Art and Media Communications
Art and Media Communications provides students a unique opportunity to study modern, post-modern, and contemporary art and design practices as agents of change in society. They will learn traditional hand skills, the art elements and principles of design, how to assemble visual narratives, and how to analyze, evaluate, and refine ideas. Also, through this class, students will gain media literacy skills alongside technology application skills. They will explore issues relevant to creating and communicating a message in a participatory culture, through online communities, and across multiple media. Students will learn valued workplace skills such as how to work in teams, how to think critically, how to maintain motivation, how to plan and document project progress, and how to present their ideas to their audience.
This course is directed toward students in grades 9-12 for which they will earn one elective credit. The course covers five basic knowledge and skills strands consisting of the four general strands from the fine arts TEKS as well as incorporating strands from the technology applications TEKS. These five strands are defined as
- Perception & Information Acquisition,
- Creative Expression & Communication,
- Historical/Cultural Studies,
- Response, Evaluation and Media Literacy, and
- Problem Solving.
While these goals are similar in many ways to the TEKS strands for traditional arts and technology applications courses, most of the related objectives are unique to the new practices of contemporary visual arts and design and reflect a strong digital media literacy component.
