The February Mailbag: Hoarding, DoorDashing, and Teaching Fibers (Ep. 407)

Welcome to Art Ed Radio, the podcast for art teachers. The show is produced by The Art of Education University, and I’m your host, Tim Bogatz.

All right, we are here post NOW Conference. Amanda is with me. Amanda, how are you?

Can I take a nap before we do this? Just kidding.

That’s kind of how we’re both feeling. I have to say, I’m very impressed with Amanda. She is very sick, but powering through things. We just got done with the conference, and I was like, “I can handle the mailbag myself.” And she’s like, “I don’t trust you to do that.” So she’s going to sit in.

That’s not true.

But we are actually in the same room that we just did the whole conference in and we’re both a little, I don’t know, stir-crazy, slap-happy, I don’t know the right word, but you may notice a little audio difference since we’re recording in a big room. But we are excited to do the mailbag. We have a lot of good questions. We have a lot of great questions that came in via the NOW Conference. We may get to one or two of those, but I think we’re going to save most of them for some future mailbags because there’s just so many good things that we want to talk about. But before we dive into that, let’s talk about the NOW Conference.

Let’s do it.

What did you enjoy, Amanda? What were the highlights for you?

Okay, highlights. Well, of course the kickoff was excellent.

Yes.

If you were there, you saw that I made a shirt covered in googly eyes, which is maybe one of the best things I’ve ever made. It was very fun. We also give away some art teacher friendship bracelets to attendees.

I am wearing my bracelets as we speak.

Me too.

I have one that says, “Art Ed Radio” and another that says “This is me sculpting,” playing on Taylor Swift’s, “This is me trying.” But I love them both. So thank you again, Amanda. For making those.

You’re welcome. I really worked hard on them. I have an “Art teacher energy” one of course, and a “Glitter on the floor” which also I feel like if you know me, is self-explanatory.

It’s perfect.

I used a lot of sparkly beads on that one.

Yeah, that was great. Art making was a lot of fun. I did colored pencils with Jen Russell, which was very cool. I got to really dive deep into how we teach and how we work with colored pencils. And then Christina Brown was hosting with Kayla Koslow and Katie Gray doing a bunch of drawing prompts and a lot of really cool things there. They had a ton of fun.

Yes, both very fun. And then of course, the conference, Devon Rodriguez brought the house down. There were multiple people crying, including myself. It was just so joyful and moving. He came on camera, which is not anything we talked about, but he jumped at the chance to come talk to our teachers and it was very excellent.

Yeah, it was so much fun. People love that. And then just the entire day was great, though. That was the cherry on top of the Sunday.

That’s a good way to put it.

It was a very good conference, from art making to the art teacher roundtable that we did, and then all of the topics that we were able to cover. We had some amazing presenters, so thankful for all of them, and we were able to put together a really good day.

And if you were someone in the chat, thank you also. That’s my favorite part of the conference, is just seeing everybody chatting and sharing ideas and commiserating and lifting each other up. It was really heart-warming to be a part of.

Yes, yes. Very good. And I guess the other thing we should talk about outside of the conference was our trip to the brunch restaurant.

Yes. We’re living in the future in Dallas.

Yeah, it was pretty great. So we went out for brunch and we made our order, and-

With a human.

Yes, we ordered with-

A regular waitress.

And then we’re just sitting and talking, and Amanda just stops mid-conversation. She says, “Oh my God, do you see what’s happening behind you?” Which obviously I don’t see what’s happening behind me, but I turn around and there is a robot, a literal robot, delivering our food. I was very excited about this. And the waitstaff followed our robot and gave us our food, and that was great. But then I noticed a little bit later if the waitstaff did not come out, the robot started yelling at people. It just parks itself by the table and it’s like, “Please take your food.” It was pretty entertaining. So it was a first for me.

Great. Me too.

People out there listening, maybe they’re like, “Oh yeah, we got robot delivery all the time.”

Our listeners in Japan are like, “That’s so 2009.”

Right, right. It was new for me. It was a good experience for me.

Same.

It was kind of fun.

And I usually don’t like robots.

That’s why I was surprised you were so excited about it.

Well, here’s the thing. I tolerate robots up to a Roomba level, and this was a Roomba.

It was.

It was just a Roomba with a tray. So it wasn’t like an animatronic robot walking our food over to us. I would’ve fled immediately. But it was just…

What if it just had arms and put silverware on the table for you?

No.

Too much?

Too much.

Okay. Good to know. All right, I feel like we’re off track so let’s bring it back. Let’s open up the mailbag. We need the sound though. Do you want to do the official introduction for the sound?

Yes. I guess I’ll just say, let’s open up the mailbag.

Okay. First question, this comes from an art teacher named Nick in New York. And Nick says, “I’ve decided that it’s finally time for me to hang it up. I’ve been teaching for 33 years, the last 21 at my current school. My question is about what I should leave behind. I’m not a hoarder, but I do have a lot of stuff. I don’t even want my lesson plans or curriculums because I’m retiring, but does the person after me even want them? What about supplies? I want to be helpful, but I’m not even sure how to start deciding what to throw out and what to leave in the classroom.” So Amanda, your thoughts?

Well, I would say, first of all, Nick, you’re amazing. I don’t know, Tim, if you did, but I walked into my first… Actually it was my second art room and it was a disaster. The person left everything in disarray and I had hours and hours and hours of cleanups. So I think even the fact that you’re being thoughtful about it is very cool. So I would say supplies, generally yes. In terms of curriculum, lesson planning, samples, that kind of stuff, I think that could also be helpful for somebody. I know that when I was transitioning out of the classroom, I actually got a chance to speak to the person who was going to be taking my place and she was like, “Oh my God, I would love for you to leave all of that stuff.” So that was great. I did take some pictures and things, so you might want to do that for, I don’t know, your virtual scrapbook.

But I would say overall, I would only leave things that you can leave very organized for the next person coming in. Clearly label what are these things, because also if it’s just a random pile of lessons, that’s not super helpful to someone, I don’t think. So if you can leave even a short note about what something is, or, “Here are all of my lesson examples, and I usually did these with third-graders,” even that is enough, I think, to get somebody started. So think about what you can organize, and anything you can’t, or you know is trash, I would try to get it out of there.

Yeah, for sure. I will echo Amanda’s thought and just thank you for being considerate about this

Also, congratulations on your retirement.

Yes, that’s what we should have started with. Congratulations, Nick. Yeah, there’s some trauma for me from taking over my high school classroom. Just the amount of work and the amount of stuff I had to go through was just… I don’t know that I could put it into words. It was incredible. So if you have the opportunity to speak with whoever’s taking over for you, just open up that line of communication, that can be hugely helpful. Because it’s different, when I was a brand new teacher fresh out of college, I was very thankful for any ideas-

Yes, a hundred percent.

Anything that people could give to me. But if you have a 10-year veteran coming in, they don’t need that.

Yeah. That’s a really good point.

So it’s going to be different for whoever. But yeah, I think just getting in touch if you can, can go a long way there to making some of those decisions for you. And then as you’re looking through stuff, if it’s seriously outdated, if you still have slide projectors around, go ahead and get rid of those. If you have art supplies from the 1970s still around-

Yup, I have a lot of those in my classroom.

Feel free to toss those out. But yeah, I love Amanda’s point of if you can leave it for them and it’s organized, leave it for them. And then they can decide. That’s the most helpful thing you can do. But try not to give them extra work. If you have a closet that needs some help, don’t just walk away from it. They’ve got enough on their plate taking over a new room, so if you want to be helpful, if you can just get things organized and let them make some decisions, that would be the most helpful way to do it, I think.

A hundred percent.

All right. Next question. I feel like I’ve seen this conversation going around a little bit on social media, but this came in from Keelin in Nevada. And Keelin says, “Thoughts on using something like Shipt or DoorDash to deliver supplies to school when kids are going through things too quickly or you really need stuff before the day is out.” I would say, at its base level, that is creative problem solving, right?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I like it, but I like delivery. I like to get dinner delivered, I like to get groceries delivered. During the pandemic I just really leaned into anything that was making my life easier. The problem with that is it can get very expensive, so I would use this on a very limited basis, especially if you’re using your own money. And the more I thought about this question, the more I thought you probably are, because I don’t know what school is reimbursing you for DoorDash or using that for a supply order. So if you are doing it, you really need something before the day is out, I would say try to front load and avoid that situation. Make sure you’re counting stuff out or preparing ahead of time. And I would probably vote for, if you know you’re going to run out before the end of the day, just pivot into a one-day lesson, and then come back to it. However, I think it’s fun. It’s a fun idea, so I am torn.

No, I would agree. I think it’s a really creative and fun way to solve that problem. But I would say if I’m in a high school room with that, I would just talk to the kids and be like, “Hey, we are running out of this. What do you think some alternatives are?” And we can do that problem-solving together.

Oh, I like it. Yeah.

And see what other options are out there. With elementary, if you have a very specific thing that you’re doing that’s maybe not available, but I feel like I’ve run into that problem a lot in my teaching career, which I don’t know, maybe that says something about me, but there are always other options out there. So spend a little bit of time figuring out what your alternatives might be. That’s what I would do before going on online and ordering-

Now I’m now trying to think, what’s the emergency? Do you know what I mean? Like, “Tempera paint emergency!” Okay, just use watercolors. Or like, “Oh, I don’t have any paper!” Just go to the copy machine or open your centers of your free choice. I don’t know. Again, it’s really making me think, which I like.

So yeah, I don’t hate it. I don’t know that it’s necessary, though. That would be the short answer.

That’s a great way to sum it up.

All right, next question. This is from @AllyMWright on Instagram, “What is your favorite lesson for a third-grader?” Amanda, I’m giving you that one first.

Okay. So I taught elementary. I love third-graders. They’re really becoming their own people, they really start to become a lot more capable I feel like, of doing multi-step processes, their fine motor skills are better, they’re ready for bigger ideas, and so I’m not going to give one specific lesson, but I would look for something tactile. Well, maybe I’ll give a few examples. Like weaving went over really well with my third-graders. Teach them a couple of really simple patterns, checkerboard, different kinds of stripes, and they’re super into it, just let them go.

Or we used to do these creative coil pots, which was just a two-day project, and they could start with a couple of coils and then I taught them swirls and little dots of clay and whatever, and they built up their pot for just two class periods. So it ended up being pretty small, but they loved that. So that’s what I would do. If you’re looking for weaving, actually we have an excellent pro pet called Getting Started with Elementary Weaving by Caitlyn Thompson that’s really excellent. It has a lot of really good suggestions. How about you? It’s been a long time since you’ve-

It has been a long time since I’ve taught elementary. If we’re looking at drawing stuff, I really love doing Keith Haring style figure drawings and just teaching them about… Like you said, third-graders are becoming capable so teaching them about drawing from observation, teaching them about movement, action lines, everything that goes along with the Keith Haring style, and then letting them make that their own. I think that’s a really, really fun one to do. But like you said, anything tactile is going to be really worthwhile. So any kind of clay project that you are loving or seeing, kids are going to enjoy that. Even if it’s just Model Magic, they just love building things like that.

And just today at the NOW Conference, Laura Ermes was talking about these clay tacos that she makes, which I thought were great. Roll out a slab and that’s your taco shell, and then you can use tools or your hands or whatever else to make the fillings and all of the toppings that go into the taco, add a little texture, add some finishing on there, and just a very cool process with a lot of fun things that you can do. So yeah, anything that’s hands-on, if you can allow them to get a little bit messy, they obviously are going to appreciate that. They’re going to love that. But yeah, just give them a little bit of a challenge. They’re capable of probably doing it, and I think that you should be able to define some success with your third-graders there.

A hundred percent.

All right, are you feeling up to reading some questions? Or would you like me just to keep moving on with them?

Yeah, just keep reading.

All right, just keep reading to you. Okay. This next one is from @ltuck514. “What do you do when you find out you are allergic to some of your art supplies but still have to teach them?” Face palm emoji.

I really do appreciate when people put an emoji with their question to really tell us about the sentiment. This is tough, but I would like to remind you, your health comes first. So if you are actually very allergic to something, do not teach it. You say you have to teach it, but I would challenge to think, what do you have to teach? If it’s a concept, you should be able to do that with a different medium. If it’s a medium, you might be able to find an alternative, like air dry clay or Model Magic versus ceramics, or different types of paint, things like that. I also think that you could do a teacher swap. So I think… Is it Nic Hahn?

Yeah, Nic Hahn did this.

Yeah, is allergic to clay, and wanted her kids to still have that experience. And so she and another teacher in another building would actually swap jobs for an entire week, I think.

Wait, quick caveat, talk to your administrator first before you do this.

Right, right. And so they took each other’s classes and it was really, really cool and worked for them. So I would also say, bring your concerns to your administrator because they should be supportive of you. This is a medical necessity that they should be willing to help you figure out.

Yeah, there are lots of alternatives there. If you’re not terribly allergic, working with gloves, if you just get those-

Or masks.

… nitrile gloves, put those on along with a mask. I’ve had kids who are allergic to clay but still sign up for ceramics. That’s a choice. But no, we just worked together to come up with a plan, and they would make sure they had a jacket on, long sleeves every day, and then they’d wear the gloves, they’d put on the mask, and we got through it. It’s fine. And so they’re not back recycling clay, they’re not doing anything really in depth with it. But depending on the level of allergies, sometimes you can just put on a little bit of protective equipment [inaudible 00:17:35] with that, but again, like Amanda said, your health comes first. If you were severely allergic, don’t be like, “Oh, I’ll put on some gloves and power through.” That’s not safe. Do not do that, please.

Right. A hundred percent.

All right. And then I think, Amanda, this is going to be our final question here. This is from @tmaloch4 also on Instagram, “What is your favorite fiber medium to teach?”

This is an interesting question. Okay, I like batik.

I love batik.

Yeah, I love fabric dying. Were you going to say something else about batik?

No, I was just going to tell you, I never knew how to do batik. I just kind of taught… Now YouTube exists, but I’m old. And so I kind of taught myself how to do batik, just bought the tools and worked my way through it with my students. We got some great stuff out of it. It’s a fantastic medium.

It’s very forgiving and it’s very beautiful. I would suggest don’t just fully trial and error it. Different types of fabric work better than others, that kind of stuff, but I’ve done it in a couple different ways. At my first school, I did it with my fifth graders with actual hot wax. They had those little melters or whatever, and we just used paintbrushes for those. And then at my second school, I did it with younger kids, and I think there’s an ancient YouTube video that is sort of about the crackle batik process, where you lay thick wax crackle it or crunch it up to create cracks and then dye it. Now, I did that with paper and some people in the comments were like, “This isn’t batik,” which fair, but it’s the same process, so maybe we can link to that. That was a favorite that I used to love to do. And then like I mentioned earlier, just regular weaving. Kids love that. It doesn’t have to be anything super fancy. So what about you?

I have two very old NOW Conference presentations that I want to highlight. Probably from, I don’t know, five or six years ago even. Caroline Gardner, once upon a time, talked everybody through the art of shibori dyeing.

Which I personally love shibori dyeing.

Yes, I loved it. So I brought a big bucket of dye to AOE headquarters, which I don’t think they’re super happy with me, but that’s okay, I led everybody there Through the shibori dyeing process. We got some really cool things so that was a lot of fun. I love doing that. And then just personally, because it says your favorite fiber medium I guess to teach-

To teach. You can go off-script.

I did do this with my students, though. Amber Kane did a NOW presentation about all sorts of really cool weaving and fiber stuff. And she showed us how to weave paper into your sketchbook or into your visual journal. And so I did that a bunch. I was like, “Yes, let’s take it to the kids.” Some of them liked it, some of them hated it. But I’ve continued to do that in my sketchbook, so I love doing that.

Yeah, that’s super fun.

All right. Excellent. Thank you all for all of these great questions. As I said, we have a bunch more, so keep tuning in in the coming months, and we will get to all of the questions that we have, all of the voicemails that are coming in and everything else that you’ve given to us. So Amanda, other things you want to share before we get going?

Yeah, well, okay, really quickly, I would love to tell you that we brought back discounted pricing for the summer 2024 NOW Conference, which is very exciting. So through March 1st, you can come to the summer NOW Conference for only $99, which is literally $50 off. I’m so excited about this. One of my goals is to get more people to come to the conference, and I know it can be tricky to spend money on PD, yourself. And so this is something I was really passionate about making happen, and I’m super excited to say that we are doing it. So you can use the code NOWEARLY99. It’s also on the Web page, maybe we can link to that.

Yes. We’ll link to that in the show notes.

Again, through March 1st. And we’re super, super excited about that. And then I’d also just love to encourage you to share the podcast with your friends. We’re always looking for new listeners, new people to get connected with AOEU, if you know new teachers who have started in the past couple of years who might not know about us, or even undergrad students, if you have student teachers, or you have friends who just don’t know about AOEU, I would love, love, love for you to share the podcast with them.

Yes, absolutely. We always want more people listening. We especially want newer teachers listening because we think the people we bring on have a lot of valuable advice and there’s so much to learn. And of course that gives me opportunity to talk about the What Do New Teachers Need to Know? podcast series, which is an even better one to share with them as long as they can handle Janet and me talking for an hour. There’s a lot of really, really good stuff in those episodes as well.

Yeah, there is.

So yeah, please share. We really love that. So Amanda, thank you so much. It has been a wonderful conference, a wonderful few days in Texas here, and I’m excited to put together another conference in six months and do this all again. So thank you.

Yeah, see you guys later.

Art Ed Radio was produced by The Art of Education University with audio engineering from Michael Crocker. All right, thank you as always for listening. And if you want to add anything else to our future mailbags, please email us at podcast@theartofeducation.edu. Thank you for listening. Thank you to everyone who came to NOW and was a part of just a brilliant… Our teacher community that we have, we love interacting with all of you, love everyone who’s coming to the conference, so thank you, we appreciate you and we’ll talk to you next week.