C (4:16)

What about some narration exercises perhaps you can use with your students?

B (4:20)

Yeah, so narrative exercises are a little bit more complex than just a simple retelling, as in a story. So let's say I'm a really good lecturer of history and maybe particularly art history. And I'm leading a lecture on Renaissance linear perspective. And I'm going through the history of it. I'm talking about Filippo Brunelleschi, I'm talking about his experiment and how he came up with linear perspective in the Renaissance. So it's a great lecture, and I delivered it in a fantastic manner. We come back to the next art class or the next history class, whatever it might be, and we're ready for the next lesson, right? It's going to add on to the previous content we've learned. And in order to get us started, I might just ask a simple question about, like, who is Filippo Brunelleschi? Or what was his experiment and why is that important to linear perspective? Perspective. And no one raises their hand. Maybe the students are just shy or they're just tired that day, but no one raises their hand. And I think this is something that a lot of teachers come across, that students have difficulty remembering content for a longer term and really mastering that content for a longer term. And so this is where narrative exercises come in. It really provides the students with a different way of Being introduced to the content, learning the content, and then reviewing the content so it could be cemented in their memory for a longer term. So narrative exercises actually take a greater degree of brain power than just listening to a lecture. So first of all, when material is presented, or if you're engaging in a narrative exercise, the students have to practice concentration and attention to details in the project, the lecture, the discussion, whatever you're having initially, as they're exposed to the material for the first time. And then secondly, when you do another exercise which is kind of a recalling of information, the students have to think back to the previous knowledge that they were exposed to, and it strengthens their neural pathways and their understanding of the material. And when they have to recall this information again, they're strengthening their memory. And then finally this helps them assimilate their knowledge and so they can apply previous knowledge to new experiences. So that's what we hope to help the students do. So these narrative exercises are really important as a way of teaching the content, but also helping the students gain mastery as well. So it's a whole different way of thinking about presenting material and helping the students learn.

C (6:55)

Yeah, I mean, it's definitely different. It sounds different than simply asking students to, you know, describe what they see. There's a whole, there's more levels than just that.

B (7:04)

Yes, absolutely. So asking students what they see in a work of art is always a great way to start the conversation. Again, you want to have the students take that active role in the learning of the material. So asking questions is a great way to do that. But I think you'll see when I share a little bit later a couple of the types of exercises we do, what that will look like in practice.

C (7:28)

Where did narration come from?

B (7:29)

Yeah, so narration is actually pedagogical practice of the classical tradition. We actually see its earliest roots in the first century with Quintilian, he actually wrote a 12 part treatise on the importance of narration as a pedagogical tool. And then John Locke, again in the 17th century, added a lot of really important nuances to the narrative practices. Narrative practices were first developed in order to help students gain more practice and understanding and skill in the art of rhetoric. So the art of speaking.

C (8:08)

Well, why should narration be used in the classical classroom today?

B (8:14)

Yeah, so it's interesting that a lot of the practices that we employ in a classical classroom are from the early classical tradition. And that's because they're really tried and true and excellent. And like the topic for this discussion suggests, first of all, narration, or telling back of information or demonstrating back in terms of a work of art can be used to help students boost engagement and reach mastery. But actually, narration as well has been proven as a very elegant teaching tool, particularly as a form of what we call a formative assessment. So in case you're not familiar with that formative assessment, assessment is a low stakes assessment that is utilized often in the classroom where students are being asked to remember or recall information that they've learned in the lesson. So you might engage in this sort of practice every single lesson to help students strengthen their memory and understanding of the material. So if we're thinking back to that Renaissance lecture, instead of waiting a whole nother class to ask students a question like who is Filippo Brunelleschi? You might ask those sorts of questions at the end of your lesson or intersperse some questions throughout your lesson to make sure students are engaged in the learning and giving them an opportunity to practice narration as well.

C (9:39)

Talking with Abigail Teska. She is lower and upper school art teacher at Seven Oaks Classical in Elletsville, Indiana. I want to ask you about activities in a moment, but I mentioned you teach lower and upper school art at Seven Oaks. Is there a particular age or age bracket in which using narration and art works best? The students are most receptive to those ideas?

B (10:00)

Yeah. So I think often we see in younger grades, in the elementary grades that students are really naturally engaged in learning. There's a joy and wonder in learning. And sometimes that joy and that spark and that wonder is. Is lost a little bit in middle school when they get bogged down in lots of classes and lots of assignments and assessments and all of this. And so I find that the sweet spot to introduce narrative exercises might actually be in middle school. And one of the really cool things about narrative exercises as well. If you've ever spoken with children, you'll know they love to tell you things and they'll tell really long, elaborate stories. So narration is actually a really natural art form for a child, especially a middle schooler. And giving these students opportunities to practice narration actually brings lots of joy to their learning and into your class as well.

C (11:01)

What kinds of narrative activities do students end up enjoying?

B (11:05)

Yeah, so there's lots of narrative exercises that I've kind of come up with, designed and explored in my classroom. Actually, in my middle school classes, they're gender split. So I have one girls class and one boys class. And one of the things I'm always hoping to do is really get the boys class really engaged and pumped about the things we get to study. And I really Find that the narrative exercises that we do really help with that. So I'll walk through a few of my students favorites now. So the first one I call the Five Senses. So take for instance, Sunday Afternoon on the island of La Grande, which is painting by Georges Sherrat. It's a post impressionist pointillism painting, so it's made entirely of little dots of paint. And there's a lot going on in the scene, right? There's lots of people, there's a monkey, there's a lady with an umbrella, there's the Seine river, so on and so forth. And I think often when students see a painting, especially in middle school, they might be like, oh, it's a painting. And then they'll wanna move on with their lives and they won't wanna really think deeply about what's happening in the scene, what the people are doing, why that might be important. So you can ask students questions, whether those are verbal questions or written questions, like choose a person in the scene, what might that person be doing? Why is the person at the Seine River? What does this person see? What does this person hear? What is this person smell? And then you might ask another question like what sort of question would you, the student, ask this person in this painting? And so you're inviting the student to kind of enter into the painting or enter into the mind of the artist so they're getting a deeper understanding of this painting. And again, instead of just lecturing on the painting, you're asking students to think more deeply and really concentrate on the important details within the painting. Another one of my favorite narration activities is what I call the art detective. And so often in the art we study, there's lots of symbolism, there's lots of shapes and designs. But often these shapes and designs and colors and so on and so forth are very, very old, very, very ancient, even thousands of years old. Like the Greek bases we get to study in sixth grade. And sometimes it's challenging for students to really understand the art that they're gifted to study, to see the beauty in the works of art that we study. And so becoming an art detective is an opportunity to again, kind of figure out and find out details or important things in a work of art, maybe even find out some symbolic elements. So for instance, in sixth grade, students study Greek geometric vases from about 600 B.C. and these vases have lots of, of geometric designs on them, as you might assume. And some of the designs look like people, but there's a lot of kind of mystery elements. Like there's these Kind of small diagonal lines that are, like, falling down on the sides of the vase. And. And so I asked students to look carefully at the scene and then write out a story of what's happening on the vase. So you can kind of see a trend here. Instead of me just telling them what's on the vase, students are discovering, discerning for themselves, using previous knowledge to figure out and kind of decode what's on the vase. And the amazing thing is when they read back their stories to me that they wrote and narrating their stories out loud, the students are shocked about how close their story is to the original. And so here, you know, we've taken a lecture again on a topic, and instead of just having the students passively listen, we're having them actively engaged in detecting and decoding what might be happening in a work of art. So they're actively engaged in learning for themselves. Another favorite is something I call Recall a Masterpiece. So this is a really great exercise to do at the beginning of a class where you might wanna review a painting or work of art you've looked at previous previously. And essentially you want the students to paint with their words what the picture or the painting looks like. And so you might begin by asking some questions like, what were the contents of the painting that we looked at last class? What was in the background? What was in the middle ground? What was in the foreground? What was the focal point? Were the objects in the painting painted realistically or not? This painting that we looked at is an example of a particular art history movement. How does it fit into that movement? So you can see how powerful this can be. Because if you're later on in the semester asking students on a quiz to, you know, define what artist painted this painting, they'll have a mental picture of the artist and the technique and the process and where this fits into history. Because they've been asked previously to recall and kind of paint the masterpiece in their minds. And it's another way of again, entering into the work of art and understanding it and kind of mastering it for yourself. One more narrative exercise. So I call this one Predict the Master Artist. So at the beginning of the year, we always are reviewing the elements of art, the building blocks of art and any composition. And it can get boring year after year to review color theory, even though it's essential, I try to find ways to make it fun and interesting. So I actually took some of Claude Monet's works of art. And if you don't know much about Claude Monet, he painted the same scene again and again and again, because he wanted to explore the effects of light at different times of the day on different surfaces. So he's an Impressionist artist, and so he would have different color schemes portrayed, same subject matter, different color schemes in different paintings. And so I took one of his paintings, turned it into a coloring page, so it was just a simple outline of his painting. And then I asked students to think about the scene and think about the color schemes that they've learned about. So, like, triad, complementary, monochromatic, analogous. And. And think about those color schemes and think about, hmm, what would Claude Monet paint this? How would he paint this? What colors might he use based on the color schemes we've learned about? And the students, you know, color them in with the color scheme. So first of all, they're demonstrating that they understand a color scheme. They're narrating by coloring the correct colors of the color scheme, labeling the color scheme. And then they're so delighted and overjoyed when they see that they. Their color scheme choice matched Claude Monet. And I have a couple different versions of his art. So usually almost every student thought exactly like Monet. And it's just a really powerful way to show the students that really anyone can be an artist and they could think like an artist and gain, I guess, again, mastery of the material that we're learning.

C (18:21)

As you talk, it occurs to me that when you're a child, when you're a kid, when you're young student, you might think, how could anyone go to an art museum and, like, stare at a painting for 15 minutes? And, like, just you see it and you walk and you. But this is giving those students the toolkit to be able to do those sorts of things, to look and consider and think about, you know, time, artist, you know, what kind of style, all those things.

B (18:46)

Yeah, I think it was. Henri Matisse said, art needs a withinness. So there's this necessity for anyone who hopes to better appreciate or understand a work of art that they need to enter into the painting, whether that's into the mind of the painting or into the painting, as in understanding the techniques and the skills that are used. And so, yes, I'm always trying to find fun and inventive ways of inviting my students to kind of understand the works of art. They study more deeply and in that way, kind of be moved toward awe and appreciation and wonder, but also give them the toolkit where they can use this skill set, not just for art class, but really for any subject to try to master the material and have fun while doing it as well.

C (19:34)

Abigail Teska is lower and upper School Art teacher at Seven Oaks Classical School in Ellettsville, Indiana, talking today about mastering art using narration to boost engagement and mastery. Abigail, thanks so much for joining us here on the Hillsdale College K12 Classical Education Podcast.

B (19:51)

Thank you so much for having me, Scott. It was a pleasure.

C (19:53)

I'm Scott Bertram. We invite you to like us on Facebook search for Hillsdale College K12 classical education. You also can follow us on Instagram hillsdalek12. That's hillsdalek12 on Instagram. Thank you for listening to The Hillsdale College K12 classical education podcast, part of the Hillsdale College Podcast Network. More at Podcast Hillsdale. Edu or wherever you get your audio.