Researching this topic through Google turned out to be harder then I expected. I did end up finding some good resources in the end but they were few and far between. I spent over an hour and half sifting thought commercial websites, totally useless websites, and art educator blogs that had no digital art to be found. Which got me to thinking that art educators need to get with it and start using digital art in the classroom more often.
The needles I find:
- Digital Art Education: For Art Educators Who Teach Imagmaking and Design Using Computers.
Link: http://digitalarted.blogspot.com/2009/07/another-useful-book-digital-painting-in.html
- Anne Pfeiffer is a high school art /computer graphics teacher in Virginia who created a blog for her peers teaching digital art. On her blog you can find quite a few examples of her students images, as well as useful links to other relevant digital media websites.
- Art Education 2.0: Using New Technology in Art Classrooms.
Link: http://arted20.ning.com/
- This website is a social networking site for arts educators using new technology. This site allows teachers to share their student’s work and connect with each other. There are lots of great images posted however, most of them are not digital media.
- The Lens: A Network for Student Photographers.
Link: http://studentphoto.ning.com/
- This website is also a social networking site, however, it allows students to upload their own digital images and interact with each other. There are lots of great examples of student work, which might give art educators ideas for lesson plans.
- Adobe: Digital School Collection Teacher Resources.
Link: http://www.adobe.com/education/instruction/adsc/#collages
- This website was set up by Adobe the creators or Photoshop and they give lots of lessons on different digital media topics. A good place to start but wouldn’t rely entirely on Adobe to plan my unit plan.
- Lesson Planet: The Search Engine for Teachers.
Link: http://www.lessonplanet.com/search?grade=All&keywords=photoshop+art&rating=3&search_type=narrow
- This website allows you to search for different lesson plans according to subject. There were quite a few digital media lessons plans but you have to have an account set up. Not really useful unless your desperate.
- PBS Teachers: Classroom Resources/
Link: http://www.pbs.org/teachers/classroom/9-12/the-arts/resources/
- This site has lots of great lesson plans and video clips exampling how to carry out the process. No account needed and generally pretty useful. The only down side is that they don’t have good examples of student’s finished work.
The sites listed give a pretty good starting point and an idea of what digital arts education has to offer. Overall I was pretty disappointed in what I found out there, most sites were not user friendly, and didn’t give enough quality examples of student work. However, I have hope that over the next few years as educators become more computer literate that will start to change.
