Happy 2013! For those of you I have not yet met, I am Larisa and I began working with Hartford Performs as a graduate-level intern (or as Jackie and Jaclynn fondly call me, their "Professional in Residence") from UConn's MPA program in August just in time for the 3rd annual Professional Development conference - but more on that in a bit!
We at Hartford Performs have just finished up 2012 with a whirlwind of activities. To keep everyone up-to-date, we are beginning 2013 with a recap of these past few months. In this review we are excited to share details about our summer Arts Literacy program, our annual professional development conference, our third year of implementation for our Arts Integration program, and a sneak peek of what you can be looking forward to in the coming months!
We at Hartford Performs have just finished up 2012 with a whirlwind of activities. To keep everyone up-to-date, we are beginning 2013 with a recap of these past few months. In this review we are excited to share details about our summer Arts Literacy program, our annual professional development conference, our third year of implementation for our Arts Integration program, and a sneak peek of what you can be looking forward to in the coming months!
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| Students rehearsing their own dramatic piece |
This past summer Harford Performs took its own spin on Early Start Education. Our Arts Literacy Program took students from 17 different school sites on a journey, making literacy more hands-on and building a sense of community within the summer program. Using Sophocles’ Antigone, students explored key themes such as “loyalty and betrayal,” “sibling rivalry,” and “power and control.” It allowed students to culminate in a devised performance of their own work which was inspired by the play. With the guidance of a teaching artist and a literacy specialist, students built an ensemble, read the play, played drama games, wrote journal entries to connect the text, and then created and rehearsed their own piece to present to another school. They kept a journal throughout the 5 weeks to write down their thoughts and connections, they completed classwork that correlated with comprehension, and worked together to not only create a performance but to truly understand and connect to the text.
Here's what some students said about their experience with the Arts Literacy program:
"Can we have this during the school year?"
"Drama helps me understand by listening and participating"
"It was a great summer and I didn't want to go to summer school but now every time I wake up, I'm happy and it's fun. I love the Antigone play!"
On August 22nd, Hartford Performs held its 3rd annual Professional Development conference, this year at the Connecticut Convention Center. What an amazing day! The event reached 350 teachers and administrators from the 7 new schools that have aligned with our Arts Integration program this year. The focus of the day was to introduce all teachers to Hartford Performs – our five guiding principles, our mission, and how our Arts Integration program will add value to and improve their schools.
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| Wake up Your Kinesthetic Mind workshop |
On August 22nd, Hartford Performs held its 3rd annual Professional Development conference, this year at the Connecticut Convention Center. What an amazing day! The event reached 350 teachers and administrators from the 7 new schools that have aligned with our Arts Integration program this year. The focus of the day was to introduce all teachers to Hartford Performs – our five guiding principles, our mission, and how our Arts Integration program will add value to and improve their schools.
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| Christopher Eaves' keynote presentation |
Teachers and administrators attended both morning and afternoon workshops to experience arts integration themselves. We had musicians, dancers, visual artists and actors all present workshops that are similar to the ones we provide to students through our Arts Integration program. In the morning, Christopher Eaves inspired us all with his keynote presentation “Multiple Intelligences – Multiple Solutions: Multiple Intelligences Theory and its relation to arts integration” where he encouraged teachers to explore effective teaching practices that celebrate their own teaching styles and engage students in higher order thinking.
In the middle of the day, teachers and administrators were able to meet our amazing arts providers to learn more about the programs available to their students this year. Throughout the day we had musicians perform and the grand finale was a show-stopping theatre/dance mash-up student performance about domestic violence. The students brought the audience to its feet and ended the conference on an incredibly high note.
The response from conference attendees was overwhelmingly positive!
For those schools who have been involved in Hartford Performs’ Arts Integration program for one or more years, we brought professional development right to their doorstep, holding 11 half-day sessions (one at each school) featuring both workshops and performances.
What attendees got from the conference:
"Inspiration to work on integrating the arts into my classroom"
"New interactions with peers - sharing our 'insecurities' together. Techniques for livening literature"
What teachers valued about the conference:
"The way art can be used to aide in comprehension"
"Everything!"
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| Teachers at McDonough Expeditionary Learning School, in the Carribean Island workshop |
After a hugely successful professional development conference, we spent the early part of the semester visiting each of our 19 Arts Integration Program schools to get them signed up for programs this year. We were excited to be able to include unified arts and physical education teachers in the program this year, in addition to the core curriculum teachers as we have done in the past. This year we have an extraordinary 19 schools and 85 arts providers (with a total of 140 different program offerings) who have combined to provide the 540 selected Arts Integration programs to approximately 10,000 Hartford students! We are thrilled to provide such a diverse array of programming that incorporate dance, music, theatre, and visual art to help teach concepts in math, English, social studies, and science.
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| Students creating their own scientific journals with the Lutz Children's Museum |
While the Arts Integration program will continue throughout the spring semester, many schools have already scheduled and participated in some of their 2012-2013 programs. So far, things are off to a great start! We will soon be submitting a brand new RFQ for arts providers so that we can continue to grow our database of Arts Integration programs. We hope to have an added new batch of amazing programs available for the 2013-2014 year!
A Sneak Peek…
This spring we have a number of exciting events and opportunities that we want everyone to know about.
- Hartford Performs is now officially a legal entity and is in the process of becoming a standalone 501(c)(3) nonprofit!
- We are also opening our new office space in room 126 of McDonough Expeditionary Learning School (MELS) at 111 Hillside Ave. Jaclynn and I will be stationed there full-time while Jackie remains in the Office of Academics in the Hartford Public School’s Central Office at 960 Main Street.
- We are excited to support Hartford Public Schools and the Wadsworth Atheneum this May for the 40th annual Hartford Youth Art Renaissance (HYAR). To celebrate 40 years, we invite everyone to attend an event on Saturday, May 4th from 2:30pm-4:30pm at the Wadsworth where this year’s student artists will be recognized, as well as the amazing history of HYAR.
- Arts providers should stay tuned as the new Arts Integration RFQ will be available soon and we look forward to new programming submissions for the 2013-2014 academic year.
We hope that everyone had a happy and safe holiday season and that you will be a part of the many exciting opportunities that 2013 has in store for Hartford Performs!
