Professor Self Evaluation

Self Evaluation-J Hays Spring 2011 Drawing I 1210 90 T/TR 1:00-3:40

GOALS: My goals for teaching this class were to develop and maintain a cumulative learning process for fundamentals of drawing. I wanted to supplement in-class drawing with a good Drawing Workbook for student reference.

OBJECTIVES: The main focus of the class was to teach and draw from direct observation of the still life and reinforce these lessons by assigning major homework. I tried to change the still life each week, bringing in items that reinforced the techniques and skills we were learning for that week and reinforcing that we draw what we see, not what we think we see. I prepared to teach the class, supplemented with handouts and gave demonstrations on specific drawing techniques.

PROJECTS: The in-progress critiques were key, although students still waited until the last minute. I have no idea how to better address this (“you can lead a horse to water...”). We lost some momentum in class after Spring Break because we had several artist talks. These are important and I was glad we had them for class time. In a perfect world, these would be in the evening outside of class and mandatory, so as not to take up class time.

The Artist Essay was a really good assessment of student thinking. The next Major assignment was the Mid Term Bag still life. Most worked reasonably hard on this assignment, but some did not even considering the amount of time given to complete it.

The grid homework assignment was an effective way to address how one grids off a photograph to reduce or enlarge its size. This was so student would be familiar with this technique for the Jefferson Street and Final Self Portrait project (although, unfortunately students did not necessarily use it when using photo reference).

In general, there was a lot of momentum gained after Spring Break and students could sustain their drawings for longer amounts of time. At this time most of the class figured out that projects takes time and effort, and that late projects can hurt one’s final grade.

At the end of the semester we lost a bit of time for exploring color, but what we did explore was convincing (ink, watercolor and colored pencils).

The Jefferson Street books were, on the whole, very good. They were well constructed, well drawn and were a good way to talk about perspective in a real world sense. The Old Master Self Portrait was less than great. Many students did not put in the time necessary to complete a major Final assignment. I was really disappointed by the lack of ambition and follow through.

TIME/EFFORT: A frustration was that students are not drawing enough outside of class- but I always think this. Students who have seen the most success are the ones that have drawn the most, been to each class (on time) and worked on their own. More sketchbook homework assignments and ideas coupled with still life work partially addressed this. The other half must come form the student’s desire to learn. I took up the sketchbook once before the end of the semester, giving pointers and suggestions. I also supplied an “ideas” sheet when students asked.

The Drawing Workbook was a good thing- instead of endless handouts. The students could read ahead for ideas, etc. I included a calendar for students this year in the workbook- so they had all the due dates visually in front of them. They changed a bit, but students need to manage time better.


VISITING ARTISTS or FIELD TRIPS: We hosted Aimee Miller, Kaleena Tucker’s talk on GD and my talk on Professional Development. We will go to the NPL Barry Moser show as a class. We also watched th “Made Here” series, very good, as supplement.

I feel that most students gained insight on how to see, how to train your hand to draw what you see, not what you think you see. Many students have suffered from not attending class or attending late, thus missing intros to class. Others have suffered from a) missing class and b) not trying at all to make up anything they missed in their absence.

I intended to bring in artists books each Tuesday (Old Master) and Thursday (contemporary)-will schedule these out better next time. I also gave quizzes to cover course work and informative conversations.
I began a blog just for sketch booking and visual journals.