Teacher's Dialogue Project
Communicating through the internet, teachers from Virginia and from the Highlands of Guatemala are beginning to participate in a five-month exchange project. They will first get to know each other through an online forum and then work together to design a unique classroom project that utilizes various forms of art media.The Dialog Project is collaboration between research students at VCU, the Highland Support Project, Mayan Arts Program (MAP) and AMA, Teachers for Social Justice (Richmond, VA) and the National Art Education Association (VCU student chapter). We are creating an experience for teachers to converse on topics of social justice and education. After we get to know one another, we plan to collaborate and create 5 different lessons together.
The Project is interdisciplinary including not only those interested in education but participators who are invested in their local and global community. In order to encourage tolerance and cultural discovery the research revealed in the Teachers Dialog Project will show educators an interest in multicultural education and the arts how to teach and brainstorm collaboratively. The project will include 5 teaching groups that focus on art that is made for the sake of learning while creating an amazing finished product. In Art Education an arts-based lesson breaks the boundaries of subject and language which occurs often in the expanding connections between students. This program will hopefully help further this new voice movement with Art Historians and lead to a one-on-one understanding of how art is interpreted in a different cultural learning environment. The Teacher’s Dialogue Project facilitates creating effective lesson plans and the techniques of maintaining a successful learning environment while collaborating with other teachers and building connections on a global scale.