Tips for Teaching AP 3D

Now that my Advanced Placement students have submitted their portfolios to the College Board,

I finally have a second to breathe.

But, if you know me at all, then you know

that when given a break, instead of relishing in rest and rejuvenation,

my brain quickly moves on to the very next thing.

It's a problem really. 

{I wonder if there is a 12-step program for busybodies?}

Before I dive 100% into my next venture,

I thought I would take this opportunity to reflect upon

this school year with what worked and what definitely did not

in teaching AP 3D.

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First things first, SUMMER ASSIGNMENTS!

I always assign my AP students four summer assignments.

With eight breadth pieces needed for the final portfolio,

my students walk in the door with half their breadth work complete.

Awesome-sauce!

These breadth projects are mostly experimental in nature

with materials that students

most likely have access to at home.

Last summer, I was recovering from a c-section,

so I really wasn't able to assist any students with their summer work.

As a result, the overall quality of the summer breadth pieces was pretty low.

Not awesome-sauce!

This summer, I plan to hold Open Studio once a week 

at school for my AP students to work on their breadth work.

Hopefully, this will help clarify any misunderstandings of summer assignments

and improve the overall quality.

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The way my schedule is set up, I teach two sections of 3D art. 

Both sections are a blend of AP and non-AP students.

Once we get grooving, this is no big deal.

But the beginning of the year,

 it is pretty challenging to balance

 the AP 3D students with the non-AP 3D students.

When teaching the non-AP students about the fundamental elements of sculpture,

I incorporate four experimental projects that are quick but effective

at creating dynamic abstract pieces.

I have my AP students repeat these four assignments

to complete the Breadth portion of the portfolio.

I find this to be pretty effective because the AP students have already 

completed the assignment once before when they were non-AP 3D students, 

and have a pretty good idea of how to manipulate the materials to their advantage.

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Developing one's concentration is the most challenging aspect of AP studio art.

For AP 3D, students must submit 12 images,

but the College Board leaves it rather open-ended

 regarding how many pieces are required for the final submission.

In my class, I require ten concentration pieces.

This gives students enough opportunity to grow and explore within their concentration

and allows them to choose to submit them all with a few second views of the pieces 

or select fewer pieces with more second views in their final portfolio.

I expect my students to create two pieces a month,

which is usually a pretty doable pace.

During the concept development phase {October},

I push students to think about materials they enjoy to work with

and specific art elements/principles they find fascinating. 

From there, they create their first concentration piece.

Once the first pieces are created, I facilitate a class-wide critique

to analyze whether or not the artist accomplished their original concept.

It is during these first critiques that students often modify their concentration concepts

and/or bounce ideas off their peers for additional approaches for their next piece.

I have found that these peer critiques are the SINGLE MOST IMPORTANT

aspect to students' concentration development.

This year I incorporated a critique per every two pieces,

but my students shared with me they wish there had been more.

Next year, I will try to be more intentional about the frequency of critiques

and I would like to start pointing them to more professional artists as resources and inspiration.

I will admit, my knowledge of past/present artists is rather superficial

 {just the bare minimum needed to pass a college art history exam}

and this is an area of growth for me.

Obviously, I will never know all the artists out there,

but I do need to find more resources for my students to discover

and research art and artists.

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LOGISTICS.

Can I get an Oy-Vey!?

This is the most challenging aspect of teaching AP 3D

for me personally.

Here are a few things I have learned the hard way:

Teaching AP 3D within a sculpture class means 

ART IS PHYSICALLY EVERYWHERE

ALL. THE. FREAKING. TIME.

I have learned to assign my AP's a designated area in the classroom for storing their work and supplies.

Now, very few of them actually use my designated area for very long

before they find their own personal niche

 {which drives me bonkers because my other classes 

somehow, someway break/steal/ruin/play with their art}.

I think forcing students to use my designated storage is going to be my priority next year.

Since there is lots physical work in my classroom all the time,

I have my AP students take digital photographs of their work with their smartphones

 immediately after they finish (sometimes even in progress) 

and submit them to me via Dropbox.

This has been insanely helpful for several reasons.

1.) Storing student work digitally is much easier than storing it physically (for obvious reasons).

2.) The College Board requires digital submissions. 

Therefore, it is beneficial for me to grade and for students to critique images of their work 

to keep the evaluation process consistent.

3.) Recording pieces digitally, frees students from having to be "finished" with a piece.

Oftentimes, students will submit an image of a piece in progress just in case

they go a little too far in the next part of their creative process. 

I have even had a student deconstruct each piece after it was photographed,

to construct his next piece using the same materials -- very cost effective.

4.) Having students take their own pictures lightens my load tremendously.

Dropbox allows students to share their photographs with me instantly 

from their smartphones. We both keep digital copies of their portfolios,

which has been beneficial when uploading the final work to the 

College Board website at the end of the school year.

The submission process this year went a helluvah lot better than last year,

mainly because I was on maternity leave last year

and had students Facebooking me all sorts of questions

while I was just trying to figure out how to take care of a new human.

It was stressful.

This year was cake (relatively speaking).

Something I realized this year during the submission process 

was that my students need help remembering their sh"t.

Each student created an account on College Board just days

before submitting their portfolios, but NOT A SINGLE ONE

remembered their username/password (that THEY created) on the day they submitted.

To prevent this from happening next year, 

I am going to assign each student their username/password 

and its going to be a formula we can all remember.

Ex. usernames: LastnameFirstname  passwords: Birthdate

Also, I suggested but didn't require students to keep track of their dimensions when 

they finished their artwork. It was a HUGE pain in the rear and slowed the submission

process waaay down to a snail's speed when students had to locate past pieces 

to record their measurements.

I have already created a graphic organizer for next year

for students to record each pieces dimensions as the year progresses.

I am wrestling with the idea of making students responsible for keeping track of this paper

or if it should be stored in a safe place in the room.

Hmm...  I will have to ponder that one.

Hopefully, if you are not an art educator or if you find all this teacher talk a real bore,

you stopped reading a looooonnnggg time ago,

but if you do not fall into one of those above categories,

I hope you have found these tips helpful. 

Please share if you have any tips that you have developed over the years.