Twitter
Facebook
Flickr
RSS
Showing posts with label personal art. Show all posts
Showing posts with label personal art. Show all posts
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
Holiday Break
Enjoying holiday break and using time to catch up. Looking to what I will be teaching in the new year and wrapping up lessons, grading and uploading to Artsonia. Boy, it is nice to have a little breather.
I had fun making recycled magazine ornaments with my 4th and 5th graders - not too many finished but it did put a little spark in them and show them what is possible from an old magazine. One student used the coils she made and added a yarn pom pom and added it to a gift ~ great idea!
I purchased the bird and sun from a fair trade booth at my school's Holiday Fundraiser. Then I made a handout of different shapes for students to follow. We used 1 inch magazine strips and folded them in half once then in half again. Pay attention to the color on the strip when folding to get the colors you want. Then I rolled that into a coil and glued the end with glue stick. Keep adding more strips to the coil until it is the right size for your design. Use a folded strip to create the outline shape when the coils are finished. When gluing the coils into the shape it is better to use liquid glue. I finished mine with a few coats of mod podge - to keep the coils from falling out in the middle and to give it some shine.
 |
| my finished birdie |
 |
| a strip before coiling and coils of different sizes. |
 |
the box top with my in progress work and strips and templates for the kids.    |
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Everyday Silliness
What fun! Each morning I check in to the blog, download my silly worksheet for the day and leave it on my desk. Then I can think about the topic and daydream about what I am going to do for the assignment throughout my day. Gives me a little mental silly break, silly mental break, mental break down... Here are a few of the things I have created as a result of the assignments so far.
My fave:
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
Getting Close...
to school starting again. It is hard to believe this will be my third year at Greenville! I am starting to get the hang of this being off in the summers again. Last year I felt a bit unproductive. This year I made lists and I had this blog to keep me honest :-) At least it helped me to feel like I was getting somewhere and doing something. This week I will be staying close to home - been taking care of drs appointments, organizing files and just wrapping my head around another great year of teaching ART to K - 5th graders.
Experimenting with dinner - need to add a few more to my list, my boys are getting tired of steak, spaghetti and breaded chicken breasts. Here is the Rachael Ray recipe I made for dinner. No leftovers and my son said "This is the fanciest dinner you've ever made, mom." I'd call that a success.
Back to curriculum ~ I made a list of what I taught by grade and attached the standards to see what I might need to add. I also listed what I taught last year but did not get to this year (mostly because of so many SNOW DAYS!) I also have my inventory lists and what I need to order. I have kind of shot myself in the foot by being good at fundraising! My principal brags that I am 'self-supporting' so with all the budget cuts I will not be getting any money from the school this year. I have to use all the money I raised. I do very well with a magnet fundraiser where items arrive in time for the holidays - it also helps that I teach in a rather affluent part of the county. I also make a pretty good sum from Artsonia. Here was my procrastination drawing on my folder.
I am working on an inventory spreadsheet to make this easier in the future. To quickly see how much I used for the year and what I need to order for the next.
All my files are organized in boxes ready to go back to school and slip into the file cabinet. I still have a couple 'not sure' piles - slowly working through them. I am proud of myself for not stressing over having the folder tabs alternate and having everything color coded - that is a big step for me... letting things like that go. It is organized and it serves the purpose - I am not getting graded on it... am I? So here are the three sections:
The files I keep in my desk divided into the following categories: My Art Program, County Art Program, School/County Admin, Previous Planning Books
Then the student handouts which I recently laminated and hole punched. (see this blog entry) This is anything the students will use as a reference or complete.
Then I have all the lesson plan ideas I have been collecting. I organized those by subject:
Hopefully this will help someone either become more organized or give them permission to use *gasp* different colored folders and *gasp* handwritten titles. I know I need help! Maybe I should just set it all on fire (CED theme of the month!)!
Well this short little update turned into a novel as usual. Enjoy the last week of summer!
Thursday, July 29, 2010
Star Book - How to
I got the idea for this from one of the middle school teachers in our county – she was nice enough to offer her materials, ideas, samples to the newbies before she retired. I saw this little gem and I snatched it up – she even gave me the stack of astro brite paper to go with it. I have only taught it once – as a little extra at the end of the year to one 3rd grade class... See what you can do with it.
1.Fold the inside pages - 5 pages works best to form the star. This is made with regular copy paper – I used the astro brite neons. Your inside papers should be twice as large as your finished book. I made a large one for this sample. The finished book is 4” so the inside pages are 8”.
3.Create your covers – cut cardboard or mat board the size of your folded pages – 4” I covered mine with paste paper I had left over from Summer Art Camp. Cut the paste paper about 1/2” larger all the way around. Gluestick the cardboard to the back of the paste paper. Wrap/glue the corners in first, then fold/glue the edges in to make neat corners. Make 2 for the front and back.
5.Choose a ribbon that coordinates with your colors. Measure it from corner to corner with the covers lined up like the photo below. Cut the ribbon to be 2.5 times as long at this measurement.
6.Glue the ribbon down to the back of the covers, leaving about 1/4” between the two covers.
I did my drawings before I assembled the book – but you could work with it after assembly as well by folding it back and forth to get a flat surface to draw on.
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Art Teachers on the River
All of the county buildings/schools are closed on Fridays in the summertime. So our camps only run from Mon-Thurs. On Friday we planned a nice little get together at one of the teacher's homes. She recently graduated from VCU and lives with her dad in Remington. http://www.remingtonva.org/ What an amazing place they have. It is right on the Rappahannock River and her dad is a real artist himself.
Our crew consisted of 2 recently retired high school teachers, two current HS teachers – one our lead art teacher for the county and then two elementary teachers. We met rather early as it was already pretty hot and humid at 9AM! 
Most set up and got to work painting. I brought all manner of drawing materials and started out sketching a nice overturned tree stump. I also took lots of pictures. I got started on a doodle technique from a book I just got called Zentangles. Check out the official site for it: http://www.zentangle.com/So here are my creative endeavors: sketches, ATCs, zentangles, photos oh my!
See my photo album on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=72824&id=1320498810&l=d3057ebb2f
Monday, July 19, 2010
Dem Bones ~ Middle School Version!
I taught the Middle School Summer Art Camp at Kettle Run High School from July 12- 15. Here is a re-cap...
Day 1
We had our middle schoolers make pinhole cameras out of hot cocoa cans. They made their cameras and got to work using them and developing the images. Our camp was so packed with 22 students – we had to have them work in shifts. While they were waiting for the darkroom, they made paste papers. I had never hear of this before – wish I had gotten pictures of them creating – but I was too busy making my own... You mix up the art paste (see pic) – the kind used for papier mache, water it down a bit and add acrylic paint to it. We used large glossy paper and painted the color on – then used plastic scrappers (see pic) to add texture. Ours were store bought but they can easily be made out of notched cardboard.
Here are some of the results:
Then we showed students how to make an accordion fold book that could hold their pinhole images. They cut out their paste papers to use as covers or as additional decoration.
Day 2
We worked with students in the darkroom to show them how to make a positive print from their pinhole negative.
Here are some of the students' best pinhole images:
We discussed Henry Moore and showed photos of him being inspired by rocks and bones. Students chose a bone they liked and drew it realistically. Then they drew it three more times until it was abstracted. From one of the 3 drawings they created a plaster sculpture using a newspaper armature.
Here are some drawings: Mine is on the left - student on the right.
The student's sculptures that was made from the drawing above:
Day 3
We took students to the American Museum of Natural History and the Brian Jungen show at National Museum of the American Indian. They had a blast – even in the rain! We ate lunch in the courtyard at the Hirshhorn since we would be out of the rain. Then we took a walk past the Henry Moore sculptures that were across the street. We stopped for a group shot:
Finish everything day! We had students create one more new piece of art – the drawback to the field trip is less art produced but the kids enjoy it so much and they rarely get a chance to go anywhere during the regular school year we feel it is important to keep it in future camps.
Students chose a few items they liked from the bones – or from a new pile of shells and sea creatures. They must have been tired of the bones because all of them chose from the shells! They created a few thumbnails to create a composition they liked – then they enlarged it on 19x19 paper and painted with acrylics. The paints were very yummy and I really enjoyed this. Some students had a hard time with composition and benefited from creating the thumbnails.
here are some thumbnail/painting pairs: (mine is first and includes the original items)
I think this project is where I was of the most help to students. I worked with them to create the best composition with the items they had chosen. I pushed them to create more thumbnails until they were happy with the results and could see the difference between a strong and a weak composition.
Most of the afternoon we worked with students to finish up and choose their best work to go in the art festival which is in April.
Now I can start my summer ~ no more teaching until August 23rd!
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)
.jpg)
