Painting the Way We Learn

“Education is not just something that happens to you, education is something that you can actively engage in and pursue.”

Alicia Goode-Allen, graduated from the Dawson School in Boulder County last year and is currently on a gap year before she heads to college in the Fall. She is part of a growing number of students that take a break between high school and college. She said she wanted to take a space to really explore her interests and her passions and what she really wants to study in college.”I wanted to have time and space to reflect and to think about how I could pursue my path deliberately and with all of who I was rather than just blindly going through the motions because that’s what society told me to do.”

She started doing tutoring work in for students from second grade up to high school seniors. She did a lot of work with students with different learning abilities and became aware of the gaps for many of these students in conventional education. As a result she is now embarking in a multi-country trip, funded by a kickstarter campaign, meeting people in different educational contexts in countries from Ireland to Switzerland, Norway, Spain, Croatia and Slovenia. Alicia says she will ask people about their experience as a student or teacher, inquire about how and why they learn new lessons, both within school and outside of the school environment and then, after hearing these stories of how and what people have learned in their lives, she will share those stories — through photos, sketches, prose and paintings.  “Painting for me is the best way that I know to relay who someone is and how they are in that moment.”

Alicia Goode-Allen says when she returns from her trip she hopes to compile three different learning methods that can be easily implemented by schools and teachers with a view to shifting classroom environments to pull in all students, particularly those individuals who learn by doing and are passionate about the arts.