking for academic connections between what I had written and the literature in the field.

Still, I had not experienced a moment of revelation or epiphany. That is, until I connected my writing with the story that unfolded at the high school theater performance. This performance elicited emotions and tied together thoughts and ideas about my educational past and present that

I had not before considered.

I have only a few close friends who are the only non-family members with whom I socialize regularly. Probably because I have always lived close to where I grew up, I never had to make new friends with neighbors or co-workers. I have an abundance of friends and long-time acquaintances, unlike people who relocate after college or get transferred due to their jobs. I have friendships that I made when I was in elementary school. My wife and I have run around with this group of people in various configurations from high school until now. Other than this core group of friends a few other friends have entered our lives. These other people my wife and I have become friends with are the parents of children at my school. Parents have many opportunities to volunteer and participate in activities at my school. Hence, the most active and

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outgoing parents get seen and make themselves known to the teachers. Two different couples have become close friends of ours. Initially I met these parents through school functions, but in some way, we connected beyond school or their children. These friendships have lasted long after the students left my classroom. One of these families placed me in the situation that was the catalyst for an important revelation about my art educations.

It was a warm fall night and my wife and I attended a dramatic performance of our friends’ daughter at the high school behind the school where I teach. This girl and her sister were both students of mine. I was much closer to her older sister who graduated a year earlier. She stood out as one of those kids who smiled and looked at me when I was teaching; not just occasionally, but every time I spoke. It was almost ridiculous when she locked on to me with her giant brown eyes. I could always count on her to be 100% present. She was far more attentive and respectful than her peers. She began her over-the-top enthusiastic engagement in kindergarten and it immediately endeared her to me She continued her rapt interest through to sixth grade when it was clearly no longer cool. Her sister was two years younger and equally as cute, but not as overly attentive. Both girls were friendly, smart and talented in art class, but their real talent was in music, dance and eventually drama. My wife and I began going to see the girls’ performances when the girls were playing the youngest children in a community theater production of “The Sound of Music”. This evolved into meeting the parents for drink, having dinner with and without the children, and going together to see other theater productions and concerts. Now the youngest daughter was in her senior year and we were attending her first performance of the year.

The four of us, my wife and I, and the parents of the girl in the play, sat in the middle of the intimate smaller theater as the lights dimmed and the performance began. The play was Proof

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by David Auburn. I was unfamiliar with the play, but had heard of a movie of the same name. I knew vaguely that it was about a woman mathematician. The title referred to mathematic term, rather than the synonym for evidence. The four main characters were my former student portraying the daughter of a famous math professor, the ghost of the professor, the professor’s other daughter and graduate student of dead professor. The story revolves around the daughter’s struggles with inherited mathematical genius or perhaps inherited mental illness from the father.

As I sat in the audience listening to dialogue about long hours spent working on comprehensible math problems I began to see parallels between this story and my life.

I envisioned my dad’s desk full of yellow legal pads covered in numbers and symbols that meant nothing to me. Watching the young actor in a tweed jacket pace around the stage shuffling papers, and pouring glasses of colored water into highball glasses, I flashed back to the desk in dad’s home office, the family room coffee table, the dining room table, and virtually every flat surface in our house with overloaded ashtrays and books, legal pads and magazines covered with purple ringed stains from glasses of wine. Dad wasn’t a pacer or liquor drinker, but the papers and the bottles evoked the memories. Whatever was happening on stage wasn’t too cryptic or personal that only I was seeing the connections, because several references in the dialogue to someone struggling with their dissertation had Lisa squeezing my hand pretty hard.

So, why did I have to see a high school play to recognize that at least part of why I’m working towards a doctorate might be to prove something to my dead father? Why isn’t it obvious that having grown up with a college professor as a father, that I would see being a PhD as something to aspire to? Of course, it wouldn’t seem intellectually or culturally satisfying to teach elementary students art when your father taught and researched electrical engineering, a hard science.

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I was mentally transported during the play. It was as close to having one of the several aesthetic experiences (as was described to me by a professor from my undergraduate art education studies) that I have ever had. For a few moments I was not totally aware of my surroundings, nor was I caught up in the story of the performance. These two states describe my usual experience viewing films or less often viewing art. I find myself either completely distracted from a work of art or performance and I find that I am seeing beyond what is presented or I “become one with the art”, placing myself firmly inside the performance. In the case I may do the opposite of getting lost in the story and forget about the movie I am watching and begin to think about how the actors were placed to get the camera angle we are seeing. When viewing art,

I am often in a public space without the darkness and quiet of a theater to centralize my focus.

Here, the addition of other people and the viewing space itself can be distraction. Or, I may lose all awareness of my surroundings.

At the high school play I was not completely caught up in the performance. Even at the relatively high level at which these particular students perform, as actors they are limited by their age and experience and I am old jaded arts patron viewing this play mainly to support my friends and their daughter, not with the expectation of great entertainment. That being said, this was a particularly strong performance with a small, evocative cast. Still, I was not fully engaged in the story or emotionally invested in the characters. My transformative experience, a ‘semi-aesthetic experience’ took me not into the storyline of the play, but into my own life. I was present in the theater and I was following the play, but at the same time I was re-living interactions with my father and making connections to this dissertation.

How important is it to identify the source of your motivation? For me, the realization that at least part of my motivation to continue so long in graduate education is to compete with or

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impress my late father is illuminating, but not very consequential. The desire to become or appear to be an academic has had far more rewards than negative outcomes. Perhaps if I had not reaped many benefits from my continued engagement with the university, I would use this realization to discontinue graduate school. But, uncovering a new understanding of my relationship with my father adds another facet by which to consider my art educations. As I stated earlier, thinking and writing through this revelation confirms the use of narrative inquiry as a research methodology.

This dissertation has become in many ways all-consuming of my consciousness. This includes waking and sleeping hours. I have made a habit of keeping a pad and pen in my car and beside my bed to write down thoughts as they occur to me. I have voice-notes recorded on my phone when I get ideas and I huge pile of post-it notes all around my desk. I’m sure these are habits that many people have who try to organize their thoughts or who are writers. The difference may be that I have found very few sources that do not elicit meaning and inspiration for me. It has become quite problematic to write about art, education and my life because so much of the world is made up of art, so much of what people are concerned about is education, and in the middle of all this is me, living my life and attempting to write about it.

So, I wasn’t very surprised that I was sitting five rows from the stage, in a dark little theater, next to the parents of the lead actor and I was wishing I had a pad and pen. Even this experience was marred by this cloud over my head, the ‘dissertation-cloud’, which makes me see the world through the lens of a graduate student. Rather than simply enjoying the show, I wanted to turn it into something academic. I wanted to somehow use this high school play to my advantage, to use this experience as a new catalyst to uncover other previously unexplored father/son factors in play throughout my art educations. I seek a third space to allow or facilitate

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interaction between my practical and academic realms. Rather than revisit the polemic assumptions about each realm I need to actively seek dialogic resolutions. My teaching and my learning need not be such unrelated activities.

Can Artman be an Academic?

Transitioning back and forth between graduate studies and my elementary art teaching practice has caused me to question my academic prowess. I much as I would like to see myself as a learned, well-read graduate student who also happens to be a practicing teacher, it more likely that others would see me as a veteran teacher dabbling in college work. I don’t really care what my colleagues or the parents at my school think about my graduate studies. My continued engagement with the university is clearly personally motivated, not to impress others. The actual practice of elementary art teaching is such that it rarely reaps the benefits of advanced university work. Thus, graduate work doesn’t give a practicing teacher a huge advantage over a teacher with good classroom management skills and well-designed activities that keep the kids engaged.

As I’ve addressed elsewhere in this dissertation, my graduate work has not only at times failed to connect to my art teaching practice, it has often contested or contradicted what I do in the classroom. I don’t see this as a problem. I have come to view my graduate studies as a pursuit towards personal growth that isn’t specifically focused to my teaching. Perhaps graduate work at the university provides an intellectual, introspective balance to the physical, interpersonal nature of my daily practice.

As I age and find myself in the latter stages of my teaching career, some of the less glamorous and downright menial aspects of teaching are highlighted. This is where my graduate work can amplify the mind-numbingly menial tasks that I perform at school especially while at

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same time I am writing a doctoral dissertation. Recently, this paradox was clearly reinforced around Halloween. A tradition that started out rather cute has grown grotesque.

My first year as an elementary art teacher I was surprised to find out that Halloween was still celebrated at our school. I grew up in the age before political correctness and my late

1960’s- early 1970’s elementary school had no qualms about school prayer or Christmas pageants. My part in one school Christmas play was God, the narrator. The norm, so I thought, was to now either skip Halloween and concentrate on schoolwork (novel idea) or disguise the celebration as a fall or harvest celebration. Well, not at this school. Tradition is king at this school and if was good enough for the parents when they attended, it was good enough for their kids who are attending now. The kids still dressed in costumes, had parties in the afternoon, paraded around the school, and shockingly most of the teachers also dressed up. Some wore elaborate costumes all day, while others changed in the afternoon right before the class parties.

Some teachers in the same grade level planned costumes together, such as three blind mice or three teachers in slippers, shower caps and bathrobes.

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Figure 9. Several Versions of Artman Figure 8. Several Versions of Artman

I was at a loss and as is my typical method, I procrastinated until the night before to come up with a costume. I hurriedly drew a large red “A” in the style of a superhero costume and pinned it to a maroon sweat shirt. I found a black mask that covered my eyes, the kind with the thin elastic string that holds it to your face. I wrote “art” in large letters with a marker and attached it to the mask. That was the entirety of my Halloween costume. Over the years I added more to the costume until settling on baggy gym shorts over contrasting color sweatpants, a

Pittsburgh Steelers helmet-hat made of fleece and a bath towel pinned to my shirt as a cape.

That first year I just walked around as a super hero that no one had ever heard of. Over the years, I developed I a tongue-in-cheek fictional narrative about that only arises once a year, every year. On the morning of the day our school has our Halloween parties and parade I have the office make an announcement in the morning that Mr. Moffatt has meeting in the afternoon and will be unable to attend the parade. Then, before the parade I change into my same lame costume and make an appearance as my alter-ego. Now Artman leads the parade. I start with the

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older students, stopping at each classroom picking up one class a time until the entire school has formed a long line. Together we walk outside to the playground where parents, grandparents and younger siblings are waiting. My shtick includes occasionally asking a student if he or she “has seen Mr. Moffatt?”, “I’ve been looking for him”. The younger students are often confused because they don’t understand that I’m supposed to be a character, but some of the older kids play along. They might respond with “No, he’s at a meeting” or “You just missed him”. After a lap around the playground, the children and teachers re-enter the school and the class parties either resume or begin. Meanwhile, I go to the staff restroom and peel off my ridiculous outfit and wonder why I still put myself through this humiliation and how long I will continue this degradation? Later that afternoon, I may see a little kid smile and call me Artman or say he saw

Artman today and it makes it a bit more tolerable.

Trying to be entertaining enough to teach young students may be undignified at times. I also feel that much of my energy is spend in teaching and behavior management activities that have nothing to do with art. But the nature of teaching art to elementary students includes relationship building. It can be frustrating to teach students who are required to be in your classroom, regardless of their interest art class. Elementary art is not an elective class. I assume if

I were a college instructor, then most students in my class would be interested in the subject or be motivated to work hard to earn a good grade. My elementary students may require more care and provide little intellectual challenge to me, but I feel what I do with them is important. I cannot expect children to grow into people that appreciate art, as I have, without providing positive experiences in the art room. I may be able to push and coerce a few motivated students, but my goal is to reach as many as possible. I am not training future artists, art historians, or critics. I am trying to help young people love art as I do.

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Would I be content to reside only in the immature world of interacting with young children? I probably would not. If I could become a true academic and reside in the world of the university community, would it make me content? Although at one time I felt that I would like to teach at the college level, it is very late in my career for a career change. Perhaps some aspect of my art education experiences would be desirable to an art education department I could teach a class as an adjunct. For the time being, the best fit for me seems to be regularly transitioning between and these two related but seemingly disparate cultures. This is an instance when I seem to revel in my liminality rather than view it negatively.

Epiphanies

I hesitate to acknowledge epiphanies. When I read Bochner’s (2011) description of autoethnography, a research method that I was considering, I was disappointed to see that he included epiphanies as one of his criteria. He stated that an autoethnographer should write stories about life changing events. I want to honor the ordinary-ness of life. However, I see the importance of recognizing life events that mark or inspire change and are some way transformative. The following two narratives would qualify as epiphanies in relation to my art educations.

College Epiphany

It was the summer of 1979. We stood in Lisa’s parent’s kitchen dialing the phone number of a girl I sat behind in Latin class a year earlier in high school. I didn’t really know her, but I knew she was at OSU studying art as I was about to do. We, Lisa and I, must have been freaking out about starting our first quarter in college. Since we began dating in January, we had been inseparable. We went to high school together for the last six months of our senior year, spent the summer together, and now we were getting ready to go to college together. We were both living

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at home and planning to commute to school. Our plan was for me to drive my car to her house, and then drive her car to OSU. That way we would save money by buying one parking pass and taking her car for the longer portion of the drive since it used less gas. Also, it was a great excuse to be together. We tried to schedule our classes so it made sense to ride together. But, we’d ride together anyway, even if it meant one of us sitting around to wait for the other. As it turned out, Lisa spent many hours sitting outside my two-hour studio art classes after finishing an hour long business class. After classes were finished for the day, we’d be together then too.

All plans I made at this point involved Lisa. So, in the few months we’d been together, her family’s kitchen had become a very familiar place for me.

The goal of the phone call at day to Amy, I think that was her name, was to answer some specific questions about scheduling my first quarter of classes as well as some general “what was

OSU like?” questions. The Fine Art department laid out the courses required sequentially and there was little room to deviate, but there was an element of choice in the BERs (basic educational requirements, i.e. social and physical sciences, and humanities) and some electives. I don’t know why I was worrying about electives already, but apparently I was. This awkward phone call that must have gone something like:

Uh, hi, Amy? Do you remember me? How’s school going? In just a few words, please tell someone you hardly know how to navigate one of the largest universities in the county and recommend some classes. Oh, and by the way, I’ll never talk to you again.

Thanks!

Amy mentioned a class that she really enjoyed called Arts 160 that was offered in the Art

Education department. The class sounded interesting, so I added it to my schedule. I was going to be an artist, not an art teacher, so why take a class in another department? I was not interested

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in teaching. Of course, in retrospect, this decision to engage with the art education department foreshadowed a close to 40-year engagement.

My first quarter classes at OSU consisted of beginning drawing, an art history survey and

Arts 160. There was also an odd class that met once a week that was about how to be an OSU student, but it wasn’t really a class, more of an information session about rules and procedures of the university. Drawing class was as expected. We sat in a circle in a dingy studio on the fourth floor of Hopkins Hall. The lockers in the hallway were decorated with cryptic graffiti and drawings and paintings of various levels of completion and sophistication. Paint of various colors and consistencies covered much of the walls and floor of the room. “The painters are on the highest floor to be closer to God. The potters are in the basement with to be one with the dirt” is saying I heard along the way, and it stuck with me ever since.

Our huge pads of drawing paper rested on a strange long “h” shaped piece of wooden furniture called a horse. The horses could be sat on by straddling and propping up your drawing pad against the tall part of the letter h, or stood on end to form a podium-like structure that you could stand at to draw. The activities were typical drawing exercises and assignments. I have a great time and fit right in with the other students.

Art history class was another matter. This survey course, meaning it covered a huge range of art, met twice a week in the evening. It was very easy to decide not to come back to campus for that class. This class was also in Hopkins Hall, but in a large classroom with rows of tables facing a projector screen. This lecture format class was conducted by a small, overly confident dapper man telling us about art from around the world and over a long period of time.

Our goal was to memorize facts about the multitude of artists, styles and time periods he spoke about, ranging from Le Corbusier to Duchamp. Although the subject, art, was of great interest to

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me, this professor found a way to make it boring and uninteresting. This was too much like real- school, not art school, for me and I did poorly, just as I did in real school. I couldn’t memorize the dates and artist’s names, which must have numbered in the hundreds by the end of the quarter. I enjoyed art if I was making it, not filling my brain with facts about it, especially ancient art that had little meaning to me. I learned that many introductory classes were like this and you often needed to get past the 101s to find a class that more depth than breadth.

Arts 160 was a whole different ballgame. The official course title was something like

Visual Art, Music and Dance from 1940 to the Present. The main portion of this class was also a lecture, but very different from the art history class. Where the art history professor was mousy and annoying, Arts 160 lectures were performed, and I do mean performed, by Dr. Arnholt who was cool and dynamic. He was a big man with a bushy mustache. When he explained about an artist, he was speaking from the perspective of a fellow artist, art world insider and enthusiastic supporter of all things wild and weird. He enthusiasm was contagious and I quickly also supported all things wild and weird. I didn’t want to crawl under a plywood ramp and masturbate while museum patrons walked over me, but I whole-heartedly supported Vito

Acconci if he wanted to do that. Surprisingly, it was not a difficult transition from someone who drew Led Zeppelin album covers to someone who admired Sol LeWitt for writing instructions for others to draw the artwork for him. I don’t know if it was Arnold’s presentation or the material he was presenting, but I was ready to drink the avant-garde Kool-Aid.

The epiphany from Arts 160 is that art is about ideas are as much or more than it is about a visual image. As my nascent college career progressed, I began to see which of my peers were the painters and which of my peers were the thinkers. The painters, whose technical skills blew me away initially, began to lose their prestige. Where I once marveled at my classmate painting

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of a fighter jet that looked like a photograph, I now began to question why and to what end did he create this image. What was the point?

Figure 10. A. Moffatt. (1983). Cat on Bob. [Acrylic].

While I worked on my BFA I developed an obsession with some simple stylized cartoonish characters that inhabited most of my paintings. I had always drawn simple cartoons to amuse myself through boring grade school classes and to try to impress girls I wanted to interact with, but was too afraid to talk to. At OSU my paintings of stylized animals evolved into a long series of acrylic paintings of a jagged-headed character named Bob in a variety of settings. The last two years of my fine art degree program were devoted exclusively to these paintings.

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Figure 11. A. Moffatt. (1983). Untitled. [Acrylic].

I enjoyed creating this body of work and I was rewarded with praise from other students and the professors in the department. But, having a predetermined subject for each painting may have become a crutch. I wonder if focusing solely on this series of related work kept me from learning more and from other experiences in the art department?

Figure 12. Opening Reception for Two-person Show at the Ohio Union

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The gaping opening in my mind, created by Arts 160, has not narrowed. This opening is the space that accepts what is considered art. However, there is a contradiction. I still value the outliers, with their avant-garde ideas, but poo-poo the technicians. I claim that I accept almost anything as art, but I obviously have a hierarchy within the art world. I had not heard the term

“postmodernism”, but this was the direction I was moving with my thinking and my art.

One summer, well after I had become a teacher, Ralph Smith visited OSU and I took one the first of many one-week summer workshops in the Art Education department. Smith was a big name in the field and his name came up in many undergraduate art education classes, in the same vein as Vincent Lanier and Elliot Eisner. Smith spent most of the week belittling avant- garde art and popular music. His premise, as I recall, was to develop criteria for evaluating art that had high standards. This would in turn elevate the status of art educators. As I had listening to the Beastie Boys in my car’s tape deck on the drive to OSU, I choose to bite my tongue rather than argue with him all week. His note on my final paper questioned how I could identify what art was if I believed everything was art.

So, I have positioned myself as someone who equally values blank white canvases hanging in the gallery, Gee’s Bend quilts and sand mandalas that would blow away in a few days. I would like to teach more like Arnold did in Arts 160, than the art history professor who sucked the life out of art. In some ways I do teach like Arnholt. I hope my enthusiasm for and love of art in contagious. But, why do I play it so safe when I select the art I show to my students? Since my students range from five to twelve years old, Vito Acconci’s art is obviously off the table, but why do I fall back on Picasso and van Gogh so often? I can say that they need to be exposed to the “masters”, but there is room in my curriculum to add many other artists.

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There are artists that I could add to my repertoire that fall safely somewhere in the middle of the

Acconci-to-Picasso avant-garde spectrum.

There was no requirement to take Arts 160 at the early stages of my fine art studies, or to even take that course at all. When I look back at how the class changed how I thought about art, and consequently how it enlightened my artmaking, I cannot understate its impact. If I had not taken Arts 160, or as some students did, I had rejected the premise that art was more than making pretty objects, my understanding and appreciation of art would be very different than it is today.

This early step towards postmodern thought primed me for accepting other avant-garde ideas.

My ontology shifted during and after the Arts 160 experience. The dialogue between my traditional ideas on art and the postmodernism of conceptual informed a new understanding that merged the two incongruent views of art. I continued to create visual art, but my art involved into images about ideas, rather than images created to please the eye or showcase my skill.

Epiphany about teaching

The years after my BFA were spent unsuccessfully looking for an art-related job and continuing to work at the warehouse on the receiving dock. At a party hosted by one of the girls who unpacked and sorted the boxes of clothing that I unloaded, I began talking to her sister. She was a teacher. I don’t recall what subject she taught, but something about her struck a chord. She described working with her students and the summer job she held. Until this time, I had never considered a career in education. Until college, I was a horrible student in any subject except art.

If it wasn’t interesting to me, I applied little effort, which is not a path to success in grade school or high school. At OSU I was studying art and I had the maturity to understand that the non-art subjects had value too. Hearing my co-worker’s sister describe her teaching job made it sound very attractive and I had my epiphany. Teaching art is something I could do.

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I began to reflect on the times that fellow students had questions about assignments in studio art classes at OSU. I recalled a time when the instructor gave a demonstration in the lithography studio, and the next day he wasn’t there when we had to begin cleaning our stones to prep them for etching. From my notes I was able to re-teach the process, a process I was also doing for the first time. I did not consider that “teaching”, but I was able to explain things effectively.

So, I went back to familiar place. I went to the chairperson of the art education department at OSU and by the autumn quarter I was re-enrolled. I kept working at the warehouse, moving to the 3:00 to midnight shift so I could take classes during the day. Around the same time all this was happening, I also got married to the girl I met my senior year of high school, who was beside me in the Pinto almost every day for that drive up I-71 to campus. She majored in business and settled into a good paying job after graduation. Although she was making good money, we quickly found that money wasn’t everything and she quit her job right around the same time that I had to go part-time at work so I was able to do my student teaching.

The stress of paying a mortgage with two part-time salaries was nothing compared to Lisa’s unhappiness with her management position and the mind-numbing nature of my loading dock job. This was our first, but not our last venture into making do with less in order to be happy.

The transition back being a student was easier than I anticipated. I felt right at home in the art education classes. I was about six years older that most of the other students, but it didn’t seem to matter. A friend and neighbor went to high school with me and also got her BFA from

OSU was in the same boat. She returned for an art education degree after finding few options with her art degree. In many ways I felt having the BFA was an advantage. I had more exposure to art and artists as well as more studio experience than most of my fellow art education students.

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Towards the end of my art education undergraduate experience I felt my age was a distinct advantage. It wasn’t as challenging to balance college and student teaching with the non- academic aspects of life as some of my classmates, as I had done it for a longer time. I was an old married man compared to these kids who had not ventured off campus for four years. I also had a “real job” for a number of years, so going to my student teaching assignment was a welcome change from warehouse work.

Undergraduate art education was about art and about teaching. I knew I was interested in art; I had been for a very long time. It was a pleasant surprise to learn I was interested in teaching. With a few exceptions the teachers who were not art teachers in my life left little impression and would certainly not be an inspiration for me to take up the profession. In elementary school the classroom teacher had us do an occasional art project. I vaguely remember some stranger coming a few times one year to teach art. This must have been an “art on a cart” experience from a teacher who traveled to many other schools judging by the infrequency of her visits. In junior high school I had my first legitimate art class. I hope I stood out among the gangly seventh graders who didn’t want to be there. I remember learning one-point perspective drawing and making a coil pot. Mr. Sleets took my pot and trued it on a banding wheel so well that it looked like it was thrown. He or I glazed it a dark blue, and it sits on a shelf on my kitchen today.

My first high school art teacher was also my JV football coach. Mr. Descartes taught my silk screen print and about Surrealism. He knew enough to teach beginning art, but I’m not sure it was his passion. One the other hand, Mrs. Hazel was an artist who also taught. Besides teaching the remainder of my high school art classes, she allowed me to come to the art room whenever I had study hall. I sat through her teaching many classes and I remember being

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allowed to sit a draw or work with clay without any restrictions. Looking back I see how teaching art seemed like a viable alternative after failing to find work as an artist. I recall that

Mrs. Hazel always had some piece of her artwork she was working on behind her desk. The artwork wasn’t on display, nor was it hidden. She wasn’t showing it off, but she wasn’t hiding it either. This told me she was a “real” artist. Consciously or unconsciously, I’m sure when I decided to go back to OSU to become a teacher, I envisioned myself, like Mrs. Hazel, as an artist who teaches. That way I wasn’t dropping my dream of becoming an artist, but was going to be an artist who was teaching to pay the bills.

Returning to OSU for the second time opened the door to many more. My art education classes were held in the same building, Hopkins Hall, where the majority of my art classes were held when I worked towards my BFA. I inhabited the same building, but a different mindset. It was here that I began to be more pragmatic about my education. My fine art studies focused on what I wanted to do. My art education studies were more of a means to an end. My actions were motivated towards a relevant purpose.

Expanded Arts

Several summers ago I was on a lunch break from the workshop class I was taking at

OSU. The class was intense, meeting every day from nine to four o’clock for a week. The lunch break was usually over an hour, but often included some sort of an assignment. On this day I don’t recall working on anything. I walked into a familiar building on my way back from eating on High Street. Hopkins Hall was an a nondescript brick building who’s outward appearance betrayed its inner workings. This was the art building. This is where I took most of my under graduate art classes and most of my undergraduate and graduate art education classes.

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The lobby on the first floor had a gallery where I remember seeing my first Chuck Close drawing. It was an enormous portrait in pencil on a roll of paper that was tacked to the wall near the ceiling and continued to where roll, about ten feet wide, rested on the floor. The diameter of the roll was so thick that he could have drawn a hundred more portraits of this size. I also remember an MFA show that included a graphic works by a male and female student who worked together on a series of pieces that looked like 1950’s advertising. Two stylized cartoon heads representing the artists were painted on the wall with their first names underneath. The images of the heads and the Close drawing are etched in my memory. Of the thousands of artworks I viewed over my four years as an undergraduate art student, these images stand out.

When I walked through the building that summer the gallery was closed but an exhibit was hung in the hallway the meandered from the front to the rear of Hopkins. The exhibit was a retrospective of work by E. F. Hebner, one of my art professors. Although it quite a long time ago and that I only took a few classes with him, he remained one of my favorite professors from my fine art studies. I was excited to see he was the artist featured, but saddened to read that he had died a year earlier. Hebner was an interesting teacher who taught me in a foundation drawing class my first quarter as a freshman and a sculpture class a bit later. I knew nothing about the paintings and prints I saw. His more traditional work was unfamiliar.

Hebner taught classes in Expanded Arts, which was the category the university used to describe performance art. The Expanded Arts students’ performances that I remember were strange and often confrontational. I remember being somewhat afraid to attend these performances and rarely did. What I recall most about Hebner was a cerebral approach to art that

I didn’t feel with other instructors. He had a quiet manner that contradicted the wild performances of his expanded arts students. Without dropping names of other artists he worked

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with or using his own work as a comparison, Hebner was able to guide me through assignments in a way that both pushed my thinking to new levels and respected the thoughts and abilities that

I brought to the table. He made me feel like an artist.

Professor Hebner was not my advisor, but he gave me advice. Back then you physically met with an advisor from the fine art department each quarter to determine which classes you would/should take the next quarter. On several occasions Hebner encouraged me to take one of his performance arts courses. What I took as interest in me and respect for my artistic thinking may have been simply his attempt to increase enrollment in his Expanded Arts courses. I took his interest in me and desire for me to try expanded arts as a huge compliment, although I never took him up of his offer.

The closest I came to performance art was in his sculpture class. One particular assignment was open-ended, enigmatic and challenging. He told us to make art with a fifty foot line. Some students created sculptures with a fifty foot length of some material, bending and shaping it into a three-dimensional form. Others took the idea of a line less literally, but I honestly don’t recall exactly what any of the other students did. I seized this opportunity to lean towards the Expanded Arts realm in cutesy, ironic piece. I took a fifty foot length of rope and laid it across the courtyard in a straight line. With a backpack strapped on I began at one end of the rope and walked towards the other end. Halfway I stopped and sat down, took a banana out of the backpack and ate it. When I was finished, I stood up and continued to the end of the rope.

My piece was well received. If I was to make performance art, I can’t imagine a more safe or non-confrontational way to do it. If I was so impressed with Hebner and flattered by his attention, why did I create such a milquetoast performance piece? If I regarded him so highly,

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why didn’t I let him advise me? I can’t remember the name of my BFA advisor. Maybe Hebner could have pushed me to be more committed as an artist.

Several years ago I had another opportunity to view Hebner’s work. Much of his work was being sold at a local gallery. The crowded opening reception was crowded. A few faces seemed familiar from either OSU or other art events. Someone spoke about his work, his influences, and the impact he made on the art world. I met his widowed partner, a quiet stylish woman. I saw how similar he and her were and imagined them having quiet thoughtful discussions. I purchased a small abstract painting. I feel very lucky to have a concrete reminder of E. F. Hebner as well as my memories.

My reluctance to fully engage in the art the Hebner was gently pushing me towards typifies my liminal tendencies. By choice I was one who revered and respected art on the fringe, but I played it safe most of the time. I am not an avant-garde artist, but I am an avant-garde thinker. The expectations of a public school teacher to remain uncontroversial are a crutch for me to play it safe. I do not understand the reason why I lean towards staying in the middle position.

Summary

These narratives about my art educations represent two aspects of Connelly and

Clandinin’s (2006) description of four elements inherent to the process of narrative inquiry. They use the terms (a) living, (b) telling, (c) retelling and (d) reliving. In the context of this study

“living” is my life experiences, all of my art education related activities, feelings and understandings created through these experiences. My art educations are the subject of this narrative inquiry. “Telling” is the act of tales I have related in the narratives for chapter four. I have strived to achieve verisimilitude with my narratives. Each narrative is an attempt to honestly relate my experiences. Of course these narratives are subjective and present only one of

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many facets of what may be considered the “truth”. Instead my research method, a hybrid of narrative inquiry, autoethnography, and practitioner research, depends upon my believability as a researcher and subject of the research.

Chapter five contains interpretations of the data (my narratives). Analysis and interpretation represent the second phase of Connelly and Clandinin’s (2006) description narrative inquiry as of living, telling, retelling and reliving. Chapter five includes “retelling” my narratives by applying thoughtful analysis. The “reliving” of my experiences describes the reflexivity that naturally occurs as a result of the research process. One experiences changes in thinking and action through the writing and analysis of one’s personal experience.

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Chapter 5: Finding and Interpretations

Introduction

This chapter contains analysis of the experiential narratives of my art educations.

Connelly and Clandinin (2006) use the terms “retelling” and “reliving” to describe the reflective and reflexive aspects analyzing narrative inquiry. Analysis includes discovery of emergent patterns and themes related to how I have understood my education. Narratives are interpreted for relevance to my research questions. The first step in this investigation is to identify (a) instances of how I have utilized experience to improve my education (as teacher and learner), (b) to identify monologic and dialogic (hybrid) interaction, and (c) identify productive and unproductive liminal third space knowledge construction The next step is finding patterns and themes that arise from the identified phenomena. Just as dialogism rejects polemic binary understanding, I acknowledge that this study will include indistinct findings. This chapter contains examination of the reflexivity I have experienced resulting from the research process.

This chapter closes with recommendations for further study that may materialize from this study.

This narrative inquiry about my art educations aims communicate through description and analysis of my experiences of educational culture. This analysis will provide insight into art education that can apply to art teachers, graduate students and university graduate art education programs.

Patterns and Themes

My narratives represent some discernable themes related to theoretical stances of Dewey,

Bakhtin, and Bhabha. Patterns of phenomena are organized under headings identified as guiding principles of each theorist in the following section

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Dewey Themes

Dewey (1938) recognized the role of experience in maximizing educational potential in his theory of experience. In this theory Dewey (1938) identified three components of experience that are integral to synthesizing experience for educational value. Dewey (1938) identified these components as (a) continuity, (b) interaction, and (c) purpose. The following section briefly defines each of the components and then identifies instances in my art education that can be characterized as representative of these components.

Continuity, Interaction, and Purpose

Dewey (1938) describes continuity of experience as the choice by the student to choose an environment that they understand as optimal for their educational goals. One gravitates to environments that match the education one wishes to receive. My narratives of art education reflect many instances of continuity of experience that I have actively chosen.

In grade school my art educations were informally conducted, yet I self-selected to direct my educational experiences into art experiences. I briefly mention in my description of beginning to identify as an artist that I directly my efforts in grade school to artistic pursuits. To elaborate, I would find a way to include art into any school assignment possible. Most elementary school reports or writing had illustrations. I drew pictures to include in assignments to satisfy my own need to express myself visually, to showcase my talents, and perhaps to compensate for a shortcoming in the content of my assignment.

As soon as I had a choice in selecting my curriculum, I made choices directed towards art instruction. This began to occur in high school, when I could take as many art classes as would fit into my schedule.

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Perhaps my most impactful choice of educational environment was to study fine art at

OSU. My narrative about deciding upon a liberal arts education at OSU over a more art-specific education at CCAD may not represent a real autonomy of choice on my part. I was heavily influenced by my father who wanted a more balanced college education for me. He saw that my path, focused totally on art, was perhaps immature and did not reflect the reality of making my way in the real world. I have always commended my parents for supporting my choice to be an artist. It must have been difficult to pay for an education that would probably not prepare me to enter the workforce. My father worked very hard and supported himself while attaining three degrees at OSU. His work ethic towards education was unmatched. It must have been frustrating for him to watch me flounder as uninterested, uninspired student in grade school and high school. Lucky for me, he valued education over job training. Though he was an electrical engineer, he supported my choice to major in fine art.

My choice to re-enter OSU to study art education exemplifies continuity of experience. I had little exposure to the art education department during my undergraduate days in fine art. The art education department shared Hopkins Hall with most of the fine art classes and industrial design. My choice to continue my experiences at OSU were undoubtedly based of familiarity with the institution, but also with an overall positive impression about education in general.

My struggles with grade school and high school were mostly rooted in my lack of interest. This reflects my lack of choice in the education I received. That changed with my college experiences. I now had a voice in where, how and what I would learn. Dewey (1938) was correct that allowing choice about my education added relevance. Being able to minimize time spent on curricula outside my area of concentration, art, motivated me to engage fully with my education.

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Continuity marked my post-graduate education as well. My decision to pursue a Master’s degree by re-enrolling at OSU was not necessarily a natural choice. As I stated in my narrative about that period, most other teachers and art teachers I knew did not opt to return to a university for their Master’s degree. With other options available, I could have continued my education at many sites. My educational experiences at OSU nurtured the desire repeat these experiences well beyond what was required. The same can be said for my more casual, unfocused coursework in the art education department. After my Master’s degree I sought to continue the intellectual stimulation I received in the past. I was influenced to choose formal graduate programs based upon my past experience at OSU.

Dewey (1938) speaks of interaction and purpose as components of his theory of experience. He explains this as internalized experiences of the past influencing present, immediate experiences. My choice to return to OSU for the third time to pursue a Master’s degree reflects that my internalized art education experiences at OSU influenced my experiences teaching. I not only wanted to repeat the pleasant and productive experiences of learning at an undergraduate level, but I wanted to integrate these learning experiences into the context of my present situation as a practicing teacher. The understandings of Feminist theory developed in working towards my Master’s degree demonstrate this internalization. My epistemology evolved to reflect a rejection of hierarchical conceptions of artists and artwork.

Purpose in the context of Dewey’s (1938) theory of experience describes the educational intent of the student; how a student actively relates personal experience to what they want to learn. My narrative about returning to OSU illustrates how I was able to find personal connection, rather than professional connection, in my learning experiences at OSU. In other words, my engagement with OSU was not driven by teaching related motivation. Instead my

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continued engagement was motivated by education in a more universal sense. I found in OSU art education opportunities to learn, mostly for the purpose of gaining knowledge and interacting with the academic community. The summer intensive courses attended that addressed DeLueze and Lacan exemplify this important learning that has yet to solidify into applications in my teaching practice.

The narratives that relate experiences at OSU after finishing my Master’s degree reflect repeated instances of continuity, interaction, and purpose. My educational experiences have not wavered from a focus of art and art education since I have had any autonomy of choice. I do not recall when I felt a need to direct my attention in any other field. I chose art as a focus early in my grade school years and have been able to stay on that path. Over and over again I chose the same environment. These choices were influenced by my synthesis of internalized past experience and the context of current experience at different times of my life. I was able to identify a purpose for my education that was important to me personally.

Pragmatism

Misak (1999) states the “central thought of pragmatism is that philosophy must be connected to practice” (p. 2). My early art education experiences are the most pragmatic in this traditional sense of the definition. All of my art education in public school, regardless of its frequency or quality, was synthesized by me towards becoming an artist and increasing my skills and abilities to create art. The narrative of my grade school experiences recounts attempts to turn general education into art education by incorporating my artwork into any school assignment that

I could. As my goal throughout high school was to be an artist, it was pragmatic for me to focus on my art classes. My immature understanding of art neglected to take into account how art has relation to most other disciplines. I saw art primarily as a visual medium, not yet aware of how

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art communicates ideas. Had I put more effort into learning about other subjects I would have built a broader body of knowledge. At the time, the pragmatic course of action was to focus on art (in the choice of classes I took and the effort I put forth in other areas) to the detriment of a comprehensive high school education.

My undergraduate studies in fine art represented a similar pragmatic philosophy.

Although I still had myopic focus on becoming an artist, the nature of a liberal arts education ensured that other concerns were addressed. This was why my father pushed so hard for OSU over an art school. He knew I needed more breadth in my education.

Perhaps the most pragmatic aspect of my art educations was to return to OSU for the second time. The motive for returning to study in the art education department was clearly to get the training and certification to be an art teacher. This was my most outcome-driven educational experience. Learning about art education, general education, and my student teaching experience as an art education student was clearly the “interaction of knowledge and practice” (Dewey, p.

30). This learning created specific knowledge that was immediately applied in my art teaching practice. My early teaching experiences were more dialogically pragmatic, in that I was synthesizing theoretical learning with what I was learning as a practitioner and from other practitioners. When I began to incorporate aspects of D. B. A. E. into my earliest lesson, the first year I taught, I was utilizing a synthesis of knowledge from my training and my peers. This dialogic understanding was a balanced product from two sources. As I gained experience the pragmatic nature of my OSU art education lessened. Instead of synthesizing the academic and practical realms, I began to compartmentalize my experiences into my teaching practice and my graduate studies. My pragmatic purpose changed.

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As stated in the previous section, at OSU I was able to determine my own purpose for my art educations. With that notion, the pragmatic nature of my graduate art educations may seem contrary to understandings of pragmatism as a marker of practicality. My continued graduate studies would not be considered pragmatic in the context of my practice as an elementary art teacher. I cannot state that I am able to apply my graduate learning directly to my teaching in a practical sense. However, if my educational purpose is to become a learned practitioner, my continued simultaneous engagement with the education as a practitioner and as a student is pragmatic.

Themes of Bakhtin’s Dialogism and Bhabha’s Hybridity

For Bakhtin (1981) dialogism is the interaction between different viewpoints. A dialogic understanding is generated from interaction between a metaphorical speaker and listener. A new understanding is a synthesis two viewpoints. When Bhabha (1994) uses the term “hybridity” to explain meaning creation from two disparate sources he is describing the action that Bakhtin

(1981) named dialogism. Whether labeled as hybridization or dialogue, both terms describe the act of co-constructed knowledge creation. My identification of instances of dialogism within my art education narratives in this chapter could also be considered as instances of hybridization and instances of resistance to hybridization. Rather than use both terms throughout this analysis of my narratives in this chapter I will use the term dialogue to represent both hybridity and dialogue.

I have come to appreciate dialogism as an important component to knowledge creation. A dialogic understanding is created as the result of a synthesis of two viewpoints communicated through interaction between speaker and listener. Dialogue requires active participation of speaker and listener to create knowledge. My narratives recount my art education experiences

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over a long period of time. Reviewing these narratives I have identified patterns of monologic and dialogic interaction.

Recognizing Dialogue

An important instance of co-created knowledge occurred in the Arts 160 class early in my undergraduate fine art coursework. This shift in thinking clearly resulted from a dialogue between my traditional view of visual art and my newly expanded view of art as a conceptual exercise. As a young, eager learner perhaps I was more susceptible to the influence of dynamic instructor. Whatever the reason I was able to synthesize two polemic conceptions of art into a working understanding that I continue to apply today.

My early teaching career was the most pragmatic in terms of putting theory to use on a practical level. This same time period could also be considered my most dialogic. As a part-time teacher, my epistemology somewhat challenged by the epistemology of my mentor teachers.

Surely most new teachers have ambitious hopes of applying the entirety of their college training to their new position. Some may be able to do just that if they are in an autonomous situation. A new art teacher who has their own teaching space could potentially design a curriculum and employ a teaching style of their own creation. I did not have that luxury. Almost immediately I had to synthesize what I had learned about art education in college with the expectations of my colleagues.

I put aside my commitment to teaching from a D. B. A. E. standpoint in my first years teaching middle school to match the curriculum to that of art teachers whose rooms I shared. But, eventually I was able to create a curriculum that honored my college training without disrespecting how my colleagues were teaching. I did this out of respect for more veteran teachers who had an informed perspective about their practice. I also respected the professors

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who had an informed perspective about relatively recent developments in the field of art education. I could not fault my art teaching colleagues for teaching as they had been trained; just as I was utilizing my teacher training to teach as I had been trained.

The dialogue between my newly trained teacher voice and the voices of my mentors resulted in knowledge about my new situation that was informed by two viewpoints. My new understanding about teaching represented co-created knowledge.

Getting my own teacher space could have resulted in an end to the dialogue between mentor voices and my newly acquired teacher voice. My teacher voice now included the collected understandings of my first three years of practice. As time passed the influence of OSU art education classes waned. Some fundamental understandings such as D. B. A. E. remained, but I was now disconnected from the university and its voice in the dialogue.

Returning to OSU for the third time to work towards a Master’s degree marked the return of an academic voice to the dialogue that had been biased toward the voice of practice. It’s easy to fall into a routine and allow the daily challenges of teaching. Those challenges include the planning, preparation, and execution of hundreds of lesson each year. Without a wider context in which to consider teaching one can miss the big picture. Graduate school provided that contextual component that I was lacking.

The narrative the recounts my recent dialogic interaction is the series of summer intensive course taught by Dr. Walden. The theories behind her courses in artmaking as idea- making, Lacan, and Deleuze have synthesized with my personal ontology to form new understanding about creating art. I admit that my full acceptance of these theories may have been hindered by their complexity and difficulty completely comprehending the theories. My thinking was clearly altered to include aspects of these conceptions that were absent before the classes

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with Dr. Walden. It is worth mentioning that this new co-created knowledge about artmaking has not found its way into my teaching practice, but has nonetheless made impact upon my ontology.

Monologism: Centrifugal and Centripetal Forces

Although graduate school provided a context in which to consider my teaching practice beyond the walls of my classroom, it remained my task to consider the two realms dialogically.

This is when I began to view my two spaces as separate. My mindset of providing instruction became my teaching space. Graduate art education became my learning space.

Bakhtin (1986) describes centrifugal and centripetal forces that aid and hinder dialogic interaction. The forces that should have prompted me to dialogic interaction have been largely ignored in respect to the later stages of my teaching career and graduate art education. The centripetal force of maintaining a status quo has been strong. Ironically, the very theme of this dissertation, dialogism, was slow to develop due to my overwhelming need to maintain the monologic definitions of teaching and learning. The conception of my teaching space and learning space existing separately is a generalization that blocks interaction, but simplifies the two spaces for me. By compartmentalizing my experiences I have failed to consider the larger contexts of art, education and art education. Monologic thinking allows me exist the separate spaces more efficiently. However, my goal to become a more learned practitioner is stifled by this dialectic mindset.

Themes of Third Space

Bhabha (1994) conceived of an intellectual location where hybridization could occur, called

“third space”. He saw third space as an intellectual gap between two cultures that could be bridged with co-created understandings that equally represent both cultures. Contact with two cultures allows unique understandings not present for one identifying with a single culture.

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Bhabha’s (2013) strategy for cultural hybridization is to optimize the opportunities inherent contact with disparate cultures. I will use Bhabha’s conception of hybridization in conjunction with the concept of third space.

I find Wilson’s (2008) description of the three pedagogical spaces very helpful to examine my art educations. The first pedagogical space is the formal art instruction, the second is the informal art education received through communication such as mass media that a student interprets without formal intervention. The third pedagogical space is where the student’s understanding of art that is a synthesis of learning they accept from the formal instruction and the influx of popular culture and media that the student understands to be art. The understanding created in the third space is the most relevant to the student. I can apply this model to my art educations. In my model of third space the formal instruction of the first space in OSU graduate and undergraduate studies. The second space differs from Wilson’s conception slightly. My second space is my art teaching practice. Although I too am influenced by mass media, my practice is far more influential in respect to the aspect of my art educations this study addresses.

My third space is where I set aside assumptions about graduate art education and elementary art teaching to create understandings about art, education, and scholarship. In the third space graduate art education studies and art teaching inform co-created knowledge that represents my unique position as student and teacher. At issue in this research is the unproductive nature of my third space.

Recognizing a Opportunities for a Productive Third Space

I often viewed my third space as a liminal space; an in-between position of limited cultural membership. As I continued to participate in graduate art education I felt my identity shift from that of a teacher, to a more academic being. At the same time, although I was

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becoming more fully engaged in graduate art education, I did not identify as a “true” graduate student.

Throughout the many years I have been affiliated with the OSU art education graduate school I have had opportunities to share what I learn in graduate school with peers in my school building and with my art teaching peers. Rarely have I done that. At different times in my career

I have been asked to help write the revised graded course of study in visual art for the district.

These were opportunities to consider how my first and second spaces inform my perception of art education. I had an opportunity to add a scholarly perspective to the practical perspective of the other teachers on the writing committee. These were also missed as opportunities because I did not actively synthesize my two educational cultures.

This dissertation represents my most effective usage of third space. The reflective nature of these narratives, paired with this analysis, is the most productive instances of dialogic understanding for me to date. Dewey, Bakhtin, and Bhabha were creators of abstract theories and concepts until I used these theories and concepts to me until I created a space that allowed these to synthesize with my deep-seated conceptions of my practice.

Addressing Research Questions

The narrative data from chapter four is categorized by themes framed as questions about:

From the identified patterns and themes drawn from Dewey, Bakhtin, and Bhabha I formed responses to the research questions stated in chapter one.

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What are the cultural, site specific understandings that I have placed in intellectually disconnected and often polemic positions? What are my assumptions about school, graduate school, and liminal sites?

Early in my grade school experience I altered my identity as a student to a conception of myself as would-be artist. As an artist I felt an increased sense of self-worth most likely based on positive feedback from others about my drawings. The feeling of accomplishment I felt about my artwork allowed me to circumvent traditional education. As an “artist”, even very early in grade school I allowed singular focus to distract me from the frustrations of the general education curriculum. I was a good reader, which should have made many subjects easier. However I did not seem to apply my reading skill to other areas based on my report cards. I am sure my parents were frustrated with my poor grades and weak effort in school. Perhaps this early identity formation was a form of separation of art and academia?

My middle and high school experiences reflect a similar assumption that an artist was not required to be a good student in other subjects. The conceptions of art and artists were naive and uninformed. I had only a single middle school art class and three years of formal art instruction in high school, yet I assumed an enough of an understanding about art that I relegated other school subjects as insignificant.

Both my undergraduate experiences at OSU in fine art and in art education quickly ended my assumptions about art and artists. I learned the complexity and rigor required to study art and art education. Luckily these new conceptions were readily assimilated into my ontology.

However, a new polemic assumption began to develop. Although undergraduate art education exposed me to scholars in the field, at the undergraduate level the focus was mostly practical.

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My first undergraduate experience was quite different. In the fine art department, little of the instruction or overall direction of the program was related to real world application. I found myself a graduate with artistic abilities, but no marketable skill.

Graduate school is where I began to assume the process of art teaching functioned separately from the theoretical activity in art education scholarship. The much of the content of my graduate art education courses veered away from the practical content of my teacher training.

My conception as a liminal participant in graduate school may have allowed me to develop assumptions that hindered dialogic interaction. My involvement was part-time and I had limited shared communication with other graduate students outside of the class sessions. The communication with the class was most often limited to the course content. I developed two assumptions about my fellow students. The most vocal students in each class conducted themselves in a way that showcased their knowledge. Not that they were arrogant or showboating, but their depth of knowledge was obvious. I assumed these students had read all the theorists, knew all the contemporary artists, and were far more intelligent than me. This assumption was based solely on a few instances and entirely without verity.

I also assumed that because these graduate students often walked in together and made small talk, that they were all friends. I imagined them sitting around between classes having deep discussions about a variety of topics that were foreign to me. In these imagined discussion the students clarified any questions they held about any of the coursework, thus putting them far above me in level of knowledge and understand of art education. These two assumptions placed me at odds with unknowing peers, who were oblivious to my jealous thoughts.

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How can I apply dialogic understandings to the three educational cultures

(graduate school, teaching practice, and the liminal space between) I seek to understand?

Bakhtin (1981) stated that an utterance exists in a historical moment that cannot avoid metaphoric contact with all the dialogue of the past and present. Dialogism maintains that entirety of dialogue (thinking) is part of an interaction that co-constructs knowledge from multiple sources. When I segregate my art education experiences and consequently my understandings of art, I am denying not only current subject matter, but an entire body of knowledge. For this interaction to occur active participation is required of a speaker and listener.

Although I characterized myself as a boundary-crosser I did not actually actively participate when navigated these spaces. Reed-Danahay (1997) challenges a single representation of self and states we all cross boundaries between our multifaceted identities. Boundary crossing is dialogic interaction if done correctly.

I could place blame on the graduate art education program for not asking me to share my practical experiences with other students. In reality I rarely offered to share my teaching tales. In my elementary school sphere I also rarely offered to share my graduate school experiences. This lack of communication is the heart the monologic nature of my art education.

I explained earlier that I find Wilson’s (2008) explanation of the three pedagogical spaces an asset for examining my art educations. Taking his view of the third space as the student’s synthesis of the first and second space, I have undoubtedly utilized third space pedagogy in developing an ontology related to art education. However, I have not performed this regularly or systematically until now.

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How can I change my perception of the liminal boundary spaces between teaching and learning into areas for opportunities for co-created knowledge creation in (a) theory and practice, (b) graduate school and elementary school, and (c) the past and present?

As I stated earlier, one of my research ideas involved the boundary crossing sensation that I experienced as I navigated between the educational cultures of elementary school and graduate school. This is when I conceived of a third, liminal space that I inhabited. By conceiving of the spaces as separate and hardly related I segregated my experiences. I characterized the spaces as two disparate, yet related education experiences.

This narrative inquiry exemplifies Connelly and Clandinin’s (2006) fourth process as self-narration; reliving. Writing on these narratives required that I retell my tales of art education.

Simply writing about my experiences gave insight into my understandings of art, education, and art education. Thoughtful analysis through the lens of Dewey for experience, and through the lens of Bakhtin and Bhabha for dialogic interaction changed how I interpret my art educations.

Reflexively, I have altered my ontology based on a new understanding that considers art education in a wider context.

Examining My Roles

Understandings of dialogism, third space, and liminality inform a relatively new paradigm for my art educations. As a long series of experiences related to art and art education my teaching and learning could be viewed as unrelated in most instances. Any college art education course that I attended but did not directly relate to a lesson could be seen as impractical. Conversely, any teaching that I did without referring to a theory or concept from my graduate studies could be considered uninformed. Instead, taken in a larger context, all my teaching and learning is blended. The dialogue between my practice and my understanding of

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theory is more complicated than direct application. Over time, theory from graduate studies and interaction with academia has changed how I look at the world, not just art education. That is why I posit that my liminal position, with one foot in the academic world, and one foot in teaching practice is advantageous.

Recommendations for Further Study

I have identified some issues in art education related to limited dialogism within my art educations. I have built a case for increased dialogism between art education practice and graduate art education. There are a multitude of derivative topics to be explored in further studies.

1. This study was limited to the philosophical stance of Dewey, Bakhtin and Bhabha. The

topic of dialogic interaction in art education could be addressed from the perspective of a

variety of stances. My stance represented a middle ground of ideology that could be

applicable to most art educators. Another study may address dialogism with a more

specific political stance or critical agenda.

2. This study represented only my perspective and spanned a lengthy time period. Another

study of more junior art teachers with less experience would represent a different, yet

important perspective.

3. The dialogue examined in this study was an internal dialogue about the educational

cultures I inhabited. A study that included the voice of students would be valuable. It

would be interesting to understand dialogic interaction between a graduate program, a

practicing art teacher and their art students.

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4. As subject and researcher I was the only perspective examined. My situation at a large

university, an affluent school, and as a middle-aged white male can be used to generate

insights, but altering any of those factors may yield very different results.

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