Alanna Gaylord's Art Education Portfolio

          My name is Alanna Gaylord and I would like to welcome you to my Art Education Licensure Portfolio. I am deeply passionate about art and art education. Through my own experiences of appreciating, understanding, and creating artwork I’ve been able to gain an understanding of the true potential that art has to offer. I believe that every human deserves this opportunity and as an art educator, it is my goal to provide this opportunity to every student that steps into my classroom. In this section I will introduce myself as an artist and art educator; I will go into depth about why I am dedicated to being an art educator, how my personality fits into the classroom setting, how my work as an artist informs my art teaching, and how the entries in my portfolio will help to communicate who I am as an art educator in relation to the standards for educators.

         I want to become an art educator because I simply want to provide as many people I can with the opportunity to experience art. Art opens infinite doors to the world of experimentation, analyzing, and learning about oneself. Art Education provides many valuable skills, methods of understanding, and means of personal expression and growth that cannot be learned in other classrooms. Learning about and creating art is a critical part of what all students need as they develop their awareness of the world around them. It is my goal to provide these opportunities for all students, regardless of cultural or socio-economic differences as well as those with different interests and abilities.

         As an educator, I am calm, open-minded, and understanding. These characteristics allow me to connect with my students, create healthy relationships, and establish trust and respect. I have found these traits to be valuable for teaching because they allow me to get to know my students and establish where individual students are coming from and what their specific needs are. Every student is completely different from one another, whether they have difficult living situations at home or they learn differently from their peers, it is important for me to be able to have an open and understanding persona so I can connect with my students and learn how to create and provide a curriculum that allows every student to be successful.

         As an artist, I work with a variety of media including clay, painting, drawing, photography, printmaking, metal work, and so on. It is important for educators to have background knowledge and skills in a variety of media because it allows them to provide their students with opportunities in different media. It will also be important for me as an educator to continue to build my own skills as an artist by taking classes and working on my own body of work. Because art comprises such a huge spectrum of media, it’s important for students to experience all kinds media in order to experiment, gain new skills, and work towards understanding what art has to offer. As a teacher, not only do I work to understand and care for my students, but I also strive to constantly introduce new projects, media, and ideas to keep things new and exciting for my students.

            Throughout my licensure portfolio you will develop an idea of who I am as an art educator and see that I am dedicated to providing every student with the opportunity to successfully experience, understand, and express themselves through art. In the first section titled “Teaching Experiences,” I will go into depth and reflect upon the learning environment in which I completed my student teaching, as well as I will discuss my experiences with colleagueship and advocacy, and I will also describe, analyze and reflect upon accommodating students identified as having special needs. In the section titled “Units and Lesson Plans,” I will provide a variety of lessons and units that I have written and taught. In the section titled "Art Education Content," I will provide a series of narratives of important content in education from the perspectives of the art educator. Finally, in the section titled “Reflection and Vision,” I will analyze and reflect upon my teaching and plan for my development as an educator. I am happy to have this opportunity to share with you who I am as an art educator. Enjoy my portfolio!