Artist-in-Residency (AIR) Archive
2009: Newton Street Elementary School


Location: 150 Newton Street, Newark, NJ 07103
Principal: James Carlo

In February 2009, the NAC began its first residency at Newton Street Elementary School. The teaching artist, Kathryn Eddy, worked with several teachers across four grade spans (5th-8th) and content areas including LAL, Math, Social Studies, and Science.

Ms. Eddy worked with two 5th grade classes whose focus was on two different content areas and collaborated with the classroom teachers to develop interdisciplinary lesson plans that centered on their subjects. In Language Arts, each student wrote autobiographical poems and artist statements that would eventually accompany their self-portraits for the student exhibit. The classroom teacher conducted short writing exercises designed to reinforce the visual arts components of the lesson while building student skills in LAL.

Following the CCCS for Math, the second 5th grade class focused on graphs and fractions and incorporated the technical aspects of graphing into the creation of their self-portraits. Some of the reference materials viewed by the student included Frida Kahlo, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Chuck Close, and Pablo Picasso.

In her residency, Ms Eddy also worked with two Special Needs classes whose content areas included Science, Social Studies, and LAL. The students created incredible animal portraits, wrote, and illustrated a myth anthology, titled “The World of Myths”. Their teacher, Ms. Blanche Lassen, called the residency “ one of the best they ever had.” She further commented that the program had increased the students’ skills and confidence in writing and art.

The culminating exhibit was held at 744 Broad Street on May 20, 2009 and was widely attended by the students, parents, participating teachers, and the school principal attended the opening. Students from other grades were bused to the exhibit, partaking in their peers’ artistic accomplishments in a gallery setting.


back to AIR archive