FACILITATION SHEET

Title: Chapter 8: Contributing to Visual Culture: Student Artistic Production and Assessment
Author(s): Kerry Freedman
Source/Date: Freedman, K. (2003).Teachingvisualculture:Curriculum,aesthetics,andthe
sociallifeofart.NewYork,NY:TeachersCollegePress.
Main Idea/Purpose (2-3 sentences):
Students are able to evaluate and discuss their peers and their own artworks through many
different types of critiques. It is important to have moderators come to check art teachers
assessments of their students artwork. Visual culture will help students understand the art world.
Short Overview (Including at least 2-3 important quotes):
According to Freedman (2003), Through their art, students can express concerns, ask questions,
interpret imagery, and make judgments while making and evaluating their artwork and other
artists artwork, which incorporates visual culture (pp. 147-148). Students are able to express
their individuality in their art by depicting their viewpoints (pp. 147-148). Freedman discusses
how students can be assessed and critiqued through a Traditional Critique, Student Questioning,
Individual Dialogue, Small Group Critique, Peer Pairs, or Role Play (pp. 156-157). A variety of
critiques will help students who learn in a more interactive or visual way instead of just sitting
down and talking about an artwork as a large group. Freedman states teachers must stay up to
date with the transformations occurring in the art education field in order to always have updated
lesson plans (p. 159). Dr. Boughton (1997) declares, Communities of teachers function as
arbiters of quality through debate and agreement. This interaction should be reflected in
assessments of student groups and modeled for students to help them come to understand the role
of social interaction in the establishment of judgment (as cited in Freedman, 2003, p. 163). I
have learned the importance of having moderators come into schools to check the validity and
reliability of assessments in Dr. Boughtons Assessment course. It is also helpful to use
benchmarks to display a chosen, visual depiction of the expectations of each grade level based on
the rubric created by the teacher. As stated by Freedman, Making art is the surest way for
students to come to understand the most fundamental reasons that visual culture is valuable
enough to be taught in school: it is a way of knowing (p. 167). It is important for students to not
only talk about visual culture but also make art that reflects on it.
Critical Response: Reflections and/or relevance to personal art educational experiences/or
teaching experience
I will always encourage my students to ask questions about their artwork in order to help them
improve and learn how to communicate the meaning of their art. One of my daily lesson
priorities will be to make sure students have time to reflect about their art. At St. Marys, I made
sure to have my fourth graders come together on the rug to talk about how they are depicting
their life lessons. We also reviewed academic language and the vocab we were learning such as,
foreground, middle ground, and background. In my entrance portfolio art education class with

Dr. Wang, he asked the class and I to try different critiques such as an Individual Dialogue, Small
Group Critique, and Peer Pairs (pp. 156-157). Since I am sometimes an introvert in large group
critiques, I found talking to a peer individually was a more effective and helpful critique for me
personally. I think students will feel more comfortable telling personal meanings of their artwork
to a peer then to the entire class. I will make sure to have moderators come make sure I am
judging my students artwork accurately compared to other art teachers assessments. I will make
sure to put time and effort into grading my students artwork through planned out rubrics and
benchmarks in order to be fair and correct in the assessment process. I agree with Freedman that
visual culture helps students understand art (p. 167).