K-12 Curriculum Planning

Since I will be starting a new teaching gig this fall- PreK-12th grade art teacher in a school district closer to home, I've been spending a lot of time this summer working on curriculum. I was able to spend a day shadowing the previous art teacher at my new school last spring so that I could get a feel for things, ask questions, etc. I took notes on the curriculum she had been using, which media she covered at each grade level, etc. With Kansas working on adopting the National Core Arts Standards and their new direction focusing more on student choice and making artwork that is personally meaningful, it seemed like a good time to reexamine EVERYTHING.

I had spreadsheets started for K-6 that I helped write in my former school district. Our process was basically to look at one standard at a time, one grade at a time, and write an "I Can" statement for each. So, we were breaking the standards down into student-friendly language and sometimes putting them in smaller pieces. I used the same process for 7th grade, 8th grade, HS proficient, and HS advanced. Then, I took the standard and "I Can" statements and put them in a table with a row below each pair where I've been writing how I will make sure we meet the standard. I've made notes to myself about discussions, processes, and assignment prompts. After I finish up the HS advanced standards, I will start to go through the notes I took about the last teacher's curriculum and see what fits in with the new standards and my goals. 

It's going to be an interesting transition for all of us, and I'm very much looking forward to it.