The Future Baltimore: Youth Empowered by Art, Critical Thinking, and Consensus
Lisa Krause
Maryland Institute College of Art
Master of Arts in Community Arts Candidate 2009
ABSTRACT:
Through a partnership between the MACA program at MICA and the 14th City Council District of Baltimore, I co-facilitated a community art program for middle school-aged youth this past summer. Curriculum was designed emphasizing critical thinking about concepts in community and included collaboration and consensus exercises, discussion and reflection. Youth addressed community assets and needs, and suggestions for community-wide changes. Youth created 2D and 3D mixed-media artwork that projected changes to their community, facilitated workshops and displayed artwork at Artscape. They also will have work featured in the community newsletter.
The youth were engaged in discussing social responsibility in community, creative problem solving and self-esteem. Through making artwork, they learned leadership skills and accountability by reflecting on their projects in both private consultation and in groups. Many of their experiences formed bonds that lasted beyond the classroom into the wider community.
During the course of my MA in Community Arts at Maryland Institute College of Art, I had the opportunity to teach a summer community art program. I worked with 11-14 year-old youth through a partnership with the Church of the Guardian Angel in Remington, a neighborhood of Baltimore. My site contacts had informed me that Remington is ethnically diverse and primarily working-class. Youth live in single-family rowhomes; some with extended family, some with single parents. The youth all live within 3-6 blocks of the site and primarily attend the same grade school.
I partnered with Emily Wheat, a fellow MACA candidate, in designing a curriculum that would teach new art skills and critical thinking. We included large and small group discussion, reflection, and sharing of ideas and artwork. In our classes, collaborative lists were made of community assets and needs, as well as suggestions for changes to address those needs. Youth created posters of values that defined community, mixed-media dioramas of projected neighborhood changes, and made 2-D collages and drawings illustrating concepts from class discussions. During the course of the program, youth both displayed artwork and facilitated workshops at Artscape, a city-wide art event.
The Classroom as a Model Community. As a means of establishing a community within the classroom, art programming began with an exercise in defining community.
Children partnered up to create a community poster. In the first step, each pair was asked to complete the statement: “A community is a place where…”. Once the youth had decided on a community value they raised their hands and announced it. I formed a list of their statements. The list included the importance of respect, not littering, non-violence, patience, and listening to one another. When they were finished, the youth hung their posters throughout the room. At the end of class, kids presented examples of how that value relates to the classroom and in the wider community. By providing the opportunity for reflection and discussion, youth were able to envision the choices people make in their behavior and how it affects others.
Our site supervisor, Pastor Alice, was present at the time we were talking about the posters. After the youth had gone home, she provided insight into their personal lives. Because of her involvement with the community, she is aware of many of the issues they are dealing with at home. She said those themes directly related to the values they expressed in their Community Posters. Pastor Alice talked about the family problems and murders that had taken place in the lives of the children who picked “No Violence” as their theme. She mentioned how much “Respect” must matter to an awkward girl who is just becoming confident, and her partner, a Muslim boy new to the neighborhood. She also said that the youth who designed the “Listen” poster comes from a turbulent home where the mother was struggling to balance drug addiction with raising 3 children. The pastor credited our establishment of a fair, safe, youth-empowered environment with the kids being able to reveal themselves so openly. I was moved by what she told me and my understanding was deepened by hearing some of the complex issues the kids faced.
Collective envisioning as themes to art projects. Emily and I took turns facilitating the reflection and discussion sections of each class. We guided themes about assessment of the surrounding community, discussion of personal choice, and suggestions for making neighborhood improvements. Youth were encouraged to list issues that resonated with them and to offer suggestions that addressed them. For the beginning of each project, youth went to the posted list on the wall and put a mark by the theme that they wished to address in a collage, drawing, poetry, or a diorama project. The list reflected everyone’s ideas and kids were encouraged to pick any topic, even if they were originally someone else’s idea. Inevitably, there were varied responses.
I feel this was an important method for the youth to witness a growing list of their own ideas for issues and their peer’s solutions to problems in the community. It was at this point that I wished that the program lasted longer than just the summer, because their ideas for improving their neighborhood would have kept us busy all year! Some of the issues they were concerned about included alternatives to doing drugs, keeping the community clean, fixing abandoned houses, beautifying and greening their neighborhood, peer-to-peer mediation, keeping healthy, conflict resolution, and how the media misrepresents Baltimore.
Youth as teachers. Through tallying votes and a jury system, the youth decided on creating a large diorama at Artscape. We decided it would be called “The Future Baltimore”. Emily and I helped youth reach consensus about what skills would be taught in the workshop in order for participants to contribute something to the collaborative diorama. Youth decided to specialize in making buildings, people, trees, or flowers using recycled materials, craft items, and natural debris. During the following class, we helped the youth hold practice sessions where each took turns as instructors and students. Throughout these sessions, youth gained practice in assessing an individual student’s learning style, problem solving, and planning by assembling their own supplies that they would need at their workstations.
At Artscape, youth demonstrated patience when teaching students ranging in age from 4 through adult the skills needed to contribute to “The Future Baltimore” diorama. Participants chose which skill to learn, and youth assisted in constructing and installing objects in the diorama. We were assisted in overseeing the workshop by volunteer parents and site staff- but the youth were in charge! Students assumed roles they were comfortable with, but became increasingly confident through the day, moving into other responsibilities as needs arose. One youth that had presented a discipline problem early in class became our main recruiter, bravely shouting to the crowd throughout the day “People of Baltimore! Come help build The Future Baltimore!” As the workshop progressed I watched shy students overcome nervousness. I saw youth who sometimes misbehaved in class demonstrate patience and leadership in their teaching and I witnessed independence emerge. With each new creation a large box rapidly emerged as the future Baltimore- a busy, colorful city full of people and gardens.
After cleaning up, most of our hardworking diorama teachers hadn’t had a chance to see the finished work. I called them over to see it. Through the process the most ambitious of the youth had helped participants glue their contribution into the diorama, which led to a completely wild, chaotic, and beautiful site. Trees were on top of buildings. Flowers were bigger than people and buildings came in every shape. Everyone was brimming with pride as they gathered around the diorama. Together they decided to add “The Future Baltimore” to the display of their collages in the Myerhoff Symphony Hall and hoisted the diorama overhead, carrying the work through the crowd.
In retrospect, we found that through facilitated positive interactions, community arts coordinators can create a safe environment where youth in this age group can develop critical thinking skills and gain confidence in self-expression. The youth we engaged this summer demonstrated skills in discussing social responsibility in community, creative problem solving, self-esteem through developing self advocacy and leadership skills. They developed pride and accountability through reflecting on their created products both in private consultation with Emily and I, and in large and small groups. The youth engaged in social interactions that became bonds that lasted beyond the classroom and into the wider community.
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