I'm so excited to be your art teacher! I've been teaching high school art for 10 years and still love my job.  A few things about me:

• I'm also a professional potter and have a home studio.

• I'm learning how to make my own clothes!

• I live on a small homestead in Bowdoinham with my potter husband, son, 2 dogs, 2 cats, some chickens, and honey bee hives.

• My dreads are older than my students.

• After high school I took a gap year to work in Iceland and Guatemala.

• I didn't love high school, but I found my people in theater, band, and in the art room, and that made it tolerable. My advice? Put yourself out there and join clubs, sports, or activities to find your people.

This student-painted mural in my room is the foundation of my everyday classroom expectations.  My goal is to teach you how to think like an artist.  You may not become a professional artist after taking this class - and I don't consider that the objective - but I want you to learn how to think like one!  I want you to be the best artist you can possibly be.  Be curious, be engaged, be intentional, be reflective, and you will achieve this goal.

Every project will follow this path of the creative process:

• Inspiration. We will learn a new technique, research an artist, look into a fascinating culture, or be guided by a central question

• Design. We will not fall in love with our first idea! This is the brainstorming part of the process. Through sketching, journaling, modeling, or finding resource images, we will plan our project.

• Creation. Now we're ready to get our hands dirty! We will produce work, expecting mistakes and revisions along the way.

• Reflection. Guess what: you grade yourself. We will learn how to critique our own work and how to present it to an audience.  Although there will be daily reflection and discussions about the work, the final reflection and presentation will be submitted on Google Classroom.