Register for Telling Tales in the Digital, Visual, & Media Arts Classroom
While there are many venues for lodging in Duluth, the Sheraton is across the street from the conference venue, and will offer you a special rate until May 29th. Link below.
Telling Tales in the Digital, Visual, & Media Arts classroom
Saturday June 13, 2026
Zeitgeist Arts
222 East Superior Street
Duluth, MN
9:30-11:30 AM
Artist Jonathan Thunder
Jonathan Thunder (b. 1977) attended the Institute of American Indian Arts – Studio Arts Program in Santa Fe (1999-2000) and received a B.A. in Visual Effects and Motion Graphics from the Art Institute International in Minneapolis (2005). His epic animated mural Manifest’o was installed in the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport 2021 – 2023. Thunder has received numerous awards and fellowships, including the Jim Denomie Memorial Scholarship, the McKnight Foundation Fellowship, the Minnesota State Arts Board Grant, the Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant, and the Tiwahe Foundation Leadership Grant. His work has been included in numerous one-person, two-person, and group exhibitions at All My Relations Gallery, the Duluth Art Institute, the Highpoint Center for Printmaking, the Minneapolis Institute of Art, the Muskegon Museum of Art, Rochester Art Center, and the Tweed Museum of Art. Jonathan Thunder: Good Mythology premiered on PBS American Masters in 2023.
Artist Statement:
“Visual storytelling plays a big role in my practice. In the painting process I work from intuition, but as the painting is put together, I’ll sense a vignette emerging. I draw inspiration from influential experiences. These current events become the setting or arrangement for the painting. The recipe is often experimental and like a dream sequence. I grew up reading Mad Magazine, Robert Crumb, collecting Garbage Pail Kids, riding skateboards with elaborate, odd designs on the deck, listening to Public Enemy, Rage Against Machine, Tom Waits and watching MTV. I’m also a life student of Ojibwe culture and storytelling. The Twin Cities is where I was raised, and I was born on the Red Lake Indian Reservation. These two worlds are integrated to me, yet far apart. Both worlds inform my perspective. I’m also attracted to urban minutiae, bad graffiti, tattoos, tribal symbolism and children’s tales. I feel these elements help place my work in our time and connect it to where we are today.” – Jonathan Thunder 2025
11:30 AM-12:45 PM
Lunch
12:45-3:00 PM
Tracy Little, visual & media arts educator, Duluth Public Schools
Tracy Little has a K-12 Visual Arts License, CTE(Career and technical education License as well as SLD& EBD(Special education license. She has a Master in ARt Education. She has taught for 20 years, isa member of NAEA & AEM for 15 years. She started working with digital media arts my first year teaching 2002 by teaching herself how to use photoshop and photography with a dark room. As the years progressed she incorporated more lessons after working with Jeremy Holien from the Perpich ARt Center. After receiving the CTE license, she received a grant through the state to build a lab and get the proper equipment to teach Career based digital arts. I continue to work professionally with my Art studio and oil paintings.
Tracy’s experience in melding the visual and media arts classroom….
*Learn what free apps are available for media arts.
*What are the rules for 6th grade or lower with apps
*Ipads versus chromebooks versus desktops
*How to use the new free photoshop web based for 6th grade and up
*Stop motion(one time fee) procreate also lifetime
*Create a tech email for log ins(if allowed)
*Let’s play – Lessons for middle school(6-8). Photography, animation, cinema and illustration/graphic design.
We will create a story board and create paper or a drawing animation. We could also create a small 30 second commercial in wevideo.
In addition to providing classroom-ready tools and lessons, ElevateArts Ed offer PD and support for arts curriculum and assessment, arts integration, and classroom structure and support for the arts lab.
Waiting for an art teacher in his room, I chatted with a couple of students working at their tables.
“What’cha working on today?” I asked.
“Tracing watercolor drops with a sharpie,” a student offered.
Hoping to learn more about the lesson, I asked, “Why?”
A student shrugged towards the teacher, “Because he told us to.”
Curriculum Development:
With service on both the National Coalition for Core Arts Standards as well as the Minnesota Academic standards in the Arts and a long history of classroom practice and professional development, we can offer curriculum and assessment protocols that are engaging, meaningful, and flexible for programs of any size.
Meaningful Assessment in the Arts:
Do your students know what they’re learning, and why? To truly engage, students need to be challenged on a range of levels.
Class-in-a-Book:
A great template formatted to fill with your own lessons, rubrics and vocabulary. Has check-in spaces for daily creative warmups, extra paper planned for draftwork, and features work habits self-check in! A terrific customizable tool that can be combined with your own choice of covers (marbled paper, paste paper, etc!) Can be customized to just about any grade level. $30
Daily Creative Warm Ups:
A digital file with 18 weeks’ worth of class-starters! Each 3-5 minute activity engages students with a creative challenge, from synectics to yarn bombing to design. $36
Interested in learning more about the offerings or purchasing resources?