You have to judge on the spot: Just-in-time community art education

ABSTRACT

This proposition concerning “just-in-time” teaching was initiated in the field where the practices of two student-teachers have inspired ongoing and continued study into community art education as a site of creative and innovative teaching and learning that contributes to forms of public pedagogy. Informed by the year-long practicum assignment of Georgina and Makini at the Young Women's Christian Association, or as it is commonly known, the YWCA, and as part of a larger ethnographically-informed study, this article is a conversation about specific aspects of their teaching experience that were unique—that is, how they learned to operate in ways akin to just-in-time models of curriculum and instruction, but with an unexpected and unintended twist in teaching practice. In turn, research considerations began to shift during the course of the study to reflective practice as a source of information in which subjective understandings tentatively advance and add to wider professional development of students becoming teachers, and to how such practice might initiate more iterative, fluid, and interactive methods of sharing capacity building in non-formal learning sites like community art education.

Funding

This research has been made possible by a grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Anita Sinner

Anita Sinner is an Associate Professor in the Department of Art Education at Concordia University, Montreal, Canada. Her interests include theoretical perspective in the visual arts, arts research methods including life writing and a/r/tography, international art education, curriculum development, teacher education, and community art education. Contact: [email protected].

Jennifer Wicks

Jennifer Wicks is a PhD candidate and graduate instructor in Art Education at Concordia University. Informed by her multi-disciplinary art and teaching practice, Jennifer uses collaborative and art based methodologies to explore artist, teacher and researcher identities, collaboration, curriculum development, and pedagogical approaches. Contact: [email protected].

Petra Zantingh

Petra Zantingh is a visual artist and community art educator in Hamilton, Canada. Her interests lie in the areas of life-long learning in the field of art education and collaborative visual art projects. Contact: [email protected].