Teaching Philosophy

In every course, I encourage my students to push themselves beyond their comfort zone and take risks. My lessons focus on the principles of the subject while leading the student to discover through reflection, application, and execution their own methodology for art making. Covering a wide range of technical and conceptual issues, I emphasize the development of critical judgment using blogs as research journals and an online wiki textbook to engage their learning process. Through experimentation and discovery, I help students nurture a desire to try new mediums and venues, express themselves effectively, and embrace their passion and interests through art.

The Polychronic Classroom  is the title my educational blog that documents a pedagogical interest to teach effectively by connecting with the student's learning process. I believe that communication technology is changing the way in which students and teachers have normally interacted. I see it as a personal goal to continually adapt and improve my courses to integrate technologies relevant to contemporary visual communication and culture.

In the classroom, I communicate clearly to the student what is expected and encourage them to alter their perceptual frameworks in order go beyond assignment objectives; taking risks, inventing fresh outcomes, and finding new artistic boundaries. I find students can be surprisingly resourceful and capable when properly motivated. By introducing the student to contemporary issues in art and visual culture and examples of successful artists, I provide the student with role models for contemporary practice.

I believe it is important to teach both the formal principles of the subject and the methodology for creation of meaning; convergent and divergent. Over the course of a semester, I lead each student to break down traditional rules to discover there are no limitations or that most limitations are self imposed. Overall, this method challenges the student to discover the meanings of art relevant to their lives, the context in which they are working, and their own artworks.