Open Studios and Roller Coaster Crashes

Greetings and salutations again, dear reader!  Here’s the skinny on what’s been happening this week in the life of Jacob Ward!

At Franklin Fine Arts:

The students are starting to move into their new projects!!! Kindergarteners are working on mini Monet waterlily ponds, 2^nd & 4^th graders are starting their final Romero Britto pieces, 6^th graders are starting a Dale Chihuly project, 7^th graders will be working with glass fusion, and the 8^th graders will be working on my edTPA painted jeans project.

For those who don’t know, edTPA is the Teacher Performance Assessment and is one of the criteria needed to receive your teaching license for Ohio & Illinois.  This is, as the title says, based and graded on teacher performance and is broken up into three parts: Planning the lessons, Commentary on the filmed lessons, and Assessment of student work & lesson as a whole.  The Pearson Exams (one of the other criteria to get licensure) are based on knowledge and are over information in your content area and educational theory.  Pearson exams and TPA prove a person has the brains and brawn, respectively, that a teacher needs in order to teach.

In Chicago:

This week has picked up a little bit even though I’ve still been bogged down with edTPA preparation.  Thursday evening’s fine arts event was a visit to the Chicago Symphony Center to hear US Premier of Detlev Glanert’s Brahms-Fantasie and Johannes Brahms’ Violin Concerto in D Major, Op. 77 & Symphony No. 1 in C Minor, Op.68.  BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE!  

 

Friday night was spent exploring Pilsen with my cooperating teacher where we saw the National Museum of Mexican Art, Hector Duartes’ house, and various artist’s studios that were open to the public that evening.  A pit stop at Honky Tonks BBQ proved to be extremely delicious (especially the candied bacon… NOM!) The good things just keep going and going…

Saturday evening was spent seeing one of the greatest shows I’ve ever seen, Ride the Cyclone at Chicago Shakespeare Theater.  The set and the projections were amazing, the story was funny and touching, the acting, singing, and music were phenomenal.  I hope that it gets picked up to move to Broadway just so I can get a cast recording… that’s how good this show was!  AND just to show how small the world really is, a friend I did theater with back in Ohio is friends with one of the actors in Cyclone and she’ll be coming to Chicago to see the show so we’re all going to hang out and it’s going to be awesome!  For people who want to see the show, Chicago Shakes has a special deal of $20 tickets for people under 35 so take advantage of it people and see Ride the Cyclone!!!!