High School Lesson Plan: Artcology in the Urban Environment

Artcology in the Urban Environment

Teacher: Kate Kaliner

Grade Level: 9-12

Brief Background:
“Recognizing art as a useful and necessary behavior is a way for us to understand humanity's relationship to the rest of the world, and to attempt to restore our role in the cycles that envelop us, unrecognized, all the time.” (Creative and Green: Art, Ecology, and Community, by Sarah E. Graddy)

In the past 50 years, Philadelphia has suffered a significant loss of population, due largely to a declining industrial base and shifting population patterns. One of the results has been a huge and growing inventory of abandoned land. At last count, there are over 31,000 vacant lots in neighborhoods throughout the city, representing a blight that diminishes property values and discourages reinvestment opportunities.

A well-kept park reflects a community with a healthy quality of life, while a neglected, trashed space reveals the despair of a struggling neighborhood. Many cities across the country are faced with decreasing budgets, and this often trickles down to adversely affect their parks and public spaces. It raises a tough question: With limited resources, how do we best care for our neighborhood parks, whose condition in many ways mirrors and even influences that of their larger communities? (The Pennsylvania Horticultural Society: Protecting Our Open Space Investments)

Involvement in the transformation their environment will provide students with a personal connection to the community. By taking an artistic approach, students may creatively express themselves while assuming a productive role in making their world and better, more beautiful place.

National Art Content Standards:
9-12 Content Standard 1: Understanding and applying media, techniques, and processes
9-12 Content Standard 2: Using knowledge of structures and functions
9-12 Content Standard 3: Choosing and evaluating a range of subject matter, symbols, and ideas
9-12 Content Standard 5: Reflecting upon and assessing the characteristics and merits of their work and the work of others
9-12 Content Standard 6: Making connections between visual arts and other disciplines

National Education Standards for Technology:
1. Basic operations and concepts
- Students demonstrate a sound understanding of the nature and operation of technology systems.
- Students are proficient in the use of technology.

2. Social, ethical, and human issues
- Students practice responsible use of technology systems, information, and software.
- Students develop positive attitudes toward technology uses that support lifelong learning, collaboration, personal pursuits, and productivity.

3. Technology productivity tools
- Students use technology tools to enhance learning, increase productivity, and promote creativity.
- Students use productivity tools to collaborate in constructing technology-enhanced models, prepare publications, and produce other creative works.

4. Technology communications tools
- Students use a variety of media and formats to communicate information and ideas effectively to multiple audiences.

5. Technology research tools
- Students use technology to locate, evaluate, and collect information from a variety of sources.
- Students use technology tools to process data and report results.
- Students evaluate and select new information resources and technological innovations based on the appropriateness for specific tasks.

6. Technology problem-solving and decision-making tools
- Students use technology resources for solving problems and making informed decisions.
- Students employ technology in the development of strategies for solving problems in the real world.

Goal: Working in groups of three, students will create an original design for restoring a vacant lot in the local community, by transforming it into a beautiful, sustainable environment.

Objectives:
1. Students will understand the effect of abandoned land in their community, and on the environment as a whole.
2. Students will use synthesized information from several disciplines to solve real-life problems.
3. Students will use action-oriented inquiry strategies that involve direct experience, observation and reflection, critical thinking, and planned action in their art and ecology projects.
4. Students will investigate how art, aesthetics, culture, and ecology are interconnected.
5. Students will recognize art as a useful tool for understanding, evaluating and restoring humanity’s relationship with the rest of the world.
6. Students will study the political, social, cultural, spiritual, economic, and scientific issues that impact the development of a sustainable, healthy ecosystem.
7. Students will improve skills in collaborative learning and critical thinking.
8. Students will use technology to explore and create designs in ecological art projects
9. Working in groups of three, students will create an original design for restoring a vacant lot in the local community, by transforming it into a beautiful, sustainable environment.

Requirements:
1. Individual student research and reflective writing on the political and ecological factors relating to the abandonment of land in the urban environment, arts-based revitalization efforts, and issues of sustainability.
2. Visual evidence of individual and group planning, and testing of materials (i.e. sketches, exemplars, lot layout, color choices, etc.)
3. 3D rendering of lot design in Sketch Up.
4. Group philosophical/ artistic statement (explanation of design and plan for sustainability)

Resource Materials/ Visual Aids:
1. Books/ Magazines relating to eco art, sustainability, urban planning, etc.
Readymade: Instructions for Everyday Life (green design magazine)
2. Websites (starting points for research)

Supplies/ Materials:
1. Computers/ Computer programs Google Earth and Sketch Up
2. Paper
3. Pencils
4. Markers
5. Paint
6. Various other materials to be used in production of plans and examples of designs

Teacher Preparation: Teacher will research and understand trends in eco art, urban/ community planning/development/revitalization, sustainability, and green design. Teacher will be familiar with artists working with eco art, and the computer programs Google Earth and Sketch Up.

Introduction:
Class will visit a vacant lot in the local environment, and while there will discuss, take notes, and document the environment and what is found there. If a class trip is not possible, the teacher may show video or photographs of a vacant lot instead.
Afterward, the class will discuss what they observed, and the issue of land abandonment in the urban environment. The teacher will introduce the class to artists working with eco art, and will ask the class the class how they might use eco art to transform the vacant lot in a way that would benefit the community and the environment.
The teacher will divide the class into groups of three, and each group will be responsible for coming up with an original design which they will render in Sketch Up. Each student within in the group will choose an aspect of the environment and/ or design on which to focus, and will be responsible for individually researching and writing a response to his/ her findings.

Directions:
1. Within groups, each student will choose an aspect of the environment on which to focus their design. Examples might be turning the trash into sculpture, incorporation of plants and flowers, etc.
2. Students will research political and ecological factors relating to the abandonment of land in the urban environment, arts-based revitalization efforts, and ideas of sustainability. Students may use Google Earth to explore other such efforts or eco art in other parts of the world.
3. Students will write a one-page response paper on their findings and ideas.
4. Working within groups students will devise an original design, plan for sustainability, and rendering in Sketch Up.

Critique/ Assessment: Each group will share their designs and plans with the class. The class will discuss their success in reclaiming and redesigning the environment, and what they have learned in the process.

Time Budget/ Allotment: Several weeks

Extension: Class may decide upon the strongest aspects of each group’s design, and explore the possibility of putting the plan into action. What steps will need to take place? Class may also decide upon ways to educate and bring design ideas to the community.

Vocabulary:
Ecology- the study of the relationships and interactions between living organisms and their natural or developed environment

Sustainable- able to be maintained; exploiting natural resources without destroying the ecological balance of a particular area

Green- supporting or promoting the protection of the environment; produced in an environmentally friendly way, for example, by using renewable resources

References:
Creative and Green: Art, Ecology, and Community, by Sarah E. Graddy
http://greenmuseum.org/generic_content.php?ct_id=238

Artful Trash Management, RiverCubes, & Cultural Contagion, by Bob Johnson
http://greenmuseum.org/generic_content.php?ct_id=273

Great Public Spaces: The Village of Arts and Humanities
http://www.pps.org/great_public_spaces/one?public_place_id=567&public_place_id=567

The Eden Project
http://www.edenproject.com/index.html

Protecting Our Open Space Investments
http://www.pennsylvaniahorticulturalsociety.org/phlgreen/protecting_open_space.html

Treehugger (everything green)
http://treehugger.com

Susan Leibovitz Steinman: Environmental & Public Art Installations
http://www.steinmanstudio.com/index.shtml