With more than twenty years’ experience as a balloon entertainer, Sam the Balloon Man is one of Nashville’s premier balloon artists. He performs at more than three hundred events every year and travels the world as a renowned balloon art instructor. He has received multiple multinational awards for his work, both as an artist and a performer. Sam the Balloon Man will also perform for the Academy’s Arts Expo on Thursday.
Catherine Harris is a Nashville-based board-certified art therapist, registered yoga instructor, and mindfulness teacher with sixteen years of experience in the field. She currently works through her own private practice, HeartSpace Wellness Studio LLC, offering sessions to individuals as well as workshops and presentations to organizations.
Stephen Coleman is the president of both the Tennessee Arts Academy Foundation and ArtsEd Tennessee. His career as an instrumental music educator has spanned nearly four decades. He has received numerous awards and accolades, and along with his wife Marion, was chosen as the 2022 winner of the TAA Lorin Hollander Award.
Julia Stark is the arts learning specialist for the Tennessee Arts Commission. A theatre educator and arts administrator, she holds degrees in performing arts outreach and in arts administration.
Chris Sweatt is the director of arts education for the Tennessee Arts Commission. He has extensive experience as an arts educator and administrator, and he holds advanced degrees from New York University and the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.
Catherine Stephens is in her fifth year as director of schools for the Tullahoma City Schools. She has worked to support a well-rounded education for all learners, so that they can thrive academically, artistically, athletically, and more.
Jim Holcomb spent twenty-four years in the classroom, both in Tennessee and Mississippi, as an instrumental and vocal music teacher. For twenty-one years he served as supervisor of music and dance programs for Memphis City Schools. In retirement, Holcomb has remained an active professional musician and performer, as well as a brass instructor at the Bellevue School of Performing Arts in Memphis. Holcomb is the incoming secretary for the Tennessee Arts Academy Foundation Board of Directors.
Jeffery Ames is a professor of music, and director of choral activities within the College of Music and Performing Arts at Belmont University. He is in high demand as a conductor and composer within the United States and abroad.
Felicia Barber is an adjunct associate professor of choral conducting, and conductor of the Yale Camerata at Yale University. In addition to teaching graduate-level and undergraduate choral conductors, Barber is developing a new initiative designed to prepare Yale students to work with young musicians on choral music in both school and church settings. Her research interests include effective teaching strategies, fostering classroom diversity, incorporating equity and justice initiatives in choral curricula, and the linguistic performance practice of African American spirituals. Barber regularly engages as a guest conductor at All-State festivals and will conduct at the American Choral Directors Association eastern division conference in 2024 and the Carnegie Hall Festival in 2025. She holds a degree in vocal performance from Oral Roberts University, a master’s degree from Mansfield University, and a doctorate from Florida State University.
After thirty years of teaching, David Chambers recently retired from his position as a pre-kindergarten through eighth grade elementary music specialist for Fentress County Schools. He is also the choir director for Allardt Presbyterian Church and the founding director of the Fentress County Community Choir. Chambers has served as a TAA elementary music facilitator since 2005.
Julie Derges is associate professor and chair of music education at the University ofHouston, where she teaches courses in elementary and secondary general music and music education research. She is a graduate of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and also holds master’s and doctorate degrees from Michigan State University. Derges’s research exploring popular music learning and music teacher professional development has been published in international and national publications, including the Journal of Research in Music Education, International Journal of Music Education, The Orff Echo, and the Oxford Handbook of Social Media and Music Learning. She is an active clinician for general music teachers and has twice been named the Texas Invited Clinician for Elementary Music at the Texas Music Educators Association annual convention. Derges has taught general music in Virginia and Michigan, and is certified in Music Learning Theory and Orff-Schulwerk.
Ruth E. Dwyer is internationally recognized as a youth and children’s choir specialist and Kodály educator. She is a frequent guest conductor and clinician for national and international colleges, universities, honors choirs, and festivals. Dwyer has recently retired from the Indianapolis Children’s Choir after thirty-six years as a conductor and director of education and as artistic director of the Columbus Indiana Children’s Choir. Her ensembles have performed across North America, Spain, and central Europe. Her teaching experiences also include nineteen years as a public school music educator and adjunct professor with Butler University. Dwyer has authored several music education text books for Illinois Central College and is a frequent guest author for the Hal Leonard choral music text book series. She is an accomplished composer, arranger, and is the editor of the Ruth Dwyer Choral Series with Colla Voce Music.
John Easley retired in 2016 after thirty-four years as a public school band director. His longest tenure was with Union City High School, whose nationally recognized marching band program flourished under his direction. Easley is consistently sought out as a consultant, clinician, workshop presenter, and adjudicator throughout the Southeast.
Arris Golden is the assistant director of bands and associate director of the Spartan Marching Band at Michigan State University (MSU). In this capacity, Golden teaches the MSU Concert Band, courses in conducting and marching band techniques, coordinates the MSU Performing Arts Camps, and assists with all aspects of the total band program. She held a similar position at UNC-Chapel Hill and also had a distinguished eighteen-year career as an educator in the public schools of North Carolina. Golden holds degrees from the UNC-Chapel Hill, UNC-Greensboro, and completed the doctor of musical arts in wind conducting from Michigan State University as a 2014 recipient of a Michigan State University Distinguished Fellowship. She maintains an active schedule with engagements throughout the United States and internationally as a guest conductor, clinician, and adjudicator.
Scott Harris offers expertise gained over his two decades in the music publishing business. He is currently program manager of Hal Leonard’s self-publishing division, ArrangeMe. Harris has been a publisher, producer, arranger, orchestrator, composer, editor, and performing musician throughout his more-than-twenty-year career.
Jacque Schrader and Rick Layton have been teaching adults in Orff Schulwerk teacher education courses, state conferences, and national conferences in the United States for more than twenty-five years. Since the late 1980s they have taught together at the University of North Texas, Southern Methodist University, and George Mason University. In addition to their work in this country, both have taught internationally, including courses in Australia, Canada, China, Dubai, Germany, Poland, Slovakia, and Taiwan, and twice at the Orff Institute in Austria.
For the past thirty years, Jacque Schrader taught in the first school, lower school, and middle school at the Key School in Annapolis, Maryland. Most recently, Schrader has been appointed as the director of the Discovery Outreach Program for the Annapolis Symphony Academy. In this role, she has launched the Discovery Outreach Program for children from age five to ten. Schrader holds a degree from Drake University, and Orff Schulwerk Level III certification from Hamline University.
Richard Layton’s teaching has included being a professor of music theory at the University of Maryland, College Park since 1992, and teaching at the Key School in Annapolis, Maryland since 1979 where he was the upper school performing arts department chair. He holds a degree from West Chester University, and his master’s degree and doctorate from the University of Maryland. He is co-author of The Elemental Style: A Handbook for Composers and Arrangers.
Marjorie LoPresti is the director of content for MusicFirst. With more than thirty years of teaching experience in music education, she was named New Jersey Master Music Teacher and received the TI:ME Music Technology Teacher of the Year Award. A frequent clinician at educational conferences, LoPresti is co-author of Practical Music Education Technology.
Robert (Rob) Russell Pethel is a musician, educator, and content creator based in Atlanta, Georgia. Pethel holds degrees from Georgia State University, including a doctorate, and a master’s degree from Auburn University. He has worked for Atlanta Public Schools since 2008 and taught at Sutton Middle School and Peyton Forest Elementary. Pethel currently serves as the lead technology teacher, music instructor, Apple learning coach, and eSports coach at the Atlanta Virtual Academy. He is also active as a professional development speaker and has presented for the Georgia Music Educators Association, Louisiana Music Educators Association, and the Georgia Educational Technology Conference. Pethel is the creator of BlueGuitar Classroom Curriculum (www.BlueGuitar.us), Music Prism (www.YouTube.com/@MusicPrism), and Armuchee Craft (www.ArmucheeCraft.com).
Nancy Beard recently retired from the Shelby County School District, where she worked with English language learners. Prior to this, Beard used the Orff approach to teach music in the Memphis and Shelby County schools. She has also taught band, chorus, and general music in Illinois and Kentucky.
Michelle Howell currently serves as the librarian, tech coach, and STEAM support for Union Elementary STEAM and Demonstration School in Gallatin, Tennessee. She brings the arts into the library through lessons connecting curriculum and research. Before becoming a librarian, Howell was a classroom teacher for grades kindergarten through third.
In this interlude, kindergarten through sixth grade teachers will be encouraged to share their favorite classroom activities, teaching tips, and theatre lesson plans with other teachers from across the state. Theatre facilitators Nancy Beard and Michelle Howell will lead the session.
Jonathan Bernstein’s plays and musicals have been produced all over the country. Under the auspices of the Jerome Robbins Foundation, he is currently developing a new project with actress and choreographer Susan Misner entitled Here in the Bright Colorado Sun. His directing credits include work at the Atlantic Theater Company, Signature Theater, the Kennedy Center, Ensemble Studio Theater, and many others. He has worked at New York’s City Center, Manhattan Theatre Club, Second Stage Theater, Roundabout Theatre, and the 52nd Street Project. Supervising director credits include the still-running revival of Chicago, overseeing both the Broadway production and the many national and international productions it has spawned. He is a professor of playwriting and script analysis at New York University and he serves as the artistic director of the Performing Arts Project, an international arts training non-profit organization designed to serve people from ages fifteen to twenty-five.
The now-iconic image from the musical Hamilton wasn’t always the front runner. Participants in this session will take a deep-dive into the process of determining how advertising can and should complement the show.
Andrew Bleiler is a passionate arts educator whose career has spanned more than thirty-five years. He serves as assistant professor, scenic designer, and production manager for Lipscomb University. He also serves as Green Captain for Lipscomb's chapter of the Broadway Green Alliance. Bleiler holds degrees from Drake University, Concordia University, and the University of Memphis. He is currently finishing his degree in science in sustainability at Lipscomb University.
The words “sustainable”, “green”, “eco-friendly”, “low-carbon footprint”, and “zero waste” have been thrown around lately. But how do any of these terms relate to the theatre? Come find out how these words can be put into action, and how money can be saved while helping the environment. This workshop will offer ideas that can be used right away and will suggest ways to lower the impact on the environment. Every drop helps to fill the bucket.
Barry Blumenfeld is on the faculty of Friends Seminary, New York University, and the Dance Education Lab of the 92Y, for which he co-created the DanceMaker app. He has served as president of the New York State Dance Education Association (NYSDEA) and was a recipient of the Outstanding PreK-12 Dance Educator Award from NYSDEA in 2017. Blumenfeld received the Outstanding Leadership Award from the National Dance Education Organization and for eight years he wrote a monthly “Ask the Experts” column for Dance Teacher Magazine. He founded the tap and modern dance company, TAPFUSION, and has choreographed numerous works that have been presented in New York, Florida, Maryland, and Washington, DC. Blumenfeld holds a degree in dance from American University; is a certified level 1 teacher of Language of Dance®; a certified yoga instructor; and a registered dance educator.
Barry Blumenfeld will teach the basics of the Big Apple dance and the Lindy Hop, which are social dances from the Harlem Renaissance. Blumenfeld will also share fully developed units for all ages from kindergarten through grade twelve, from DEL’s Tracing Footsteps Curriculum project. No prior dance training is necessary to take this class.
Olivia Aston Bosworth is an artist, educator, and producer who deeply believes in the power of theatre for young audiences. She is the head of youth and family programs at the Alliance Theatre in Atlanta, Georgia and works with educational programming for children from birth through fifth grade. She oversees the Alliance Bernhardt Theatre for the Very Young program, early learner and elementary classes and camps, caregiver initiatives, and family programming. As a Wolf Trap Early Learning Through the Arts Teaching Artist, Bosworth has taught arts integrated lessons in early childhood and elementary school classrooms around Atlanta and has also presented at several professional development conferences on immersive storytelling through the curriculum. Additionally, she is the vice president of the Board of Directors of Theatre for Young Audiences in the United States. Bosworth holds degrees from Georgia State University and Kennesaw State University.
From crunching apples to the hissing steam of a train engine, people have recorded every last peep from this planet. Well, all but one: the sound of art. Come capture the quiet, round up the roars, gather the giggles, and make some noise with Olivia Aston Bosworth using drama and art interpretation strategies based on her collaboration with the High Museum of Art and Alliance Theatre in Atlanta, Georgia. Learn how to engage young people in interpretation through play!
Katie Bruno is the director of education at the Nashville Shakespeare Festival, a professional stage and screen actor, and a proud graduate of the University of Miami. Her passion for poetry and fascination with Shakespeare's characters keeps her on her toes as she visits classrooms and students all across the state.
This session will make use of fun and engaging games that use Shakespeare's language. These activities will help students to become more comfortable with speaking and understanding commonly used words and phrases throughout the canon.
Alicia Fuss is a member of the theatre faculty at Middle Tennessee State University. She gets fired up about all things that intersect theatre and youth, and has more than eighteen years of experience with drama work in classrooms and communities.
Explore the magical world of shadow puppetry in this hands-on workshop tailored to the needs of elementary educators! Learn how to guide a shadow puppetry sequence with students and discover budget-friendly tips for creating shadow puppets.
Sarah Hankins is a director, actor, teacher, and theatre administrator with a strong focus in collaboration, physical theatre, and heightened language. Hankins recently joined the Tennessee Shakespeare Company as director of education and outreach programs. She has taught theatre education programs from Maine to Florida for kindergarten to graduate-level students.
Explore outrageous characters in this session through movement, vocal exercises, and games that will inspire students to break out of their comfort zones. Commedia influences can be found in plays ranging from Molière to the musical Babydoll to the play One Man, Two Guvnors. Help students to explore the ridiculous miser Pantalone, the over-the-top Ingenues, and the brash (yet cowardly) Capitano.
Denice Hicks has been the Nashville Shakespeare Festival executive artistic director since 2005. An advocate for empowering students through creativity, she has edited and directed touring productions of Shakespeare’s works, developed workshops for students of all ages, and created the Festival’s Apprentice Company Training and Shakespeare Allowed programming.
Participants in this session will experience exercises that get players out of their heads and into their creativity, ending with a game called "Zen Garden," a meditative, physical improv exercise.
Jim Hoare is the executive vice president at TRW and has presented workshops throughout the United States and United Kingdom. In 2011, he received the New York State Theatre Education Association’s Lifetime Achievement Award. Hoare is the author of Your High School Improv Show Playbook and Your School Theatre Director’s Playbook.
Catherine Daigle is the director of amateur licensing at TRW. She joined the Helen Hayes Youth Theatre in Nyack, New York, at age nine and did more than thirty shows with them before getting her degree in theatre and sociology. Daigle started at TRW during the pandemic and is thrilled to spend every day supporting groups all over the country while they mount successful productions of TRW titles.
In this session, free musical scripts will be distributed to all participants. Both Young@Part (TRW’s Broadway musicals for middle schools) and Younger@Part (for elementary schools) will be introduced, along with TRW Plays, including Shakespeare Young@Part. Licensing experts Jim Hoare and Catherine Daigle will describe the many advantages and possibilities for producing a Young@Part show. Titles that will be reviewed include Imaginary (new from the West End), The Addams Family, All Shook Up, Spamalot, Miss Nelson is Missing!, The Wind in the Willows, and We Will Rock You. During the workshop, questions and concerns about the theatrical licensing process will also be addressed.
Jim Hoare is the executive vice president at TRW and has presented workshops throughout the United States and United Kingdom. In 2011, he received the New York State Theatre Education Association’s Lifetime Achievement Award. Hoare is the author of Your High School Improv Show Playbook and Your School Theatre Director’s Playbook.
Catherine Daigle is the director of amateur licensing at TRW. She joined the Helen Hayes Youth Theatre in Nyack, New York, at age nine and did more than thirty shows with them before getting her degree in theatre and sociology. Daigle started at TRW during the pandemic and is thrilled to spend every day supporting groups all over the country while they mount successful productions of TRW titles.
In this session, free musical scripts will be distributed to all participants and new TRW Plays will be introduced. Approved changes, creative casting suggestions, low-tech production resources, props, sets, SFX, accompaniment tracks, and projections will be discussed. School editions for The Olympians, an Epic Muse-ical (a new release); The Prom; All Shook Up; Bright Star; Beehive; The Addams Family; Spamalot; Ring of Fire; and We Will Rock You will be introduced. During the workshop, questions and concerns about the theatrical licensing process will also be addressed.
Lynn Hoare is a facilitator, educator, and director working in the field of applied theatre and arts education with regional, national, and international partners. She was the senior director of school-based programs at Creative Action, the largest arts and education nonprofit in central Texas. She is an adjunct faculty member at the University of Texas at Austin, a co-founder of the Center for Imagining and Performing Justice, and the co-director of the Performing Justice Project which devises original theatre with young people about gender and racial justice. Her co-authored book, Devising Critically Engaged Theatre with Youth: The Performing Justice Project, won the distinguished book award from the American Alliance of Theatre and Education in 2021. Hoare collaborates with others to use theatre as a tool for imagining justice, building connection and community, and fostering critical dialogue.
How can we promote curiosity in students as a way to engage them in learning, help them connect with each other, and find wonder in the world? This is a brief introduction to the importance of curiosity, creativity, and wonder through movement and theatre exercises.
Lynn Hoare is a facilitator, educator, and director working in the field of applied theatre and arts education with regional, national, and international partners. She was the senior director of school-based programs at Creative Action, the largest arts and education nonprofit in central Texas. She is an adjunct faculty member at the University of Texas at Austin, a co-founder of the Center for Imagining and Performing Justice, and the co-director of the Performing Justice Project which devises original theatre with young people about gender and racial justice. Her co-authored book, Devising Critically Engaged Theatre with Youth: The Performing Justice Project, won the distinguished book award from the American Alliance of Theatre and Education in 2021. Hoare collaborates with others to use theatre as a tool for imagining justice, building connection and community, and fostering critical dialogue.
This interactive workshop will offer strategies that explore and celebrate individual difference as a way to create spaces of caring and belonging.
Tia James is an actor, director, teacher, and vocal coach. She is an assistant professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and teaches voice and acting to the graduate students in the professional actor training program. She also serves as a company member, resident director, and vocal coach for PlayMakers Repertory Company. James’s acting credits include Hamlet in Hamlet, Benedick in Much Ado About Nothing, Clyde in Clyde's, Angel in Blues for an Alabama Sky, and Mark Antony in Julius Caesar. James has directed numerous plays, including By The Way, Meet Vera Stark; Constellations; Grand Concourse; and A Bright New Boise. She has served as vocal coach for more than a dozen plays. James earned degrees at Virginia Commonwealth University, the New York University graduate acting program, and the Miller Voice Method Teacher Certification program. She has won numerous awards and scholarships including the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival Irene Ryan Award.
Tia James will lead the company through an exploration of voice, focusing on the power of breath. Have you ever been in flow? This flow state can happen more often than we think. Instead of relying on a magical moment to arrive, you have the power to prime your environment with your most powerful tool: your presence. In this workshop participants will gain a deeper relationship with their own instrument through the power of breath.
Ryan Kasprzak is the co-head of acting for musical theatre at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, and an adjunct faculty member at Montclair State University. He recently served as dance supervisor for Hamilton in San Juan, Puerto Rico, with Lin-Manuel Miranda in the title role. Kasprzak received a Chita Rivera Award nomination for his Broadway debut in Bandstand under the direction of Tony Award-winner Andy Blankenbuehler. His Broadway national tours include: Billy Elliot (associate resident choreographer/dance captain) and Fosse (dance captain). His television work can be seen on NBC’s Smash and Fox’s So You Think You Can Dance. His choreography has been featured in numerous regional productions and in New York Musical Festivals’ award-winning shows. Kasprzak continues creating new work with Parallel Exit: Physical Comedy Theater. He received his degree in acting from Marymount Manhattan College and a degree in choreography from Wilson College.
Separate fact from fiction and learn about the creative process that turned American history into the hit Broadway musical Hamilton. This workshop offers an inside look into the hidden gems of Hamilton and traces the connectivity of historical facts as they appear in theatrical metaphors. Discuss the Hamilton education program and brainstorm how historical fiction can inspire future interdisciplinary artistic collaboration.
Jennifer Keith is the founder of the Grassland Middle School drama program in the Williamson County Schools. In 2014, she was named Grassland Middle School Teacher of the Year and in 2022 was named as a Tennessee Excellence in Education award finalist. Keith is an avid traveler who regularly brings global experiences back to her students and curriculum.
Pollyanna Parker was inducted into the Tennessee High School Speech and Drama League’s Hall of Fame in 2010 and is a past recipient of that organization’s Ruby Krider Award for Outstanding Theatre Educator of the Year. Parker recently retired after teaching for thirty years in the Clarksville-Montgomery County Schools.
In this interlude, upper middle school and high school educators will be encouraged to share their favorite classroom activities, teaching tips, and theatre lesson plans with other teachers from across the state. Theatre facilitators Jennifer Keith and Pollyanna Parker will lead the session.
Carla Lahey is an assistant professor of theatre, and the director of the undergraduate theatre education program at Belmont University. She has worked as an educator for more than eighteen years and has experience as a middle school teacher, community theatre educator, and university professor.
Participants in this session will learn practical strategies for making middle and high school theatre classrooms into more inclusive and accessible space for students with disabilities. This will be developed through presentations, video examples, and group discussions.
Cassie LaFevor is an arts educator at heart with experience working with students from early childhood to adulthood. She is enjoying her seventeenth year as director of education enrichment at the Tennessee Performing Arts Center, and she manages both the Season for Young People and the Spotlight Awards programs.
This session will provide ways to use the arts to create meaningful experiences with children's literature, including topics such as partner work, sequence and storytelling, character, and much more. Using the story examples “Jack and the Beanstalk”, Charlotte’s Web, and Miss Nelson Has a Field Day, participants will explore strategies to make any story come alive for students.
Luke McGuire is a teaching artist at Watershed Public Theatre and Nashville Children's Theatre. He has a degree in theater from Middle Tennessee State University, where he trained in theatre for young audiences under the mentorship of Jette Halladay. He has performed on many stages across Middle Tennessee.
Geared towards the needs of elementary educators, this session utilizes bodies, voices, and imagination to teach participants how to build a story through physical interaction. Students will be able to see words leap off the page as they use these games to bring words to life!
Mileah Milstead currently serves as the middle school drama instructor at Battle Ground Academy where she teaches acting, stage makeup, and improv classes. In the past, she has worked as a teaching artist for the Rose Theater in Omaha, Nebraska, Nashville Children's Theatre, and many other theatres in the area.
Participants will experience and learn to guide collaborative storytelling. The session will cover improvising and creating, as well as play writing and performance.
Amanda Cantrell Roche is a Nashville-based choreographer and writer with more than two decades of experience in her craft. She offers arts integration residencies in schools, both independently and as a lead teaching artist for Tennessee Performing Arts Center education.
Participants in this session will experience the improvisational dance technique called flocking. This is a great tool for developing focus while also providing a calming movement activity that can be integrated into literature. While this technique works well with second graders and older students, it is adaptable for younger students. It can also include the added layer of poetry or short stories to be read aloud for movement prompts and visualization. Flocking is a great way to bring wit and wisdom literature to life!
Core theatre instructors will be in their classrooms to answer specific questions about their sessions and to provide one-on-one time with participants who desire additional information about theatre-related issues or arts-education concerns.
David Arnold has been a caricaturist based mainly in Nashville, Tennessee, for more than forty years. He learned his craft while in high school so he could work a summer job at Opryland USA theme park from 1974 to 1980. Through his company, Caricatures, etc., Arnold provides art entertainment, such as caricature artists, face painters, balloon artists, and magicians, to the public.
This interactive drawing workshop will touch on the basics of depicting a live subject as a caricature. It will focus on the step-by-step process of creating a reasonable cartoon likeness of the subject. At the session, all participants will get a workbook, which will allow them to continue honing their skills on their own.
Join a printmaking workshop and engage in a conversation about one artist’s journey. Explore the challenges and triumphs of his experience evolving into a full-time artist. Discover the resilience needed to thrive in the art world and learn about the continuous growth that shapes an art career.
Having worked at the Frist Art Museum for more than eighteen years, Shaun Giles was appointed as the Frist Art Museum Director for Community Engagement in 2020.
Ellen O’Brien is the Frist Art Museum Educator for Teacher and School Programs. She manages the development and implementation of programs for K-12 teachers and school groups including teacher workshops, professional development, school art shows, and student tours.
Join educators from the Frist Art Museum to hear about upcoming exhibitions for the 2024-2025 academic year. The presenters will give an overview of opportunities to connect through guided school group tours, self-guided visits and activities, hands-on art experiences in the Martin ArtQuest, virtual programming, teacher resources, and educator workshops.
Bill Hickerson has been executive director of the West Tennessee Regional Art Center since 1998. For the past seventeen years, he has served as West Tennessee chair of the Tennessee Art Education Association (TAEA) Regional Student Art Exhibition program. He is a past recipient of three TAEA awards including Museum Art Educator of the Year, West Tennessee Art Educator of the Year, and Art Educator of the Year.
In this hands-on workshop, participants will learn how to apply oil pastels; first to act as a resist and to be used over, or instead of watercolor, to add interest and energy when painting. This session is designed for Visual Art Recognition Day students, but any TAA participant may attend.
Kem Hinton, a fellow at the American Institute of Architects, is an author, urban designer, historian, public speaker, and visual artist. He is the co-founder of Tuck-Hinton Architects, and was the lead designer of Tennessee Bicentennial Capitol Mall, Tennessee World War II Memorial, and Tennessee State Library & Archives.
This session will serve as an introduction to the field of architecture and related design professions. The presentation will provide information to teachers with the hope that they will encourage promising students to enter these exciting and rewarding careers.
Janet Laws is a TAA visual art facilitator. She teaches at Brentwood Academy in Brentwood, Tennessee. Laws was named as the Middle Tennessee Art Educator of the Year by the Tennessee Art Education Association in 2022.
In this session, participants will bring a successful lesson to share. At the end of the workshop, participants will leave with new lessons and ideas to bring to their own classrooms.
Learn to draw the human head by the math, not by stylistic choices, with step-by-step instructions. It's easy to follow and it's for absolutely everyone, from the most advanced artist to bare beginners.
Mike Mitchell is the art education coordinator at Tennessee State University. His personal research encompasses animation, art writing, curating, drawing, instrument building, mail art, painting, performance, poetry, rubber stamping, sculpture, skateboarding, sound art, social practice, and songwriting. He is a Crayola Creativity Ambassador, a Makey-Makey Ambassador, member of the Educators’ Cooperative, founding editor of Number Inc.’s Young Art Writers Projects, and founder of the Little Free Skate Shop (LFSS) which operates out of his office and Missy Lindsay’s art classroom at McGavock High School. In the past three years LFSS has redistributed more than one hundred skateboards to high school students in and around Nashville.
In this simple but sophisticated twist on a basic accordion fold, session participants will make at least one diamond folded accordion book. These books can be an incredible resource for students; they can use them to take notes on a specific topic like elements and principles of design, use them as amazing celebration cards for any occasion, or see them as an opportunity to investigate sculpture through bookmaking.
Mike Mitchell is the art education coordinator at Tennessee State University. His personal research encompasses animation, art writing, curating, drawing, instrument building, mail art, painting, performance, poetry, rubber stamping, sculpture, skateboarding, sound art, social practice, and songwriting. He is a Crayola Creativity Ambassador, a Makey-Makey Ambassador, member of the Educators’ Cooperative, founding editor of Number Inc.’s Young Art Writers Projects, and founder of the Little Free Skate Shop (LFSS) which operates out of his office and Missy Lindsay’s art classroom at McGavock High School. In the past three years LFSS has redistributed more than one hundred skateboards to high school students in and around Nashville.
In this session participants will quickly make a found object sculpture and then learn to document it using paper backdrop and cell phone flashlight. This procedure will capture dramatic shadows that rival studio photographs, which will take students’ and teachers’ breath away! It’s an easy but dynamic way to bring sculpture into the classroom using Brancusi’s adjacent photography practice as a historical jumping off point. These techniques are appropriate for students ranging from kindergarten through twelfth grade.
Virginia Nix, TAA facilitator, teaches at Kenrose Elementary in Brentwood, Tennessee. She was recognized as the Elementary Art Educator of the Year in 2022 by the Tennessee Art Education Association (TAEA). During her time with the TAEA, she served as the exhibitions chair, and developed the STARS Elementary Exhibition, which recognizes elementary school artists from across the state.
In this session, participants will bring a successful lesson to share. At the end of the workshop, participants will leave with new lessons and ideas to bring to their own classrooms.
Janis Nunnally has previously served as President of TAEA and currently serves as middle level division director for NAEA. She is an art educator at Upperman Middle School in Baxter, Tennessee.
The mission of the Tennessee Art Education Association is to advance quality visual arts education and to promote a cohesive professional community through advocacy, leadership, and professional development.
This session will provide information about the benefits of membership in the Tennessee Art Education Association (TAEA) and National Art Education Association (NAEA). Janis Nunnally will facilitate the discussion along with members of the 2024 Tennessee Art Education Association.
Kim Shamblin is a retired art teacher who taught in West Tennessee for twenty-eight years and now resides in northern Louisiana. She has been a part of TAA for more than twenty years and serves as the TAA Connections liaison. Shamblin is an avid quilter and uses her art background to teach other quilters a variety of fabric and design techniques.
Ken Snyder has thirty years of experience teaching art to students from prekindergarten through eighth grade. He has participated in TAA for twenty-five years and served as a facilitator at the Academy for more than a decade.
Step into a kaleidoscopic world where ordinary fabric transforms into a vibrant masterpiece, creativity knows no bounds, and every twist and swirl of color tells a story. Session participants are requested to bring an item they own to tie-dye during the workshop.
Debrah Sickler-Voigt is a professor of art education at Middle Tennessee State University. She is the author of Teaching and Learning in Art Education: Cultivating Students’ Potential from Pre-K Through High School, a widely-adopted art methods textbook, with its second edition to be published in 2025. Learn more and access free resources at https://routledgetextbooks.com/textbooks/_author/sickler-voigt/
This workshop will apply the presenter’s model of transformative art education, illustrating how to cultivate positive transformations for the greater good, whether they be large or small, individualized or collective. The empowering methods shared will help participants to achieve their desired goals through conversation, storyboarding, and visualizing achievable actions.
Cassie Stephens has been an elementary art teacher in the Nashville area for twenty-five years. She has consistently over-shared on nearly every social media platform and would like to share even more.
With twenty-five years of art teacherin’ under her colorful belt, Cassie Stephens has stepped out of the classroom to share her practices in her new venture as an author. Join Stephens as she shares, reads from, and signs her book Art Teacherin’ 101 and her children’s books, Larry the Line and Alfred the Ape Knows His Shapes.
Laura Sturgill is a Nashville-based art educator. She has taught for twenty years in both private and public settings. She is currently teaching second through sixth grade visual art at Oak Hill School. Sturgill loves painting, fiber arts, traveling, and spending time with friends and her two sons.
In this hands-on session, participants will observe and gain inspiration from the work of Wayne Thiebaud. They will use oil pastels and tempera paint to create an abstracted version of a landscape.
Christopher Taylor has been teaching art for nine years. He is an art teacher at Napier Elementary in Nashville, Tennessee, but also teaches life, empowering his students by encouraging them to visually tell their stories and share them with the class and community.
This session will demonstrate a way to develop an equitable, diverse, and inclusive lesson plan that will increase student engagement.
Constance Tutor is a visual art teacher at Booker T. Washington Middle & High School in Memphis, Tennessee. Growing up in a rural community and from a large family, she entertained herself by experimenting with found and recycled objects. Today, she fabricates personal adornments, often using recycled items.
Learn how to create a pendant or earrings out of colored pencils using cold connections. Basic jewelry making skills are helpful but not necessary.
Bailey Woods has been teaching in middle and high school for nearly ten years. Prior to teaching, her background was in museum education and artifact installation.
In this session participants will observe a lesson in puppetry. They will see how the multifaceted lesson involves practical skill building (such as sewing), group work, and creative expression
Visual art participants may use this time to continue working in the studio, talking with their instructors, or networking with fellow teachers about issues and concerns related to the arts and arts education.
