Engaging Teachers and Students in Visual Arts Learning
A workshop for teams of teachers

Four successful, day-long workshops were conducted on November 9, November 15, December 2, and December 8 at Carnegie Museum of Art. A total of 57 teachers participated from 18 different schools including several Pittsburgh Public Schools, Wilkinsburg Middle School, Bentworth Elementary, Woodland Hills High School, South Butler Intermediate, Bethel Park High School, Blackhawk High School, Urban League of Greater Pittsburgh Charter School, Greensburg Central Catholic High School, and several independent schools including The Ellis School, Winchester Thurston, and Shadyside Academy. These workshops were highly praised in the follow-up evaluations.

CMA staff led teachers in an interactive experience and thoughtful dialogue about how learning skills developed in their classroom could cross disciplines. This would become a major element of their students’ visit to the museum.

CMA docents and staff led teachers on an interactive experience through the two concurrent photography exhibitions: Teenie Harris and Picturing the City.  Later in the day, teachers had free time to explore these exhibitions with their school teams to plan for their museum visit with students.

In the final part of the workshop, teachers had “team time” to plan their museum visit one-on-one with CMA education staff.  Our evaluation team from the University of Pittsburgh used an online survey to take note of how teachers used a pilot registration system. Later, they gave CMA staff useful insights to the teachers’ ideas, questions, evaluations, and the overall picture of the workshops.