Welcome to Art & Inquiry! I'm Lisa Mazzola and I'm talking to you
from the library at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, where I come to prepare my
classes and workshops.
As the museum educator in charge of student-teacher programs
I spend much of my professional time helping all kinds of teachers
just like you
to use inquiry effectively in the classroom. I like teaching with modern art
because it inspire so many questions
but you can use these techniques with any subject, and over the next four weeks
I will show you how. Your job is to engage with the content and interact
your fellow students. It will be easy and even fun. The content of the course
will be presented through different types of media
where I will share tools and tips and also show you examples of
strategies in MoMA's galleries with students. The spirit of our professional
development programs is rooted in in-person dialogue and exchange, and
we hope to cultivate both in our weekly discussion forums.
We want this to be as interactive as possible, so we strongly encourage you
all to practice with friends or colleagues wherever you are.
When I started teaching with inquiry, I was very nervous,
but very quickly I became comfortable, and realized how easy it was to teach in this way,
and you will too.
Your success in this course is based on your level of engagement
and participation
not on grades. The focus for this week is to give an introduction and
overview about inquiry-based teaching, what it looks like,
and how and why it's beneficial for both museum
and classroom teaching practice. We have organized a Google hangout
and invited educators in both museums and K12
to share their experiences. You can access the recording
through the posted link.
We will also spent time discussion forms talking about the ways in which you are
currently using
inquiry based methods and how you hope to expand the possibilities.
Whenever possible we want to build on your experiences, and I'm sure many of you
already teach this way and can serve as a resource to others in the course.
Once again, welcome!
Lisa MazzolaAssistant Director, School and Teacher Programs
