S.U.'s Neurodiversity Symposium: The Keynote

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Gormley Comes to MassArt

Antony Gormley's work, both sculptural and interactive installations, challenge the viewer to embody their own role of being "on display" for others. His work reflects our own experience, subjecting us to our own gaze. The reciprocity of his work brings to mind many questions I face in my classroom interactions with students. In the special needs classroom, one is always evaluating and re-evaluating our own actions and directives, and Gormley's work makes this subconscious dance visible.

Tongue in Cheek or Call to Action?

Powerpoint seems to have taken over as the educative medium of choice, but we can easily lose sight of the objective of any presentation. What is our foremost goal in presenting information? It's to convey the information.

Oyl Miller, writing for McSweeney's, in a piece called "I am the Orson Welles of Powerpoint," hits the nail on the head with her sarcastic (I think) take on our new addiction to the Microsoft Office Suite.

As an art teacher in the special needs classroom, this trend is particularly troubling. Yes, we're told to create visual presentations and avoid lectures, but is this truly "visual?" Or are we just adding a second layer of "lecture" to another lecture?

I hope others can be inspired by Miller's editorial, and take up the call to use Powerpoint for good and not for mediocrity.

The Creativity Crisis

Newsweek covered this topic in a recent issue. Basically, the trends in American classrooms' creativity, and by extension, in the economy, have dipped drastically in the past few decades. Two notable thinking skills, Divergence and then Convergence, are cited as elemental to improving creative processes. Also, the article takes issue with the idea that creative thinking is primarily a right-brain function. It argues that innovation involves the whole brain, using logic and order to harness the abstract.

The Artist is Present

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An Open Letter

This open letter, penned by Katie Schneider for McSweeney's, sheds some welcome light onto the experience of a parent of a child with AS. Enjoy!