POR Tiscar Lara 29/03/09 // Español
Transversalia deals with one of the hardest things in education: the effort to adapt situations, issues and discussions of life, that is sometimes left out of school, to embedded them in the curriculum with topics such as health, consumption, environment, sexuality, democracy, etc.. But the originality of his proposal remains in using the contemporary art as the way to discuss them. This is because Transversalia understand arts education as an interdisciplinary knowledge and critical understanding of contemporary society.
To develop these adaptations, as Clara Boj told us in her project presentation in the symposium, they bring together teachers of different subjects and help them to think about how contemporary works can teach across the curriculum.
This mixture produces small teaching units to work issues such as war, the environment care or the responsible consumption in the classroom through the representations of contemporary artists.
The choice of this kind of art as a vehicle for social and educational tool is not casual for Clara Boj "works are closer to the students about aesthetics and interpretations, and allow them to tell their own story" and add "good contemporary art shows different perspectives of reality, providing the students opinions and views to think about them. "
The pedagogical model of teaching objectives by Transversalia makes us think of the theoretical work on curriculum and postmodern art education developed by Cary, Clark and Efland:
1. Experiential: What can I learn from myself to the work. 2. Conceptual: What does it make me think with what is shown. 3. Analysis: how can I apply and relate it to life, with the environment. 4. Communication: How do I spread this experience, how do I communicate it.
As a sample of his work in action, she offered us some examples of contemporary works and its possible relationship with curriculum content:
Candice Breitz Becoming Series in which imitates the gestures of Hollywood actresses and films themselves (interesting to work on gesture and expression in Sports Education).
Kalle Laar, Calling the glacier,, a listening experience to reflect on the transformation of nature (useful for issues of Environment)
Jeremy Wood and Hugh Prior, with his GPS drawing to work with maps and perception of reality (for subjects of Geography and History)
Eduardo Kac and his GPF Bunny (for Biology and Geology, in terms of life evolution).
Annette Messager and his collection of feminine proverbs to discuss stereotypes, sexist language, cultural traditions, etc..
Clara Boj invited us to the next seminar of Transversalia: those teachers interested in expanding the curriculum from contemporary art, have an opportunity to work with Transversalia at the seminar who is scheduled for May in La Laboral Gijón. The proposed theme: the expanded landscape.