Motivación

Immediately following the first visit I sent the teacher the first interview protocol. A week later the teacher and I met to participate in the first interview and preliminary planning session. The purpose of the initial, one-hour interview was to establish the setting of the study, clarify the starting point in terms of prior knowledge and experience, and to gather broader data about the teacher’s educational philosophy, background and interest in arts education. The questions then began to focus more narrowly on the teacher’s ideas and thoughts about the use of sensory- based strategies in arts education. Interview transcripts were shared with the teacher following the interview for verification and or clarification. During this meeting I shared my preliminary plan to begin with a lesson to provide general overview of the project to familiarize the

students with some of the vocabulary and concepts associated with sensory work, flow, and engagement in order to inform and prepare the students for the work to come.

My second visit, the first official lesson, was an opportunity for me to share more ideas about the project and introduce vocabulary associated with sensory learning, engagement, and the concept of flow (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990) so the students felt informed and connected to the project. For this lesson I created a power-point for the teacher to lead in class. The purpose of this lesson was to introduce the students to some of the language of the senses, the arts and the idea of flow (Csikszentmihalyi, 1990). During this lesson we discussed the main ideas and I gathered diagnostic information to help inform the direction that the research would take. I gathered data from the students to determine what they liked to learn, how they liked to learn and I gave them the opportunity to share their own experiences of flow (Appendix E). At this point I was still experimenting with existing curricular content to determine the best approach. The teacher and I were in the exploratory phase of programming the sensory learning. The teacher had informed me that the students were designing dwellings in math so following the power-point and diagnostic reflection, I facilitated a visualization exercise to help the students consider their dwellings in an imaginative and sensorial way through creative movement. It was challenging to work with these students in the afternoon and hold their attention and interest. After observing the class and facilitating the movement I determined that the first sense to investigate would be auditory with an emphasis on active listening strategies and skills. I knew this would be essential for the success of the project regardless of the curricular content that we would focus on throughout the study.

A major turning point in the study was when the teacher and I decided to focus the learning exclusively on the book, Fatty Legs (Jordan-Fenton & Pokiak-Fenton, 2010). During the fourth visit when the students were actively involved in their soundscape activity (described in more detail in 4.2) both the teacher and I knew that there was great potential for the students to have a deeper and more meaningful experience by focusing the sensory arts experiences exclusively on the themes generated by this book. Originally, I had resisted the specificity of the book because I thought it might be too exclusive for the study. I soon realized that my hesitation was linked to my concern that if the study focused too much on one source it would not do enough or it would not be as useful. I let go of the unrealistic notion that I wanted the study to

encompass as much as possible. Relinquishing that expectation and realizing specificity and focus benefitted the research and made it stronger was part of my own learning journey. Basing the work on specific, rich content had much better potential. Teachers and researchers could apply similar strategies and approaches to adapt the ideas across the curriculum and find their own meaningful and authentic connections with source material of their choice, based on their curricular needs and student interest.

During the fieldwork, the teacher and I facilitated sensory-based awareness through various creative processes in different arts disciplines. Students practiced using their senses and mind- body awareness to explore and respond through the disciplines. During the study, the students were actively involved in constructing their learning. The sources and materials were

interpreted in different ways to highlight the importance of multiple points of view, multiple ways of knowing, multiple learning styles and preferences. The teacher considered students’ prior knowledge and access to materials in order to determine how to introduce the strategies. The students practiced different methods of relaxation and engaged in exercises that activated somatic memory and mind-body awareness. They explored physical and metaphoric

connections in movement, writing, drama, and visual art and made explicit connections between their sensory, experiential learning, and the curriculum. Students participated in individual and collaborative sensory-based arts experiences and assessed and reflected on their own creative and critical processes.