Throughout my own life, I’ve been told I interact better with children than I do with a lot of adults. To some that’s been deemed as childish, but I resonate with what Riccardi says about it being an “innate desire to help children”. There are so many issues that kids face as they develop and grow in the world. One person they should always be able to rely on for accessibility and empathy, is their teacher.

What made you want to become an educator?

“Specifically, well, just to backtrack a little bit, I went to the School of Visual Arts initially. I didn’t really know what track I wanted to take, but I knew I wanted to get into the arts. I wound up majoring in Advertising and Graphic Design. Then, my senior year, I decided I wanted to try theater and acting.

From there, I started studying at a studio called the Acting Studio (not to be confused with the Actors Studio) and I absolutely loved it. So, after graduating SVA, I promised my family that I would work for at least a year. They had invested all this money into my schooling and I had invested 4 years getting my Bachelors of Fine Arts, so I wound up working in Advertising for a year. I hated it. While I was doing that, I was still taking acting classes, I was going to auditions, and after about a year, I just walked out. I just quit.

I started doing the acting thing, and bartending and waitressing, and that was tough. Then, a friend of mine, her father, was the president of the Boys and Girls Club in Long Island City. He needed a Drama and Dance instructor. It started out as a Dance Instructor. So I said “Alright I’ll do it, I love working with kids.”

It was the perfect job for me. It was an afterschool center, for underprivileged kids. A lot of the kids came from the Astoria projects, or they lived in Astoria locally, and it was basically just a lot of them coming from single parent homes, and it was an afterschool center. They could do homework, play basketball, and they had this newly renovated Dance studio. So I went in there, and I basically had free range of whatever I wanted to do with the kids. That experience was probably the best experience of my life. Although I thought I wanted to pursue acting, working with those kids every day, in an environment like that where I had almost complete creative control–I mean, I was putting on performances with them where I was able to pull things from the movie Chicago and West Side Story and even Saturday Night Live! Things you could never get away with today, and putting them on more of a kid-friendly level. But the kids were so receptive and it was probably one of the most amazing groups of kids I’ve ever worked with. We just became a family.

From there, I said “I have to work with kids.”

Would you say that carries over into what you find rewarding about being a teacher today?

“I think in order to really find teaching rewarding, it has to be an intrinsic thing in a person. It’s just an innate desire not only to help children but you have to really enjoy kids. And I’ve always really enjoyed being around children. I enjoy children more than I enjoy most adults! I think that I also have a very nurturing side, but I’m also very firm. You have to have a balance. Because you’re spending so much time with these kids, you’re seeing them on a daily basis, and you’re watching them in ways that their parents don’t even get to see. You’re observing them in an environment that their parents aren’t privy to, that their family isn’t exposed to, so you’re seeing a different side of them. So you have to have that combination of almost a parental figure, but also an authoritative figure. So you have to combine that nurturing side with that authoritative side, because the kids pick up on that. Kids can sniff out insincerity, they can sniff out weakness, and I think part of it was just always in me as a person. It’s not something I think about too much, it’s just who I am. So I think my demeanor overall, the fact that I love working with kids, the fact that I have that nurturing personality, along with a strong personality. I have a very strong energy. So I’m able to speak and command attention but also make them feel like I’m approachable. That comes with experience and age, but it also has to come from the person’s temperament. I think those things can be practiced, but for me I think it’s just part of who I am. So I think that just naturally lends itself to teaching. “

Speaking of that kind of authoritative vs nurturing balance, how do you implement behavioral management in the classroom?

“It depends on the situation. I think with students, they have to know that you mean what you say. So, for example, if I’m having difficulty getting my class’ attention at the beginning of the period. Let’s say they’re in the process of setting up materials but I’m trying to give instructions, and it’s very noisy, and I’ve stopped them multiple times. They’ve already been given a warning and they can see I’m raising my voice. They have all the visual signs that I’m struggling to get their attention, that they’re taking advantage. I have to set the tone but without expelling my energy to the point that I’m raising my voice or taking it personally. So at that point, I just did this with a class a few weeks ago, I stopped the class and said “That’s it, we’re not doing this.” I made them pack up. This was after they had completely set up their paint and everything. I talked to them as if they were my peers. It’s not about leveling the playing field and allowing them to question the things you say and go toe to toe with 12 or 15 year olds. It’s about talking to them like they’re your peers. So I said to them “I spent 10 minutes trying to get your attention. I raised my voice, I told you I wasn’t feeling well, I had to stop my intro at least 3 times. We’re not painting. We’re not doing this.” And I explained to them that this is a life lesson.

In the traffic rules, if I see a stop sign and blow past the stop sign, then I’m doing it at my own risk. I know that if I go through the stop sign, I know I might potentially hurt someone. I know it can’t be good. But if I do it, at least I know that there’s a consequence and I’m doing it at my own risk, so I made a choice. When you make a choice to behave a certain way, when you know that you’re going in the wrong direction, then you have to be okay with the consequences. So now the consequence is that we’re going to sit here for the next 25 minutes of the period. You’re not going to take anything out, you’re not working on anything. It’s going to be totally quiet, and there’s no talking. You made me wait, and struggle for attention, and you lost the privilege of working in my classroom. And that works, because you’re not talking down to them. You’re basically telling them “I’m being fair with you, but you have to meet me halfway. If you can’t meet me halfway, we can’t do this.” If you take away the emotional piece of it, you expel a lot less energy. Teaching is draining, it’s exhausting. For many reasons. But behaviorally I’ve found that if you talk to them like that, they’re more likely to not only respect you but hear what you’re saying. “

I see. So jumping off of that point for behavioral issues, there are more issues with student behavior than just them acting out in class. Specifically, how do you help a student engage with material when they don’t seem to have any interest?

“Well, you have to know when to modify lessons for students. You have to gauge not only the student’s interests, but their skill level. A lot of times when students don’t have an interest, it really comes from them not having confidence. Usually that confidence comes from lacking a skill. Usually the students that do the worst behaviorally are the ones that are struggling in school. So they substitute their low self esteem for behaving poorly, because they want to show that they don’t care, or that it means nothing to them. But those are also usually the most sensitive students. You have to be careful with those students, because it’s very easy to just label them as little jerks. So with students that are showing no interest, 9 out of 10 times it’s because they just lack a skill. So you have to modify it. It can be something simple like having them do the project at half the size. Taking out a component of it. Doing three shapes out of five. Giving them a tool that will help them do better, like some sort of template or written instruction or traceable object. Then, make sure you’re going over and giving them praise every once in a while. “

So you would say it’s less about them not having any interest, and more about them maybe feeling overwhelmed and not confident, so they don’t try?

“In my experience, yes. I've been teaching 18 years now and there are certain patterns you can recognize in these things, especially when you compare how they’re doing in other classes. I think modifying things is key. “

That makes total sense. With all the modifying and trying to tailor a class to the students’ needs, what would you say is a teacher’s biggest hurdle they have to face?

“Administrative support is really important. If you don’t feel like they’re valuing the program, the morale starts to weaken. Then, you have less incentive, at least for me, I have less incentive to do extra things. Holiday things, special events, I’m less inclined to do those projects with the students because I know that it’s going to be more work, time, and energy on my part, and I have to save that for the students. It’s not about getting paid extra, it’s about getting recognition. I try to keep that energy towards the students, but if administration doesn’t fully support, appreciate, or support what’s going into the arts, and they’re not checking in, then an art teacher has to be very flexible and very tenacious with how they use materials. I think that’s one of the best things about being an art teacher: we’re so resourceful and flexible, but sometimes to a fault. People assume it’s art and it’s creative and anything goes, so sometimes we’re using scraps of things or we’re reusing materials or we’re using things that are old and not in great condition, and we’re trying to make the most out of basic materials. And we work with a lot of materials, and it’s messy and time consuming to clean up to start with. So that’s some obstacles for teachers to work with.

In the classroom, there’s also so many varying degrees of processing speed, fine motor skills, and you’re one body with 30 students. Where do you give your time? I tend to give my time to making sure everyone’s engaged. As opposed to 1 on 1, where if you’re in a 45 minute period, you don’t have enough time in a period to engage students 1 on 1. So you have to make sure that you are emphasizing the most important components of the lesson, the takeaways of the unit, doing a solid demo, everything necessary so that the lesson can run without them asking you a million questions. They’re going to do it anyway, though. That’s just how kids are!“

What are your thoughts on the importance of art in school in terms of importance to a student’s education experience?

“This is how I preface my classes every semester. I don’t want them to think about Art in terms of the traditional Fine Arts. I explain to them that if you never do anything with this class, but you go into it with an open mind, you don’t know where this knowledge will take you. We’re living in a world today where so much is visual and universal. I talk to them about the apps they use and the games they play, the products they buy and the logos they’re drawn to. These were designed by an artist and designer. It starts with classes like these. Even if you don’t draw, even if you don’t do anything traditional, you will develop a greater sense of style when you pick your clothing out. You will develop a better aesthetic, so that when you grow up and eventually have your own place, your own apartment, your own home, it’s aesthetically pleasing to you. It’s well designed. You are honing your observational skills. That’s only going to make you stronger, not only as an artist but as a human being in whatever career you go into. So I try to explain to them that Art is not about just creating something tangible. It’s about expanding their vocabulary, it’s about understanding why they’re drawn to the products they’re drawn to, the films and clothing they’re drawn to. It carries over into so many different careers. The culinary arts, performing arts, set design, commercial design, graphic design, photography, digital art, animation, illustration, all of those things. Then you start to see their light bulbs go off, and I try to tie things in with interior design spaces. That’s more practical than just doing a painting. That can go into teaching warm and cool colors. They’re going to take these vocabularies into adulthood. For me, it’s not just art or college, but I can tell that in any classroom, several students are going to be in the Arts, whether they know it or not. It may not be something they’re expecting. They could be lighting a film set, or doing makeup artistry. At the end of the day, I want them to know what they’re learning is meaningful and helps everything from their style, to their aesthetic, to their attention to detail, to their vocabulary. “