Classroom In Residence Program
Classroom-in-Residence at the Hammer (CRH) is an innovative program designed to strengthen student and teacher learning about art through a weeklong, immersive experience at the UCLA Hammer Museum. Arts educators from the Visual and Performing Arts Education Program (VAPAE) and the Hammer Museum collaborate with classroom teachers to develop arts-based lessons inspired by the museum. By taking learning out of the traditional classroom and into a museum setting, students are able to make cross-curricular connections in a new environment. This project model, developed by VAPAE at UCLA, establishes a template for an immersive arts-based program that can be replicated at any number of community sites.
In a workroom at the Hammer Museum on a recent afternoon, a group of two dozen fourth graders from Cienega Elementary sat focused on constructing tiny art galleries out of paper, coloring and glueing paintings on the walls.
Nine-year-old Steven Mateo glued landscapes and flowers on one side of his gallery and put portraits on another. He and his classmates had just learned all about the process of exhibition design from Hammer staff, and he had some lessons to share.
"Art is not only about painting, it’s about curating your stuff, like what you want to [choose] and where you want to put it," he said.
Across the room, Emily Rhem shared another lesson she'd garnered about the curation process: "It’s kind of hard, because there’s so many great paintings but sometimes you can’t fit them all," she said.
Instead of the typical half-day field trip, these fourth graders spent an entire week at the Hammer Museum. It’s part of the museum’s classroom-in-residence program. The goal is to immerse students in an environment outside of their classroom and jolt them into thinking about art in a new way.
"I think on the first day they approach the galleries with that kind of hallowed trepidation you might expect from going into a room filled with 500-year-old paintings," said Noelle Valentino, academic programs coordinator at the Hammer.
But she says even after a few hours, there's a noticeable shift. And after a couple days, the children feel at home. — Maya Sugarman, Mar. 21
Read the full article at the KPCC Southern California Public Radio website.