Kristi Summer Lovett

I have been teaching at Crescent since August of 1999. I am privileged to be the first art teacher employed by my alma mater. I love teaching and the students I get to work with everyday. I am married to John Lovett, minister of music and youth at First Baptist Church of Crescent. We have five awesome kids (Josiah, Mariah, Micah, Isaiah and Elisha). I enjoy road tripping with my family, art (no-brainer), reading and stupid comedies (The Princess Bride/Shanghai Noon). My favorite food is Italian, except I'm not a big fan of spaghetti and if Chocolate or Coffee qualfied as a food group, I'd love that. I am fairly certain that whoever thought up coating coffee beans in chocolate should be memorialized in the culinary hall of fame. My favorite artist is Dale Chihuly, innovative modern master of glass and color. Running a close second is Georgia O'Keefe who....well, we'll get to that in class, won't we?

It is my goal for students to understand that art is the evidence of human cognition across time and cultures; the result of the innate human desire to translate experiences, thoughts and ideas into tangible products. Visual education is essential in contemporary culture because of the abundance of information that is communicated through images. Students must be taught to be competent coders and de-coders of visual messages. Good art education is not achieved by transmitting inert facts, but by allowing students the opportunity to be involved in the creative process by using higher order thinking skills to solve particular, relevant problems in an individual way. I teach students through four components: producing art through materials and techniques; critiquing art through discussion of descriptions, analyses, interpretations and judgments; the study of the importance and relevance of art throughout history; and the theory of beauty and awareness (aesthetics). I believe in the control theory of motivation and strive to make my students’ classroom experiences relevant to their current lives and practical for their futures. I am a teacher because I firmly believe in the potential of every student to succeed. I see my classroom as a chance to influence popular culture for good and as a place to provide every student with a safe, supportive environment and the opportunity to search for and find Truth. I am a constructivist and teach students by sequentially building upon prior art skills and experiences as well as translating personal life experiences into artwork. I believe strongly in the right-brain/left brain theory of learning. I believe most students have been taught to be left-brain dominant and teach students to “see” (think) using right-brain skills. I use a combination of formative and summative assessment, focusing on student reflective self-evaluation and peer-evaluation using teacher made rubrics. I use technology, specifically the Internet, to facilitate student research on current artists and art methods for a variety of applications in the four areas of art education. My web-page serves as a syllabus and content delivery system for my classes. Students may access my website through moodle.

Education:

Bachelor's of Science in Art Education K-12

Oklahoma Baptist University, Shawnee, Oklahoma

December 1997

 

High School Diploma

Crescent High School, Crescent, Oklahoma

May 1993