Blog Post by: Claudia Michael, APSI Art & Design Instructor
If you Google the title of this post you will find many reasons why students and artists in general should keep a sketchbook. In fact I urge you to search the Internet for the benefits of visual journaling, as there are a lot of good ideas to be found.
Here, I want to highlight the relationship of the National Core Art Standards to the rigorous activity and higher order thinking associated with keeping a visual journal and how it relates to the skills that are assessed in the AP exam.
Specifically, sketchbook or process work is highly valued in the Sustained Investigation section of the AP Art and Design exam.
You will observe that the National Core Art Standards:
Creating
Performing, Presenting, Producing
Responding
Connecting
These align with the AP Art and Design skills:
AP Course skill 1: Inquiry and Investigation.
AP Course skill 2: Making through Practice, Experimentation, and Revision
AP Course skill 3: Communication and Reflection
Let’s begin with Creating. When students make entries in a sketchbook, they are interpreting what they see, what they know or what they imagine through processing information. Sometimes they are collecting and other times curating materials and ideas. Higher order thinking skills such as investigation, authorship, formulation and construction are activated. Drawing in a sketchbook is more than just recording information, it is also processing information. It allows the artist to select, appraise, judge, critique and reflect. Inquiry is used to ponder questions, construct knowledge, and examine what is known and seek what is unknown. Teachers can encourage thoughtful use of sketchbooks by supporting student choices and pointing out the generative properties of asking questions to support ideation. Sketchbook/Process work serves as essential evidence of the application of AP course skills.
AP Course skill 1: Inquiry and Investigation.
AP Course skill 2: Making through Practice, Experimentation, and Revision
Presenting and Producing: Sketchbook/Process work allows the student to think “out loud”. By describing, explaining, defending, and asking questions about their work, students develop insight into their own learning and metacognition. Working with peers in productive critique promotes collaboration, an important 21st century skill. Sharing works in progress is risk taking. When presenting becomes comfortable, student confidence flourishes and self-knowledge evolves. The presentation of sketchbook/process work serves as essential evidence of the application of AP course skills.
AP Course skill 2: Making through Practice, Experimentation, and Revision
AP Course skill 3: Communication and Presenting
When students are encouraged to Respond to their own work and the work of their peers, they exercise the ability to discern and organize their thoughts. They develop descriptive language skills and learn to value the work of others with diverse points of view. The ability to accept and respect diversity fosters empathy and the understanding that multiple points of view enrich one’s experience and provide avenues of thought different than one’s own. Expanding one’s thinking encourages inquiry and discovery. Teachers can promote these values through sketchbook assignments that require creative problem solving where there is no standard solution or expectation. The sketchbook is a visual “think tank”.
Sketchbook/Process work serves as essential evidence of the application of course skills.
AP Course skill 3: Communication and Reflection
The sketchbook is a perfect tool for Connecting ideas, emotions, narratives, facts, and fantasies, even when they seem unrelated. Finding connections in this way is a practice of creative individuals. Asking questions about their thinking is also a common practice of artists and creatives in general. A sketchbook can be the vehicle through which students connect to their past, present and future. Functioning as a repository for memories, and other intangible resources, sketchbooks serve as a catalyst for image making. Personal inventories of images can be curated and created in a variety of media and approaches. Positive identities grow from self-knowledge, awareness, and reflection. The visual journal can be a garden where creative growth takes place.
Sketchbook/Process work serves as essential evidence of the application of AP course skills.
AP Course skill 1: Inquiry and Investigation.
AP Course skill 2: Making through Practice, Experimentation, and Revision
Although there is no required number of process or sketchbook images for the Sustained Investigation section of the AP Art and Design portfolio, they provide insight into the student’s thinking. The process/sketchbook work illustrates the means through which learning occurs and provides evidence of practice, experimentation, and revision. It is a window into the students’ cognition and creative process. The value of process work cannot be underestimated as it serves to illuminate the student’s thinking – something not always visible in the final product.
In the Sustained Investigation, the student’s written commentary and sketchbook/process work hand in hand to narrate a journey of creative problem solving, culminating in finished works that display the student’s accumulated knowledge and skill.
Claudia Michael has been a College Board endorsed AP Studio Art Consultant and exam reader for over fifteen years. In addition to grading portfolio submissions, and serving on the leadership team during portfolio evaluations, she has written published commentary for the College Board, providing rationale for the scores students received. Claudia has been an art educator for more than thirty-five years. Her experience includes teaching K-12 in private and public schools. As district mentor for the Manchester School District, she worked with new and experienced teachers across disciplines. She has taught studio art and teacher preparation classes in several New Hampshire institutions of higher education. In recent years, she has focused on using Contemporary Art to inspire K-12 curriculum. Claudia has created two courses that reflect her research for the NH Institute of Art, now the Institute of Art and Design at New England College, MAT degree program. She holds the title of senior lecturer in Studio with Granite State College. She has received two distinguished faculty awards and was Secondary School Teacher of the Year.
An award winning artist and art educator, Claudia is the recipient of three Fulbright fellowships, a Freeman Foundation Grant, two Granite State College Faculty Development Grants and a University of NH Academic Technology Grant. She has painted in several countries including Canada, Italy, Greece, Turkey, Cyprus, China, Morocco and the U.S. Claudia was recently an artist in residence in Assisi, Italy. She exhibits her work widely in New England and her paintings have won numerous awards. Her work is included in several private and corporate collections.
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