Senior Exhibition Series

Lesson Summary

The senior show is a unique privilege for DRHSART students and is a great driver of our program’s success. At the beginning of each school year, senior students have the opportunity to participate in the Senior Show Exhibition Series. This is not mandatory, and it is only recommended for students with self-discipline and a strong work ethic. The expectations for these shows are exceptionally high.

The annual Senior Show Exhibition Series kicks off in November and contains a new exhibition each month until May. The number of featured artists per show varies depending upon how many seniors choose to participate that particular year. Since the first show in 2010, we have had over 50 group/solo exhibitions in our gallery.

TIPC Ratings

Research & Information Fluency

Rating:Ideal – Explanation: Students collaborate in teams to solve real-world creative problems, create original works of art that have personal value, and evaluate achievements of both their team and themselves through post-exhibition self-reflective essays. Additionally, these students are required to visit local museums / galleries to observe and take notes on exhibition trends in order to improve the professionalism of their own exhibitions. Most importantly, the students research the reflective writing of past generations of students who have gone through this process and provided rich advice about how they would improve their experience if they had the chance to do it again. These research resources have proven to increase the quality of student exhibitions each year, as they build upon the great ideas professional artists exhibiting in the community, as wells as the ideas of those students who came before them in the DRHSART program.

Communication & Collaboration

Rating: Ideal – Explanation: Students apply innovative thinking and to produce cohesive bodies of original artworks. Students worked collaboratively to produce a unified exhibition of their work that requires real-world creative solutions. Additionally they communicate in real and non-real time through email, text, Google documents, and share their knowledge globally through social media sources such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Students create innovative products that have value for specified audiences. Most importantly, there is no one right way to solve the creative problems that are laid before the students. Instead, the possibilities are infinite and specific to each student. These students are not only required to collaborate and communicate with other exhibiting student artists, but they are also expected to properly communicate the opening of their show through a variety of social and school specific media outlets. This exhibition series reaches well beyond the walls of the school and finds audiences within the immediate community and beyond.

Critical Thinking & Problem Solving

Rating: Ideal – Explanation: Students are provided with multiple resources to draw conclusions, based on clear patterns of evidence to produce new understandings. Students are challenged to reflect on the success of their exhibition through a series of specific guided questions that challenge them to not only evaluate their work, but also imagine how the entire process might be better for future students. Based on their research, experience, and self-reflection essays, students are challenged to use higher order thinking skills.

Creativity & Innovation

Rating: Ideal – Explanation: Students select appropriate digital tools such as Schoology, Facebook, Instagram and the Wildcat News to properly promote their shows. Additionally they are challenged to go above and beyond those students who have showed in the gallery before them, which required research and innovative problem solving. Students utilize prior knowledge and or teacher and peer support to find and evaluate resources to apply those needed innovative skills. Each individual student show is the culmination of a series of innovative solutions to an array of creative problems. This exhibition is the ultimate showcase of everything our upper level students have achieved in terms of creativity and innovation throughout their high school career at DRHSART.