Finding My Way: Using Visual Journals to Forge a Path of Resilience and Resistance

Abstract

Over the last four years of my K-12 visual arts teaching career, I faithfully kept visual journals, filling them with stories of my experiences in the classroom. What initially began as an experiment as I searched for a tool to help me navigate new challenges within a public school system, eventually led me to realize that my visual journals were a valuable resource to better understand myself as a teacher, my place within the system, and a resource for resilience. In this article, I use narrative and arts-based approaches to explore the ways I leveraged visual journals as a tool for resilience by integrating humor, fostering a sense of accomplishment and self-efficacy, as well as retaking ownership of my journey to fight back. Through sharing this narrative I hope to illustrate some of the ways visual journals can help arts educators find resilience and strength to resist during challenging times.