Welcome to the Modern Classrooms Project Podcast. Each week we bring you discussions with educators on how they use blended, self-paced, and mastery-based learning to better serve their students. In this episode, Zach Diamond sat down with educator Aimee Plueger to discuss how she implements Modern Classrooms in her visual arts class.

Art cannot be rushed! Students naturally flourish in a self-paced arts environment, where they can learn and apply self-pacing. Although new to a Modern Classroom, and not yet fully using instructional videos in all her lessons, Aimee has best practices she has discovered from implementing her Modern Classroom since January.

Break it Down

When it comes to arts classrooms, you can take a project-based or skills-based approach. “I try to keep it more like skill based because I'm teaching students specific skills that they're going to go on in practice,” Aimee says. Either way, you need to break down the work into smaller steps.

After struggling to figure it out for herself, Aimee figured out something that worked for her. “I just really need to break things down a lot more, to break it down in very specific steps in order for me to make this work in my classroom,” she says. You can get really granular. “I've even made ‘how to clean your brushes so that you don't add to my brush graveyard,’” Aimee says. “Each step just builds on the last one and you work your way through them. And it's not like there's no ambiguity as to what you're supposed to be doing right now because each step is broken down so much.”

Lead with Student Interests

Aimee has worked to make her classroom less prescriptive in the type of assignments students have to complete and even the mediums they have to use with choice-based arts. Instead, she focuses on the skills they need to master, and allows them to illustrate their mastery with minimal guideposts. “I like to learn about what my students are interested in and who they are as people. And you don't get that unless you're giving them that open ended choice,” Aimee says. “You choose your subject matter, how you want to do it, how you want to incorporate those skills, and you kind of run with it based on what you've practiced.”

Make Demos Work for You

Aimee does a lot of demos but has historically run into many technology and pacing challenges. When she was doing demos at the front of her class, she was always moving too fast for some students, not fast enough for others, and still, some students couldn’t see the demo from their seats. Now, she can do a “I do, We do, You do” model using the videos to cover both the “I do” and “We do” portions of the activity.

Put It All In One Place

Every day students can expect to begin with a starter activity prompt that she puts on the board. They complete these prompts in their sketchbook portfolios, which hold most of their projects, keeping her grading work all in one place. So students will see the prompt on the board, grab their sketchbooks, and get to work.

Taking Advantage of Routines

Aimee’s school takes the first ten minutes of class for school-wide SEL activities. Some days, she will guide students through a group activity, or else she points them to their starter activity. Then she will either lead the whole class in a lesson or send them to instructional videos to watch a demo before releasing students to independent work. “They're either working on skill building or mastery checks or they've moved on to the final for a unit,” Aimee says. She has an extra-long class, so she will often break up the independent work time with a mini-lesson. “I spend a lot of my time just walking around the room. I check in with kids individually. I found it a lot easier for me to pull groups of students to work out in a smaller work area in the hall briefly and then give them small group instruction.”

Grading Subjective Work

“Full disclosure: grading is one of my least favorite things. It stresses me out, and it's just always subjective,” Aimee says. It’s important to remove the element of comparison - both for students and yourself. “I tell kids this straight up, I'm not worried about how your art looks compared to the person sitting next to you.”

And when you focus on student progress and mastery, you can focus less on the subjective style of art. She has students keep this practice work in their sketchbooks, which ensure that nothing gets lost and she quickly identify whether or not students are ready to move onto the next lesson. Additionally, she uses a rubric to have students grade themselves first. “It makes my job a lot easier for grading them because they've actually been forced to do that reflection,” she says.

If you’re interested in exploring the basic tenets of a Modern Classroom enroll in our free online course or Virtual Mentorship Program.

Our Guests

Aimee Plueger

What are you most passionate about? I am passionate about helping students find success and gain confidence in their abilities in the art room and out in the real world. Art is a place to express yourself and formulate opinions and share them with the world in a unique way.

Our Host

Zach Diamond studied Music History and Theory at Oberlin College and received a Masters of Music in Music Education from Boston University. He taught music for five years in Lima, Peru, and is currently a Middle School music teacher at DC International School, a language-immersion school where he teaches in Spanish. He began implementing the Modern Classrooms Model in the 19-20 School Year and enthusiastically continues his work with the organization as a mentor and podcast producer.

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