As an art teacher I’m always trying to get kids to talk about art and the visual world around us.  There are so many strategies that I have learned over the years to help kids to do this but I am always looking for new ideas.  In my classes students are often talking about their processes and doing reflective writing as their project comes to a close.  Still, I often feel that communicating their ideas and processes verbally is extremely important and not practiced enough in school.

Aurasma is an app that allows students to create a visual overlay onto an existing image by scanning it much like you would a QR code.   With Aurasma students are able to videotape themselves talking about their art work rather than writing.  I prefer this as an art teacher because as I stated before I want kids to be able to express their ideas and what they are seeing verbally.

Here is a Ted talk to help better illustrate Aurasma.
https://embed.ted.com/talks/matt_mills_image_recognition_that_triggers_augmented_reality.html

Presentation is another important component in the art room.  By augmented arts statements students are adding a new interactive element to their presentation that allows the viewer to see and hear the artists perspective or thought process. As time goes on I hope to explore many of the other possibilities that Aurasma has to offer.

For this project students will be video recording their artist statements to help enhance their verbal presentation skills.  They will then use their art work as a trigger image for their video statement to appear on the mobile device in use.  When these works of art are on displayed in a gallery or in the halls of our school any student or parent who has subscribed to our classroom channel can learn more about the artist intent and process.