Learning grant artists draw student interest

BANGOR – Students in kindergarten through high school got to work with a variety of professional Maine artists this year thanks to a Partners in Arts and Learning grant, the school committee learned Monday.

Awarded last fall, the three-year, $9,801 grant is matched by local funds and has enabled visiting artists to teach students about calligraphy and book making, dance and movement, clay and pottery making, songwriting and Civil War music, said Jackie Frisk, a teacher at Abraham Lincoln School.

Frisk, who chairs the Bangor PAL committee that awards money to individual teachers so they can bring artists into their classrooms, said the program complements the curriculum and ties into the Maine Learning Results by focusing on cultural heritage; creative expression and experimentation with art forms; and art critiquing.

Participants were:

. Bangor High School art teachers Kal Elmore and Sarah Tabor and Mary Snow School teacher Debbie Jellison, who all hosted calligrapher and book maker Jan Owen of Bangor;

. Bangor High drama teacher Carlene Hirsh, who hosted the Robinson Ballet Company and River City Dance Company;

. James F. Doughty Middle School teacher Judith Morrison, who hosted musician-historian George Swanson of Manset;

. Kindergarten-grade three art teachers Julie Cameron, Wendy Libby and Michele Fournier, who hosted pottery artist Sandy Houtman of Old Town;

. Kindergarten-grade three music teachers Frisk, Mary Kilbride, Sarah McQuarrie Sherwin and Michele Hall, who hosted well-known singer-songwriter Rick Charette of the Portland area.

Teachers, who were on hand with samples of students’ work, told the committee that the program enhanced students’ creative abilities, honed their problem solving skills, and even aided them with other subjects.

Morrison said one student told her after learning Civil War songs with Swanson that “the singing was good because it puts a rhyme in your head and when you sing it helps you to learn and remember the facts of the Civil War.”

Making books with Owen allowed high school students to “blossom, grow and learn things in a way they hadn’t before,” said Elmore, pointing out that the projects were “tactile, visually rich and interesting and showed lots of depth in thinking.”

Libby said a survey taken after the arts class asked children how they felt while creating their clay sculptures.

“I was surprised at what I could create,” said one.

“I felt like I was a dragon myself,” another said.

The students were thoroughly engaged in the process, according to Libby. “They were becoming what [they] were creating,” she said.

Students took a “tremendous sense of pride” in creating their own songs with Charette, who “validated everything they did,” Kilbride said.

“They talked about the rhythm of words, then they began clapping and snapping,” she said. “They developed a simple melody that he’d nurture and encourage … and, lo and behold, they had a song.”

Hirsh’s students developed a greater appreciation for classical ballet, jazz, modern dance and hip-hop, according to the teacher who said “dance is an area [in which the curriculum] is a little weak.”

The artist became a mini-celebrity to the kids, said Cameron, whose students came to understand “how to express their ideas and feelings through clay.” The program was integrated with the China studies theme which has been introduced into Bangor’s curriculum, Cameron said.

Meanwhile, Jellison liked that her students had “the opportunity to work with someone who’s [involved with art] at a professional level.”

School committee members were obviously impressed by the teachers’ presentations. “It’s absolutely spectacular what you people are managing to bring out in our children,” said Susan Carlisle.