Art teacher Krystal Strong

What classes will you be teaching?

I will be teaching [art] foundations, drawing I and sculpture.

What do you do in sculpture?

In sculpture, you’re going to get to use a lot of different mediums, like we might use wire, plaster or cardboard. Just about anything you can think of to make three dimensional art.

What is your favorite medium to use?

My favorite art in my own free time would actually be photography, but I’ve always loved to paint and draw. Over the summer I was actually teaching myself calligraphy and floral arrangement. I love to restore old furniture, so all kinds of different artsy stuff.

What made you want to become a teacher?

When I was in school at K-State I knew I wanted to do something with art. At first I thought I maybe I would do graphic design and then I started to get into that program and I thought, there’s just no way I could sit in front of a computer all day. It just wasn’t for me. So, then I started thinking about what else I could do. I was someone who always loved school and I really liked art when I was in high school, so that kind of got me interested in it. I knew I wanted to be able to interact with students, so art education seemed like the perfect fit.

What is your past experience?

I started out teaching at Tonganoxie Elementary School, kindergarten through 4th grade. There were 700 students and I taught there for about three years. It was kind of a long drive out to Tonganoxie every day because I lived here in Kansas City, so I knew I wanted to find something a little bit closer. So I applied at Riverview Elementary School, here in the De Soto school district and I’ve been there for the past five years. [However], I always really, really, really wanted to teach high school. So, I was just hanging out in our district, waiting for an opportunity to open up at the high school and when one did this last spring I thought, I have to apply for it and I have to give it a try because when I was student teaching I just loved high school, but I ended up in elementary for whatever reason and that was also a lot of fun.

What are you excited about for this year?

I am excited, number one, to get to know students. It will also be fun to see some of my former students all grown up now, so that will be cool. I’m really just excited to teach these classes at a little bit higher level skill than what I’m used to teaching. At the elementary level, you do a lot of really basic stuff and it will be fun to dive a little bit deeper and doing more challenging things. Ultimately, getting the know the staff, getting to know the students and just getting used to being at the high school.

What are you wanting to learn from this year?

I have a lot to learn. Teaching sculpture at a higher level is going to be kind of a new thing for me. My emphasis is definitely in painting and drawing, but I’m super excited about sculpture just because there are so many different things you can do with it. I will definitely be learning a lot more about sculpture. Students will probably be teaching me, just as much as I am teaching them.

How experienced would a student have to be to take drawing or painting?

I don’t think you need any experience. Of course, at this high school, they require you to take the foundations class first, which kind of gives you a little introduction into all the different things for we do. So, I think once you’ve taken that class, anything you’re going to learn, you have to start somewhere. So, coming in with no skills, in just a semester you can learn a ton. [Students] shouldn’t be scared to take art if they don’t feel like they’re a good artist or if they don’t feel like they have a lot of practice because you can learn so much … my whole thing is, when I grade, I try to use a rubric to make it fair and to just look for a student’s individual growth. I want to see that you’ve gotten better from the beginning of the school year to the end and not judge people student-to-student, but judge that person just on their own work. If you’ve improved, that means a good grade to me.

What made you want to teach here?

Our district has always really supported the arts. If you’ve ever been in the district office and you see that huge wall of art, I think that shows that we have a district that supports us and gives us the things that we need. Even the fact that they’re adding another art teacher says a lot. A lot of kids are wanting to take it and that people are interested in it and I think that’s awesome. Like I said, I’ve just always wanted to teach high school and I’ve never really had to opportunity and I knew that I didn’t want to switch districts if I didn’t have to because I really like it here.

Will you be involved as a coach or sponsor of any clubs or sports?

I’m definitely not going to be a coach. I do play sand volleyball and did a lot of sports in high school and because I’m really tall people always think that I’m super good at sports, but I’m actually a little bit of a clutz. I do enjoy them, but I’m not super great. I played basketball, did track and softball growing up, but was never super great at it. I would be happy to sponsor clubs, but I need to learn more about what clubs are here and which ones need a sponsor. I’m sure I’ll get signed up to help with something, but I’m not sure yet.

What is one thing you want all of your students to know about you?

This is probably the coolest fact: when I was studying abroad in Australia, I also got to go to New Zealand. When I was in New Zealand I got to go skydiving and people always ask me if I would do it again, the answer is no, but it was really cool to try once. Not many people know that about me, but I went skydiving … The crazy thing though is when you go in this plane and you have to do tandem—which is when you’re attached to someone else—and I was attached to this professional skydiver, but he was super crazy and he had this mohawk (of course). He was trying to scare me as we were going up there and I’m already afraid of heights and should not have done this, but he was like, “you see what that is out there? That’s a graveyard,” then laughed. I was just like this is so scary, this is not helping at all. The scariest part is when you first jump out of the plane, they have you barrel roll backwards … and I thought I was going to die at that part when we were spinning. Then you start falling and it’s so scary, but as soon he pulled the parachute and you jump back up in the air, I knew we were safe safe, then it was fun. [However], that first, probably ten seconds, I was thinking, this is it.

How did you get the opportunity to go to Australia?

I was at school and I knew I wanted to study abroad because I have always loved to travel and have got to travel a lot, so I just went to the study abroad office. I told them I would prefer to go to an English speaking culture, so I could make friends better. I knew some Spanish, but not well enough to do all my course work in Spanish. Then they showed me some programs and I ended up picking one in Australia. When I was in high school, there was an Australian foreign exchange student at my school, so when I got to study abroad, I got to re-meet-up with them and that was fun because I felt like I knew somebody.