Saturday, October 12, 2013

Fall has Arrived

I know fall has officially arrived here in South Carolina when I look outside and my yard is completely orange with pine needles. That's what I'll be doing this weekend, creating Mt. Pine Needle right by my driveway. Other changes have been a little less noticeable. The weather has gotten somewhat cooler and the mornings have stayed dark longer...in fact, I had to check my clock repeatedly Tuesday. I could have sworn that it was way earlier than it really was!

As for things in the Art room...they have remained pretty much the same. Great! Students are steadily finishing their first projects and are getting excited about things to come. I just can't believe how quickly this year is flying by! Before too long, I will be posting about the Art Show!

Anyway, here are the updates for this week...

K4: Still working on Warm and Cool color drawings. Should have a few finished examples by next week.

K5: Don't be mad...I totally forgot about taking pictures of our finished projects! Yesterday, I had about 100 things on my mind when I was trying to leave school and forgot to bring their projects home. :( I will tell you though, they look great! This week, students outlined their ice cream scoops...really making them POP! They also added a few doodles and details to their black backgrounds using a white crayon. Sadly the school is closed on Monday for Columbus Day, but I will try my best to get these posted on Tuesday.

1st: I am trying to teach students this year, that there is a huge variety of ways that art can be created. Just because we are creating a painting does not mean that the only materials we can use are paints and a brush, or if we are creating a drawing, its pencils only. As I posted last week, we tried out some tea staining. This week, students tried spray painting, using a spray bottle. Before we used the spray bottle, we discussed the rock walls that cave paintings are commonly found on. Students described the rocks noting that they display a variety of color. This helped students understand why we would be spray painting...to hint at the natural color variations in rocks. They loved the process! They loved seeing the little drips splat all over their artworks!



2nd: Talk about excited, you should have seen the 2nd graders this week! Most students began coloring their stained glass windows. Even though they knew what the process was going to be like (coloring their transparency with Sharpies), they were just blown away with their work at the end of class! The remainder of the 2nd grade applied their black glue this week and is anxiously awaiting their turn to add color.



3rd: Let me start off by saying, I am the kind of art teacher that usually stays away from glitter and rhinestones. I find that students often overly use them to the point that it takes away from what they originally created. However, after looking at several actual examples of Medieval jewelry (the Crown of Charlamagne for example) I knew that rhinestones were a must. For this project, I did restrict the amount of rhinestones that students could use...however, it was mainly because I wanted to make sure that every student had access to what they wanted. I love how these have turned out! The rhinestones have added a lot to the metallic plate sections we created last week.




4th: Another success story this week...students were able to add color to their hieroglyphics! I would have taken more photos, but the aluminum foil that students used for this project presented a new photography challenge that I need to figure out. They are great though! The colors the students chose and the designs that they used for their border blew me away. Several students explained their ideas to me and by the end of class, I was almost to the point of tears. They were being "Art Smart" for sure!!!



5th: Our Sumi-e landscapes are nearing completion. This week, all students created their final landscape. We will be adding Japanese Kanji to them next week as a final touch.



6th: We had a catch up day this week. There were several students that had not finalized their sketches for our Greek Vases and others, who had missed last week, needed to apply their acrylic paint in order to participate in the etching process we will do next week. However, everyone was able to catch up and we are now totally ready for next week!

Art Club: Bet you can guess :) If you guessed, painting...you would be right! I had a few students finish this week and I am so happy with the results! Can't wait to share!

Next week, there is a pretty good chance that you will not find my normal post on Saturday. Next week is the annual South Carolina Art Education Association conference. I will be posting Saturday, but it will be late in the evening and it will cover what I have been up to at the conference...BTW super excited about the sessions I will be attending! I will be posting an update of what we will be doing in the art room, but it will probably be Sunday night or Monday morning after I get back from the conference. Lots of awesome things to come!

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