Jamie Winter Dawson

We would like you to meet our Roster Teaching Artist Jamie Winter Dawson, professional artist, art instructor, and passionate arts advocate in the Twin Cities. For over fourteen years, she has coordinated, taught, and led arts programs and classes for children and adults with special needs in a variety of venues including educational settings, advocacy programs, and nonprofit organizations. She specializes in connecting resources with communities and artists to bring a rich, engaging, and sustainable arts experience to everyone involved.

Jamie will be working with school staff, Ms. Super, Ms. Leslie, Ms. Anderson, at Oneka Elementary, to cultivate a collaborative culture and support the learning of each student. This will be her second year participating in VSA Minnesota and Perpich Center for Arts Educaion’s Arts Bridge project. This residency will be designed to develop and foster social and behavioral skills in students and provide a deeper engagement with the curriculum through exposure to the visual arts. Follow along with our blog to see these students get a chance to express themselves through different media!

Introducing our newest Roster Teaching Artist, Lyndie Walker, MT-BC, Director of Clinical Services and board certified music therapist at Toneworks Music Therapy Services. You may have heard her at community orchestras or chamber ensembles when she is not hard at work providing music therapy sessions for individuals, families or groups. Lyndie has been an artist-in-residence in the schools through Arts for Academic Achievement and grants from the Minnesota State Arts Board Arts and Cultural Heritage fund.

This year, she will be working with Ms. Batts and Ms. Pierce’s Early Childhood Special Education classrooms at Rockford Elementary Arts Magnet School to enhance creative expression and personal development through music as apart of VSA Minnesota and Perpich Center for Arts Educaion’s Arts Bridge project. Stay tuned to HEAR about their experience!

Teaching & Learning Arts Bridge 2014 Begins

Transition Plus students in Anoka work together to create a collaborative clay tile and mosaic mural during an Arts Bridge residency 2013.

Teaching & Learning Arts Bridge 2014 Begins

This is a project to build skills through the Arts in students with disabilities and collaborative skills in Teaching Artists and Teachers in Special Education settings.This program is provided under a contract with the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

VSA Minnesota has partnered again with the Perpich Center for Arts Education to implement Teaching & Learning Arts Bridge - a project is designed to build skills through the Arts in students with disabilities and collaborative skills in Teaching Artists and Teachers in Special Education settings.

Arts Bridge aims to develop and implement innovative curriculum that will enhance and support academic learning and achievement through Arts for students with disabilities. This initiative is designed to support collaboration between Host Teachers and Teaching Artists and support Teachers’ efforts to integrate the Arts in the curriculum while engaging students in meaningful, high quality arts learning experiences.

Participating teachers will receive embedded professional development on partnering and planning with a Teaching Artist, an Assistant and a Coach during a 10-session residency in their classroom that integrates dance, music, theater, storytelling, visual, media or literary arts with a goal of deepening student engagement, knowledge and achievement.

In January, Teams will establish clear instructional goals, develop engaging activities, make plans to support and enhance sequential learning, align instruction with standards and benchmarks, and determine assessment outcomes. The residencies will take place during February-May.

For more information about how you can participate, please contact: Jenea Rewertz-Targui, Arts in Education Coordinator, jenea@vsamn.org or 612-332-3888.

Professional Development Day August 19 – a valuable learning experience!

Professional Development Day– a valuable learning experience!

Twenty-seven people came together at the Perpich Center for Arts Education on August 19 to learn more about the VSA Minnesota Teaching Artist Roster, a community of teaching artists working to create engaging lessons and environments that meet the diverse learning needs of all students.

Participants:

• became more familiar with VSA Minnesota’s Artists-in-Residence Grant Program as well as how to become a rostered teaching artist.
• experienced a hands-on visual art workshop designed for working with learners with various disabilities.
• engaged in a hands-on theater activity taught during an artist residency with students with Autism.
• explored the Perpich Center for Arts Education Artful Tools by describing what they experienced using facilitated reflection protocols.
• reviewed various disabilities and teaching strategies for each.

Many thanks to the Perpich Center for Arts Education for the use of Glass Box Conference Room and to our fantastic presenters including Lori Brink, Visual Artist/Teaching Artist/Peer Coach; Barbara Hackett Cox, Arts Education Partnership Coordinator, Perpich Center for Arts Education; Steve Busa, Theater Artist/Teaching Artist/Peer Coach; Katie Lipe, Southwest High School Autism Program; and Mary Z. McGrath, Educator/Professional Speaker/Author, Reflections Resources Ltd.

VSA arts Institute

VSA arts Institute hosted by VSA arts of North Dakota

Arts and Inclusive Learning is a one-day intensive session that is part of the VSA arts Institute. This interactive institute focuses on designing and delivering arts learning experiences that reach students of all abilities. Throughout the day you will gain an understanding of the foundations of inclusive education and arts-based learning, discuss theories and methods for teaching in inclusive environments, and engage in hands-on techniques that ensure progress for all students.For more information about the workshop download: The Arts and Inclusive Learning Workshop (PDF).

Eligibility: Classroom teachers, teaching artists, social services agency providers, arts administrators, and educators from all fields and levels.

Time: 9:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m.

Place: Grand Forks County Office Building, 6^th Floor Conference Room,151 S. 4^th Street, Grand Forks, ND 58201.

Date: Tuesday, October 20, 2009.

Cost: $15, includes lunch and snacks; scholarship available.

Registration:

Please register early, space is limited. Complete and mail the registration form along with a check for $15 to:

VSA arts of North Dakota, Attn: Linda Olsrud, 2518 Atlas Dr, Bismarck ND 58503.

Accommodations: A block of rooms has been reserved under the name “VSA arts” until October 9, 2009 at County Inn & Suites, 3101 S 42nd St, Grand Forks ND 58201. The rate is $70 per night and includes continental breakfast. For reservations call 701.757.2200 or toll-free 1.800.456.4000.

For more information, please contact:

Linda Olsrud 701-426-4396, vsa.northdakota@gmail.com, http://www.dakotawest.org/

Panel Discussion Notes

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT DAY---Aug 6 a great success!
Click here to download notes from the Panel Discussion: What should be happening during our artist residencies, including: reasoning for the changes to programming from funders' perspective, understanding the Minnesota Academic Standards, defining the relationship between IEPs and 504s, advice for collaborating with classroom and Special Education teachers and Arts and Cultural Heritage Funds impact, resources available through the Minnesota State Arts Board, and more...

Theater Activity & Academic Standards Notes

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT DAY -- Aug 6 making connections!
Click here to download notes from the Theater Activity & Minnesota Academic Standards in the Arts in Action. Participants explored character development through simple warm-up activities, a focus on team building exercises and performed a short scene based on a prop, poem or a picture. Following the activities, participants discussed observations and reflected on lesson objectives and how they correlate to the standards.

Teaching Artist Roster

Teaching Artists who work with VSA arts of Minnesota are professional artists with expertise in one or more arts disciplines and have skills in working with children, youth, and teachers in educational settings. In addition, these artists are familiar with various disabilities and effective methods for adapting techniques and differentiating instruction to reach all learners.

VSA arts of Minnesota is implementing a new application procedure with the intention that it will grow and evolve over time to better serve students with disabilities and their peers within our state, as well as the teaching artists themselves. The approved listing of Minnesota artists (from all artistic disciplines) will have completed a thorough application, review, and interview. The primary purpose is to identify and promote high quality teaching artists who have particular expertise working with students with disabilities. The roster is intended as a resource for recipients of VSA arts of Minnesota AIR Grants, as well as any educational settings and community groups seeking professional teaching artists to work with their special needs population.

The roster has a secondary purpose of promoting and supporting professional development for teaching artists. Teaching in and through the arts is a complex profession and a growing field - and more support and training is needed. With the new roster, VSA arts of Minnesota hopes to play a role in advancing the field of teaching artists, with the ultimate goal of supporting, strengthening, and expanding arts education for all Minnesota students.

Applications will be accepted on an on-going basis in the disciplines of Dance, Literary Arts, Music, Theatre, and Visual Arts. Artists may apply in more than one discipline. For more information, please visit www.vsaartsmn.org.