Susan G. Lea, Lawrence R. Sipe & Tricia O'Loughlin "He Said It AU in the Painting" 5

I I ARTICLES

"He Said It AU inthe Painting":UsingVisual Art to Interpretand Create Biography

SUSAN G. LEA, L A W R E N C E R. SIPE & T R I C I A O ' L O U G H L I N

The authors discuss the use of a multimodalintegrated visual art and literacy curriculumin student investigations, interpretations,and writing of biography.

THIS ARTICLE IS centrally focused on teaching biogra-phy to second grade children in what we feel are newand intriguing ways. We speak about this as a curricularproject that has already been completed and therefore areable to reflect on the various successes and challenges weexperienced. It is important to note that the teaching ofbiography was nested in a more comprehensive frameworkof teaching visual art and literacy. And although studentslearned a great deal about art and art design, we havechosen to concentrate on the exciting ways children learnedabout writing their own biographies through explor-ing biographical information about, and the art of, twowell-known artists.

Section one describes the wider project of conceptualizingan integrated art and literacy program and briefly describesthe process in which teachers (including Tricia, one ofthe authors of this article), with some input by a univer-sity professor (Larry) and his doctoral student (Susan),constructed the curriculum. In section two we delve intothe curriculum development process in more detail, whichincluded a yearlong course in theories of reader response,art elements and design, and how we view the concept ofliteracy. We discuss the framework of the units of study

we developed for Diego Rivera and Jacob Lawrence, whichculminated in the student biographies (all student namesare pseudonyms). Section three describes the elementsof teaching and learning that resulted in the children'sacquisition of the concept of biography, and presentsevidence of student responses in a number of genres andmodes. We end with some general conclusions about theinsights we gained including: (a) the importance of multimo-dality in thinking about biography, (b) the richness of suchcurricular units as they meet the standards and contents ofa number of different curricular areas, and (c) the ways inwhich certain of these types of lessons could be implementedin a more scripted curriculum.

Integrating Art and LiteracyThis article is part of a larger study of an integrated visualart and literacy curriculum. Burton, Horowitz, and Abeles(1999) argue that:

If the arts are to help define our path to the future, theyneed to become curriculum partners with other subjectdisciplines in ways that will allow them to contributetheir own distinctive richness and complexity to thelearning process, (p. 45)

journal of Children's Literature, 37(2), pp. 5-14. ©Children's Literature Assembly iSSN 1521-7779

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Subscribing to this idea and in response to the currenteducational environment in which literacy is narrowlydefined, we developed our arts and literacy and literacythrough the arts curriculum with: (a) picturebooks withillustrations reminiscent of the style of Rivera, such asDavid Diaz's illustrations for Eve Bunting's Smoky Night(1999), or picturebooks illustrated with story panels byJacob Lawrence, such as in Harriet and the Promised Land(1997), (h) age appropriate websites and biographies ofthese artists, (c) original works of art, and (d) local urbanmurals that had clearly been influenced by the style ofthese two artists. Together these four elements comprisedwhat are commonly called "text sets," collections of materi-als that illuminate a common theme, in ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^this case, the biographies and artworkof the chosen artists (Short, Harste,& Burke, 1995; Sipe, 2000b). Further,while affording equal importanceto printed and visual texts, we paidcareful attention to how the currentliteracy curriculum was enriched bythe introduction of visual art.

In exploring the complex interrelation-ships among these four types of visualand verbal texts—their "intertextual-ity" (Kristeva, 1980; Fairclough, 1992),we attempted to identify how children'sliteracy development and their aestheticabilities could be enhanced throughthe implementation of this curriculum.Recognizing the close relationship among aesthetic develop-ment, early language learning, and visual literacy, as wellas young children's demonstrated ability to identify elementsof style and distinguish among artists (Kiefer, 1988), thecurriculum was designed to foster aesthetic response,co-constructed meaning, and higher order comprehensionby presenting and exploring art in these intertextual sets(Gardner, 1982; Sipe, 2000b) while working within thecurrent state and district content standards.

This approach instantiates John Dewey's (1934, 1938) andMaxine Greene's (1995) philosophy that art should notbe divorced from everyday life and that school curriculashould integrate all of the arts across such content areas asreading and writing. Our larger project consisted of unitsof study for seven artists. We think it is important to notethat none of the authors have formal training in studio artor art history.

In Tricia's second grade classroom (see Appendix A fordemographic information about the school and classroom).

While the teachers were

enthused about building

a curriculum with visual

arts and literacy at its

core, they were hesitant

to do so without a better

understanding of the

theoretical grounding

of, and, in essence,

justification for, such work.

close connections were made through the biographicalstudy of the artists, the socio-historical context of theartists' lives, and the subjects of their artwork. Thus,biography is employed as a context for understanding inorder to situate, interpret, and create visual art in theartists' socio-historical periods.

Cur r icu lum and Teaching ContextWhile the teachers were enthused about building acurriculum with visual art and literacy at its core, theywere hesitant to do so without a better understandingof the theoretical grounding of, and, in essence, justifi-cation for, such work. As a result, Larry and Susan

^^^^^^^^^^^ structured a yearlong graduatelevel course investigating readerresponse theory (Rosenblatt, 1982),children's responses to literature(Sipe, 2000a, 2000b, 2001), currentconcepts in literacy studies (Street,1984, 1993; Pahl & Rowsell, 2006),issues of multimodality and visualgrammar (Kress & van Leeuwen,1996; Kress, 2002), and the implica-tions for arts and imagination ineducation (Gardner, 1982; Greene,1995; Eisner, 2002; Heath, 1999).The arts and literacy curriculumwas developed in an organic, inquiry-oriented fashion, without specificallydefined outcomes. Our hope was thatby pursuing these questions we could

teach children both about visual art and about readingand writing. Accordingly, initial discussions regardingbig ideas revolved around such questions as, "What is art?Who determines what 'good' art is? and Where is art?"These questions were combined with concepts of art style,art analysis, social significance, aesthetic/efferent stances,and connections to other disciplines. As one teacherstated, "We want our children to become members of the'art club'" —that is, have an "insider's" view of, and acomfortable familiarity with, visual art. Ultimately, in theyear following the course, Tricia drew on Diego Rivera'slegacy of four guiding principles for art to crystallize theenduring ideas for both the Rivera and Lawrence units.Those principles, and therefore, the enduring ideas for thetwo units, were:

n Art should be for everyone.a Art should show the importance of common people.a Art should be meaningful but accessible enough

to be understood by every viewer.a Art should make people think.

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Susan G. Lea, Lavi/rence R. Sipe & Tricia O'Loughlin "He Said It AU in the Painting" 7

We created the units of study and related lessons aroundthese ideas, and the texts, paintings, and genres that wereread, analyzed, and produced highlighted Rivera's guidingprinciples.

Tricia's primary criterion for the selection of text sets was tofind the most diverse artists who would represent a varietyof cultures and races as well as historical periods, with richfiction and nonfiction texts as resources. In addition, Triciaherself had a strong interest in issues of oppression. Withthese ideas in mind, Tricia chose the artists Diego Riveraand Jacob Lawrence for this project. Diego Rivera was aMexican Socialist who painted murals in order to bring tothe public's attention the realities of the Mexican struggle forindependence. Rivera also believed that painting everydayMexican people, as well as Mexican historical events, wouldbring pride to those of Mexican heritage. Jacob Lawrencewas an African American painter who was an observer andrecorder of the American Civil Rights struggle from the CivilWar to the end of the Twentieth Century. Lawrence, himselfa product of the Harlem Renaissance, brought to life themalevolent effects of slavery, migration, and the continualstruggle for equality. Thus, these two men represented thediversity of class, race and culture that Tricia wanted tointroduce to her second graders. (Please see references formaterials in these text sets.)

As we began to organize the units of study, Susan andTricia noticed many similarities between the life and art ofDiego Rivera and Jacob Lawrence. Rivera told the storiesof Mexican history while Lawrence told the story of theAfrican American experience. They both created visualnarratives about their own people, the social inequities ofthe times, and the quest for justice. When we invited thechildren to compare Rivera and Lawrence, they were ableto identify similarities in the historical context and theartists' social justice stances as well as differences in theart styles in which each painted, all of which was recordedon a Venn diagram. The children noticed that while Riverapainted murals, Lawrence painted some murals but mostlypaintings and story panels. Rivera used frescoes, whileLawrence used gouache in painting up to 60 sequentialstory panels simultaneously. Rivera's works filled the entirecanvas, had duller, quiet, or muted color, included patterns,and were realistic or life-like. Lawrence's works exhibitedmore fiuidity and motion in space, bright bold colors, andincluded soft, abstract patterns. Indeed, Jacob Lawrencewas influenced by Diego Rivera's work: he actually watchedRivera paint a mural in New York City.

In order to create context during each unit of study, eachartist was introduced by reading aloud a biography. Facts

about the artist's life were charted and used to make atimeline later in the unit. After the main biography wasread, the children worked in partnerships and read variousother biographies written about the artist. They added tothe facts-about-the-artist chart and included some of theseevents in the timeline. Websites were used to further thecollection of information and visual images of the artists'work. All of these activities served to immerse childrenin biography in order to facilitate their future success inwriting in the genre (Bamford & Kristo, 2003). As thechildren began to discover the artist's life, a power pointpresentation was created and presented in order to give thechildren the background knowledge of the historical eventsand social perspectives for each time period, recognizingthat children's sometimes lackluster biographies are oftenthe result of minimal historical knowledge (Harvey, 1998).To support these ideas, nonfiction and historical fictiontexts were read aloud in large and small groups as wellas independently and in reading workshop. During eachunit of study Tricia worked with the class in whole groupsand modeled for the children in order to scaffold theirlearning. Then she gradually released responsibility as thechildren worked in small groups or independently duringplanned art and literacy learning center activities (Pearson& Gallagher, 1983). In the next section we discuss thesecenters in greater detail.

As the units progressed and the children's knowledge of theartists' lives and the historical context grew, the artists'work was presented in reproduced images drawn frompicturebooks and the internet. In addition, the childrenvisited a local art museum and studied some of Rivera'sfrescoes. The children were asked to "read the paintings"(Kress & van Leeuwen, 1996). Prompting questions suchas, "What do you see? How does it make you feel? Whatstory is the artist telling you?" were used to guide thechildren initially. As children analyzed the works of artin order to read the painting, Tricia slowly introducedart element and composition terms. While she initiatedconversations about art elements such as color, contrast,space, texture and line, children ultimately co-constructedtheir own definitions, which were later compared to, anddeemed superior to, the dictionary definitions. Graduallythe children began to use this language to describe whatthey saw in the artists' works as well as other works of art,illustration, and photographs, and in their own writing.

In addition to the art and literacy centers, there wereculminating projects for the two units and a trip to visitmurals that were inspired by the works of Rivera andLawrence. During the Rivera unit, the children werefascinated to learn that Rivera sometimes had to chip

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away the plaster when painting his frescoes in order torectify an error. They were also distraught to learn thatsome of the frescoes fell apart with age. Building on thechildren's interest and inquiry in this area, the childrenmade and painted their own frescoes. Families donated theingredients and were invited into the classroom; adults andchildren alike mixed the plaster, molded, and painted tocreate the frescoes. The frescoes were related to biographi-cal information about Rivera's life.

Central to the Lawrence unit was Lawrence's interest intelling and painting stories of heroes. Accordingly, eachchild was asked to choose a special person in his/her life tointerview in order to write a biography about him or her.With the information they learned from the interviews,the children wrote biographies about their own "everydayheroes" and also produced story panels that were similar tothe style of Jacob Lawrence.

Throughout the Rivera and Lawrence units, data werecollected in a number of ways. Class discussions and smallgroup work in centers were audiotaped and then selectivelytranscribed. Both Susan and Tricia kept observation notesand reflective journals. Class artifacts and student work wereretained in their original form, or copied or photographed.In addition, on occasion, students were photographed orvideotaped in their work. All student work, including theculminating biographies and accompanying artwork, wasexamined through informal assessments guided by the statedunderstandings and goals of the integrated curriculum, thegoals of the school's traditional literacy curriculum, and therelevant state content standards.

Elements of Teaching and LearningAbout BiographyIn this section we describe specific lessons and unit activitiesthat we consider to be critical elements in the teaching of, andlearning to write in, the genre of biography. Student work ishighlighted to illustrate our observations. Although biogra-phy was a significant focus in the Rivera unit, we have chosento concentrate our analysis on the more pertinent activitiesin the Lawrence unit because they were designed with theculminating "everyday hero" biography project in mind.

The Venn diagram comparing Rivera and Lawrenceserved as a whole class activity and as a precursor to aten-minute independent activity (several days later) wherechildren were asked to create a T-chart based on theirfactual recall, indicating on the left side of the T-chartwhat they remembered about Jacob Lawrence's life andwhat they knew about his art on the right. The potentialvisual juxtaposition of these two themes afforded by the

T-chart was not by accident: Tricia wanted to encour-age the children to see and consider connections betweenLawrence's life and his artwork. Indeed, there were severalexamples of precisely this. For instance, one child wroteabout Lawrence's life: "He only heard about white heroes,"and opposite was an entry about Lawrence's art: "[His]paint[ings] showed important historical events [involv-ing African Americans]." In another T-chart, "Jacob gotideas for painting by looking around in the town [Harlem]"is opposite "His art is mostly about Black history." Andfinally, a description of Lawrence being abandoned by hisfather—"after a few days his dad left his house, he wentsomewhere"—is across from an artwork comment thatreads, "Jacob Lawrence painted big and strong people inthe Great Migration" (though Lawrence himself was born inAtlantic City in 1917 and moved to Harlem in 1930).

For several weeks following the creation of the T-charts,children worked in small groups and independently inthree literacy and arts centers, all designed to allowchildren to investigate elements of biography and toexamine Lawrence's art as biographical text. The centersfocused on: (a) art elements and design as a means ofinterpreting art, (b) writing captions to Lawrence's panels,and (c) writing imagined biographies about figures inLawrence's paintings. In the "art elements center," forexample, children were asked to identify art elements in aparticular panel of their choosing, using the sophisticatedvocabulary which they had by then internalized. Next thechildren wrote a description of the "story you think JacobLawrence is trying to tell," and last, the children wereasked to indicate whether they thought Jacob Lawrence had"succeeded or failed" in telling his story, citing evidence tosupport their response. Thus, through the centers, therewas a "refiguring" of art by privileging the visual mode as aresource for making meaning (Bartlett & Holland, 2002).

In these readings of a painting's story, children not onlyemployed their prior knowledge, but also altered andadjusted their understanding based on new informationderived from the paintings (Fairclough, 1992; Kristeva,1980; Sipe, 1997). The children demonstrated a facilitywith discussing art elements and composition in thepaintings, such as the notations of "dull colors," "a lot ofspace in the foreground." "movement," "contrast: the man'ssuit is dark, the girl's stockings are light," and "smoothtexture," as well as the implication of such elements withrespect to painting mood and message. In addition tociting art elements, children related the story lines to thehistorical backdrop. Analyzing the Great Migration panels,one child wrote that he believed Lawrence was telling"how harebal [horrible] it was back then." Another child

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Susan G. Lea, Lawrence R. Sipe & Tricia O'LoughUn "He Said It AU in the Painting" 9

observed, "I think he is trying to tell how people tryed toget from the south to the north and how they did it." Thissame child indicated that Lawrence succeeded in tellingthis story because "he added details and did good coloringand you can feel there feelings." Grant (1989) articulatesthis concept in discussing Lawrence's work, referring toconveyance of "a disposition, an attitude, a state" (p. 528)rather than a simple statement of historical fact.

An even more sophisticated analysis, though, was theinferred meaning the children were making of the panelsand the way in which they were situating that meaning ina social justice context. For example, a notation describingthe story of The Card Game panel was. "Oley [only] blackpeolel [people] could play cards with black peolel [people]."Another child, referencing The Builders panel, wrote: "Ithink he's trying to say that all different kinds of peoplecan work together." The children's work in this center, then,evidenced their interpretation of Lawrence's visual artas a recursive process built upon the interrelationship ofexisting knowledge and new experiences.

Of particular importance to this unit's purpose wasJacob Lawrence's multiple series of gouache panels whichdepict the lives of the Haitian revolutionary ToussaintL'Ouverture, abolitionists John Brown and HarrietTubman, and the Migration of the Negro series. Lawrencedescribed his work as a social commentary resultingfrom his own experiences, in some cases autobiographi-cal or biographical in nature (Grant, 1989). Thus, wewere especially interested in the double conveyance ofsuch narrative through the common nonfiction techniqueof captioning: most of Lawrence's panels are captioned.Accordingly, in the "captions center," children were askedto select one of Jacoh Lawrence's panels and write a captionfor it. This technique would later be used for the children'sown "everyday heroes" biography triptych panels.

As with the "art elements center," this center invited thechildren to engage their imagination as well as their abilityto infer. The "captions center" also was an opportunity toexperiment with a specific writing convention: while theywere familiar with reading captions, the children hadlittle previous experience in writing them. We were againimpressed with the integration of historical knowledge inthe captions, but also struck by the children's imaginationand sophisticated use of language—sometimes humorous,sometimes sobering. For example, a child captioningVaudeville wrote, "On amateur night anyone could performbut if the audience didn't like it, they were out!" On a moreserious note, revisiting themes of discrimination whilewriting about the panel Separation, a child's caption was.

"white and black go [together], but white and black ona person goes nowhere." In other words, the panel bothcontrasts white and black colors and represents white andblack people, but never as engaging in activities together.

Literacy involves making meaning of both the word andthe world (Freiré, 1970) while recognizing text as bothprinted and visual (Arnheim, 1982). Thus, the captionswriting center prompted children to draw on imagina-tion and perception, botb critical elements in construct-ing meaning, in making connections to text, in cognitivedevelopment, and in sophisticated language use (Eisner.2002; Greene, 1995; Heath, 1999). To read the word andthe world in Lawrence's artwork, then, required familiaritywith the historical context, an understanding of his panels,a knowledge of his life experiences, and an ability to makemeaning of his words in the form of captions and otherwritten work. The children in Tricia's classroom had beenwell-prepared to understand all of these elements.

The last of the three centers concentrated on biography—an imagined biography of figures in Lawrence's artwork.This center was intended to prepare children for the longerbiographies they would be writing about their own heroes,while not losing sight of the artwork and historical contextthey had been studying. The directions for this center read:

Choose one of Jacoh Lawrence's artworks that includesa person. Study it carefully. As you read this artwork,remember to make inferences. Pretend you know oneof these people in his artwork. Write a biography aboutthe person you choose.

One of the children, using Forward Together, a panel aboutHarriet Tubman leading slaves to freedom, identified one ofthe characters as "Rita," tracing Rita's arduous journey withHarriet to freedom by "always following the North star."

While the "imagined" biographies continued to demonstratethe children's engagement in interpreting visual art in thesocio-historical context, the concept of biography appearedto be expanding exponentially. During the Jacob Lawrenceunit, the class read The Great Migration (1995), a picture-book authored by Lawrence and illustrated with his storypanels. The conversation around this semi-autobiographicaltext was very powerful as children connected their impres-sions of Lawrence's perspective, as interpreted through hisart, to their knowledge of Civil Rights activists Rosa Parksand Martin Luther King, Jr., about whom they had learnedthrough books and activities during Black History month.Although the children wanted to continue to explore theoppressive nature of this time, Tricia opted to provide a

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balance by sharing the cultural richness of this historicalperiod. Accordingly, she introduced texts about the HarlemRenaissance including picturebook biographies about EllaFitzgerald. Fats Waller, Duke Ellington. Chick Webb, andLangston Hughes, among others. In addition, over severalweeks, the class listened to the music of Ella Fitzgerald andread and analyzed the poetry of Langston Hughes. Childrenbrought CD recordings of Ella Fitzgerald from their parents'collection, marveling at the fact that their parents knewwho Fitzgerald was. In this way, the learning boundariesbetween classroom and home became blurred (Dyson, 1989).

Capitalizing on the multidisciplinary and multimodalaspects of the curriculum, the school's music teacherincorporated the works of Ella Fitzgerald and Duke Elling-ton into her classes, while the librarian read aloud poemsfrom Langston Hughes and offered dozens of books onthese musicians, poets, and artists to satisfy the children'scuriosity. Soon, Fitzgerald's voice became the classroombackground noise at the beginning and end of schooldays, and during independent work periods. Through thismultimodal focus, children became immersed in the socialand cultural trends of the time period. More interestingly,though, children now referred to all of these individu-als—Jake (Jacob Lawrence's nickname), Ella, Duke, andDiego (from their previous studies)—by their first names,as though they had become intimate friends with them.At this point, children were spontaneously bringing frombome biographical information they bad retrieved from theinternet or other sources. They reveled in, and were eagerto share, connections and chance encounters with "Jake" or"Ella" in various multimodal and multimedia contexts in andoutside of school. During work at one of the centers, a childjoyfully exclaimed "I could do this all night long!" whichwas followed by a small group of students fantasizing about"a school sleepover with Jake." Rosenblatt (1982) discussesthe aesthetic stance in reading as a space where personalfeelings, ideas, and attitudes surface; reading is experientialand "lived through" (p. 269). With the powerfully intimateand broad conception of biography now embraced by thestudents in Tricia's class, these children had moved beyonda "lived tbrough" experience and were continuously "livingwith" the subjects of their study: it was as if "Jake" and"Ella" were actually in the classroom and at home.

Taking up the children's fascination with Ella Fitzgerald inparticular, students were asked to write in their ThinkingLogs, imagining they were at the Apollo Theatre and hadthe opportunity to ask Ella Fitzgerald one question. Whenthis assignment was introduced there were shrieks ofexcitement at the prospect of "asking Ella." Lead sentencesfor these pieces captured this enthusiasm with wonderful

imagery: "It's sooooooo cool!!! I'm at the Apollo Theatre andElla is singing my favorite song a tiskit a taskat." AnotherThinking Log began:

I couldn't believe I got tickets to see Ella Fitzgerald.The theater was filled with excitement. The seatswere crowed [crowded]. Then, the lights went off. Ellasounded great and everyone was pumped. It was thefeeling of a lifetime. Ella looked amazing in her gown.

Through biographies of Jacob Lawrence, the childrendiscovered that he never learned about important AfricanAmericans when he was in school, but rather from peoplehe met in his community while growing up in Harlem.Lawrence was determined to paint the stories of these"everyday heroes" so others could learn about this importanthistory. Accordingly, Tricia's class was well aware thatLawrence's panels, influenced by historical fact and context,conveyed meaning that the accompanying printed textand captions could not, as is the symbiotic nature of printand illustration in any picturebook (Nodelman, 1988).In describing a panel in the picturebook Harriet and thePromised Land (Lawrence, 1997), one child commented.

It [the art] has a story behind it...it has meaning, likefor Harriet Tubman's big hand, it has meaning likeshe was strong even though it didn't say it in the book.Jacob Lawrence put it in the painting that she had a bighand and was very strong...he said it all in the paintinginstead [of the printed text].

Thus, this child's description of how Lawrence representedTubman's strength indicates recognition, as Kress (2002)has noted, that the visual mode offers affordances that thewritten cannot. And it was this concept that was pursuedin creating written biographies integrated with art paneltriptychs in the style of Jacob Lawrence as the culminatingproject for the unit.

Children began the biographies to tell the story of their"everyday heroes" by identifying and interviewing theirsubject. They wrote their text while paying attention tokey events that would be worthy of visual documentation.First they sketched ideas for three art panels to accompanytheir printed text biographies, and then created them fromabstract, bold-colored construction-paper pieces. Drawingon their experiences in the "captions center," they wrote acaption for each panel. In effect, the visual panels becamethe more dominant mode for the biography, similar toLawrence's work. The written biographies, along with thetriptych art panels, were displayed in the school's atriumso that the entire school community could participate in

JOURNAL OF CHILDREN'S LITERATURE VOL 37 NO 2 FALL 2011

Susan G. Lea, Lawrence R. Sipe & Tricia O'Loughlin "He Said It AU in the Painting"

calling into question the privileging of printed text overthe visual. One example of a student-made triptych and itsaccompanying biography is found in Figure 1.

The unit concluded with a trip to see two urban muralsin the style of Jacob Lawrence. They were located on thesides of buildings, emphasizing the public and accessibledimensions of art. The children were asked to make notes onclipboards regarding the murals, including what stood outfor them, and what similarities and differences they notedbetween the artist's original work and the murals. As mightbe expected, many children drew on their knowledge ofJacob Lawrence and his life to make observations regarding

the murals, highlighting the affinity they now felt towardhim, his work, and their interpretation of its meaning. Whilethey were standing in front of it, Tricia asked one of herstudents what she made of the abstract mural:

Student: It looks like hands.Tricia: Which colors?Student: The white.Tricia : Remember the painting of Harriet looking likeshe was floating?Student: It [the mural] is very abstract. I am not quitesure what it is about.Tricia : Well, what do you think it might be about?Student: It is like she is flying away to freedom.Tricia : Could he.Student: (after pause) He [Lawrence] wanted us to bethinking about what happened.

Final ThoughtsWe posit that the multimodal aspect of our arts andliteracy curriculum adds a new dimension to how teachersand students think about biography. The students in thisstudy took up biography in the context of enduring ideasabout art, and, we suggest, incorporated those ideas intheir conceptualization of biography. As one child observedof Lawrence's art: "He paints everyday people. He drewlittle stories about the world. He makes [people] thinkreally hard about what happened." This is the essence of adeeper connection to biography—extending to an intimatemeaning-making and an understanding of the implicationsof someone's life in the context of the past and present.

Kress (1997), discussing imagination in different modes,draws a distinction between two-dimensional representationand three-dimensional objects, particularly with respectto how one interacts with such texts. The two-dimensionalrepresentation, such as a written text or picture, involvesthe imagination into a distanced world, as compared tothe practical engagement with a three-dimensional object

in the real world. As Kress (1997) notes, in the case oftwo-dimensional representation, "the movement is towardsthe distanced world, where I make the move into thatworld; in the other case [three-dimensional] the movementis towards me and my present practical world" (p. 27). Wepropose that immersion in artist biography and criticalanalysis of those artists' works, extended by childrencreating their own three-dimensional art—frescoes andstory panel triptychs—shifted their understanding of Rivera

FIGURE 1Triptych

Biography

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1 2 ARTICLES

and Lawrence from a distanced perspective to one thatcame to them, residing in their real world. That is, students"lived with" their knowledge about, and impressions of,these artists-as-people and of the biographical nature oftheir art, resulting in a sophisticated, higher-order levelconceptualization of what it means to interpret and createbiography.

When contemplating the curriculum, teachers focused firstand foremost on essential questions and enduring ideas.They had the luxury of pursuing what intrigued themabout visual art, literacy learning, and the possibilities ofteaching within and around the text sets. As the curriculumtook shape, teachers referenced the state content standards,not from the stance of which standards needed to becovered, but from the perspective of which standards werebeing addressed by virtue of the richness of the curriculum.In other words, the assumption was that in taking up broadand sophisticated concepts in the curriculum the contentstandards would naturally be incorporated.

Indeed, this was the case. The Pennsylvania State reading,writing, speaking and listening content standards wereimbedded in the curriculum in numerous ways, amongthem: learning to read independently; reading criticallyin all content areas—including making inferences and

drawing conclusions based on text; using and understand-ing a variety of media; and writing narrative pieces(Pennsylvania State Content Standards, 2010). We suggest,particularly in the area of speaking and listening, thatthe student discourse far exceeded the state contentstandards of predicting, retelling, and recognizing acharacter and tone. Although not detailed here, standardsin other disciplines, such as math, history, and music, werealso met. With respect to state content standards for thearts and humanities, this curriculum satisfied not onlysecond grade standards, but many of those identified forthird grade, such as: use vocabulary specific to art forms;identify, explain, and analyze common themes, forms andtechniques from works of art; and analyze a work of artfrom its historical and cultural perspective (PennsylvaniaState Content Standards, 2010).

Art is accessible to all students regardless of reading level,thereby inviting all students to engage in discussions andobservations about artists and related artwork in a positiveand equitable class environment. Every child had theopportunity to be successful in this curriculum as a resultof its visual art and multimodal components. Thus, thearts and literacy curriculum lends itself to adaptation fordifferentiated instruction as well as meeting the needs of avariety of learners.

This is the essence of a deeper connection

to biography—extending to an intimate

meaning-making and an understanding

of the implications of someone's life in the

context of the past and present.

Likewise, we believe the curriculum units and lessonsare adaptable for a broad range of schools working withestablished core curricula. In fact, the arts and literacycurriculum in this study was aligned with the district'score literacy curriculum, especially with respect to readingand writing in a variety of genres, including personalnarrative, biography, historical fiction, and poetry. Weacknowledge, though, the typical and perhaps ubiquitouschallenges in curriculum design and implementation, suchas limited teacher collaboration and planning time, anddiffering levels of engagement by various classroom andspecialty teachers. The consistent support of the schooladministration, which we enjoyed, was critical. The artsand literacy curriculum was generally implemented severalafternoons a week during time allotted for specialtydisciplines, such as social studies. Because of the curricu-lum's multidisciplinary nature, using time assigned to a

variety of disciplines was easily justified.

Perhaps both the greatest challenge and advantage of thecurriculum is its framework, which allows for, even encour-ages, teacher autonomy in the pursuit of his/her interestsin, and desire to, learn more about art. We see our lackof formal training in studio art or art history as evidencethat any classroom teacher can engage in this curricu-lum, and further, that there is a significant benefit tobeing a "novice" in the discipline of art. Ironically, it is theclassroom teacher's need to expand his or her own contentknowledge that creates strength and depth in the arts andliteracy curriculum as a venue for teaching biography. Inessence, the curriculum should be a site of the teacher'sown inquiry, which, in turn, ultimately becomes an inquiryundertaken mutually by teacher and students. Tricia sumsup the experience with this idea:

There was an ease in teaching biography and nonfic-tion—it wasn't as intimidating as it often is—becauseboth the children and I had an authentic interest infinding out more about the artists in order to makemeaning of the art. We were on a mutual journey ofdiscovery, n

JOURNAL OF CHILDREN'S LITERATURE VOL 37 NO 2 FALL 2011

Susan G. Lea, Lawrence R. Sipe & Tricia O Loughlin 'He Said It All in the Painting"

Susan G. Lea is a doctoral candidate at the University of Pennsylvania Graduate

School of Education, where she has also taught in the ReadinglWritingI Literacy

program. Her research interests are in how teachers integrate, and children

respond to, muitin\edia and multimodaiity in literacy curricula.

E-mail: susanglea@gmaii.com

Lawrence R. Sipe (1949-2011) was a professor at the University of Pennsylva-

nia Graduate School of Education. His primary research interest was in how

young children talk and respond to picturebooks in the classroom and how

those activities enhance their learning. Dr. S/pe is missed as a teacher, mentor,

scholar, and friend.

Tricia O'Loughiin has been an elementary school teacher for sixteen years.

She has taught in urban and suburban school districts in the New York City

and Philadelphia areas. Currently, Tricia is an elementary mathematics coach

in the Kennett Consolidated School District, a suburb of Philadelphia. E-mail:

toloughlin@gmail.com

Appendix A

This study was conducted in a second grade classroom at a PreK-8 public school in a large northeast city. The school

is the result of a unique partnership that was developed with the school district, teachers' union, and a local univer-

sity. Additional aspects of this school that make it atypical in the local urban school system are: class size, capped at 23

students; accessible in-classroom technology; and a television studio for student productions.

At the tinne of the study, the student population of 525 was diverse, representing 30 countries; 19% of the students were

international (the student or one parent born outside of the U.S.). Of the student body, 48.8% were low-income. Regard-

ing the ethnic composition of the student body, 53% were African American, 23.5% were White, 12.5% were Asian, 6.5%

were Latino, and 4.5% were "other"

Tricia's second grade class was comprised of 19 children, of whom eight were girls and eleven were boys. The majority

of the students were middle class although several families were working class and three families functioned below the

poverty level. There were seven African American children, seven White children and five children of Middle Eastern,

Asian, and Latino descent. In addition, there were several bilingual children who spoke Cambodian, Spanish, Pakistani,

Arabic, or Bengali.

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Original Art: Forward, Revolt on the Amistad

Philadelphia Murals: Deap In Our Hearts, Grace Jung, Artist;

1847 Wylie Street

Looking Up At Heaven, Grace Jung, Artist; 1847 Wylie Street

This research was made possible, in part, by the support of the School District of Philadelphia. Opinions contained in this article reflect those of the authorsand do not necessarily reflect those of the School District of Philadelphia.

JOURNAL OF CHILDREN'S LITERATURE VOL 37 NO 2 FALL 2011

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