Classroom Choreography Counts

Art is... Lorraine O'Grady, artist, asserts that anything and anyone outlined within it is art. @walkerartcenter pic.twitter.com/4QBob9fFee

There's a temptation to rush through the standards to meet the end point, yet that is not effective education.

The key is to choreograph the days, weeks, month, and year well--a responsive, interactive choreography that engages, empowers, and educates students.

A thoughtful mix of content, process, and disposition with a thread of intrigue and interest that keep the children coming back each day with curiosity and care not dissimilar to a very good book, musical, movie, play, or television series.

This kind of teaching, in a sense, is performance art. The kind of art I viewed recently at the Walker Museum in Minneapolis. An art that invites and incites audience participation and thought.

Use Learning to Learn activities to develop students' ability to learn with confidence, skill, and care. Also begin each subject area with the main foundation pieces--the kinds of learning they'll replicate often as they learn new concepts, skill, and knowledge in that content area.

Educators like parents have a unique opportunity to help young children reach their dreams and live a good life by carefully choreographing the learning program that focuses on individual learners' strengths and happiness--a program like the frames in Lorraine O'Grady's Exhibit.