WAM Professional Development Day

Last Saturday, the Education Department at the Worcester Art Museum where I teach held a professional development day. The day began with coffee, pastries, and a goodie bag. The museum is celebrating its 125th anniversary.

We lined up to pick up a bag and fill it with some goodies. A new lanyard for the employee ID, The sand dollar looking thing fits inside a water cup and is a brush cleaner. The boss made each of us a little sketchbook that had our name on it,  There was also a pencil with a white eraser, and a stubby watercolor pencil. I chose a blue one.

There were several new faculty members so we played an ice-breaker. Everyone was given a puzzle piece. You had to go around to find your partner. Introduce yourself, tell what you teach, and add a fun fact. Then each pair was called to introduce each other and tell what we talked about. My partner's fun fact was she has a horse named Ace who is retired from riding. My fun fact was I'm a hooker (left-handed 😉) and proud of it.

We had a meeting to discuss up coming events, schedules for the year, and important dates like the faculty art show and open house in January 2024.

After the meeting, we got to play and make art. There was a station for bubble printing, a large canvas for a group painting , and paper for individual expression.

It was messy play and I got a dot of blue paint on my blue shoes. I thought the paint was tempera mixed with soap bubbles. My shoes are washable, but the paint didn't come out. I think it might have been acrylic. Oh, well!

After playtime, we broke into groups depending on whether we taught adults or children, and discussed teaching challenges and swapped ideas while we waited for lunch.

Lunch was an assortment of pizza, bruschetta, salad, soda, and water. We were going to have lunch outside in the courtyard, but it began to rain so we moved inside. Just as the buffet was set up, the rain stopped!

It was a fun day hearing what was going on in the museum, catching up with colleagues, and meeting new ones. Oh, and the eats were good, too.