Getting Started as a Docent Art Teacher

Once your school has decided to incorporate a Art Docent Program, establish guidelines that will keep the program on track and also create the expectations for both the parent docent and the teacher.  Following is some recommendations:

• Meet with Other Class Docents - At our school, docent parents have selected multiple teachers to work with off the full list of teachers grouped together by grade.  Docents may pick just one teacher to work with, but often pick two or three.  If you chose to work in the same grade level, then you may repeat the coursework in all classes you are working in. Decide how you, and the other class docents, would like to work together in a class. Docents can work in teams or individually.  For a successful program, our goal as docents is to provide a lesson once a month. If you work individually you can alternate months between you and another parent docent(s), spending less time in the classroom (if lack of time is a consideration).  However, the team approach gives you more one on one time with the kids and is a lot more fun for everyone involved.

• Meet with your Teacher  - Schedule all lessons through the teacher directly.  Ask about curriculum integration and anything else they may need from you.  Also, discuss the technology available to you.  What kind of projector and materials are needed for display. What supplies do students have that could be useful in determining your project; example, do they all have their own marker and colored pencils?  Determine the best times for the lessons and schedule them.  Scheduling can be tough if you don't be proactive about it. Most teachers will want you to offer to them specific times versus a teacher asking a docent.  Therefore, be proactive by offering a teacher 2 to 3 options for the month that work for you (and your class docent team), and then coordinate calendars.   

IMPORTANT!!!  ONCE YOU KNOW THE DATES, PLEASE PUT THEM ON THE CALENDAR IN THE SUPPLY ROOM SO THERE IS NOT OVERLAP AND RISK OF RUNNING OUT OF SUPPLIES. 

• Prep your Supplies - Get everything ready ahead of your lesson time, so you are ready to distribute to the class when you walk in.  Pre-mix, pre-sort, pre-cut, pre-prep...be ready.  Your time is short and you can not spend any of the lesson time still prepping.  Also, to help save value lesson time, have kids in the classroom to help you pass out materials if you don't have a class docent partner.

• Teaching the Lesson - Find artist's bio, photos and artwork and display them on the screen in the classroom, or print them out and project them.    Once you have your lesson determined, use this general guideline when in the classroom:

1. Distribute supplies to all children in the class.  (Again, have kids in the classroom to help you pass out materials if you don't have a class docent partner)
2. Introduce an artist and show samples of their work.  (5 to 15 minutes).  Use interesting details (like Van Gogh slicing his ear off)
3. Describe the lesson you have for them and how it ties in to the artist
4. Walk them through the project, step by step.  If you are able to, bring in some music, it is a great tool for creating artists.
5. Keep lessons between 1 to 2 hours.  The teacher will tell you how much time you have.
6. As students finish, have them mount their own work on colored paper sized to fit the art and sign it.  Decide with the teacher if the art can be left to dry in a specific area.  If students don't finish before the class is over, decide with the teacher if there is time for the student to finish  their project indendentely later in the day. 
7. Arrange with the teacher (or with other class room 'helpers') to 'hang' the art in the art gallery (hallway outside of the classroom) along with the LESSON DESCRIPTION sheet!  This IS the most important part of the lesson.  As students, teachers and parents walk by the display they can easily reference the lesson and concepts learned. 

•  Retreive all docent supplies - Round up all supplies at the end of the lesson and return them back to the storage area.

• Back-up plan - If you are unable to teach a scheduled lesson, find another docent that could cover for you.  The kids really look forward to these lessons and we certainly don't want to disappoint!