Sorry For Posting Late

Well, I am posting a little later than expected. If you read my post last week, I shared with you that my family would be coming into town for Mr....I mean Dr. Chance's graduation :) My family was initially planning on going home on Sunday, but we ended up hanging out with them until late yesterday after, thus the reason I did not post like I had promised.

I guess though it is better late than never. This update will be a little different than normal. I will include the usual update, but toward the end of the post, I will share a recap of our 3rd Annual Art Show!!! On to the update....

K4: In preparation for our new monster sculptures we will be creating, the K4 students sketched ideas of what they think a monster would look like. There were the usual vampires and werewolves, along with several monsters that students have seen in the movies and on T.V. I can't wait to see how students will react this week when I give them a piece of pool noodle as the base of their monster!

K5: Since I arrived in South Carolina 5 years ago, I have waited for the opportunity to teach about Ernest Lee, or as many around here know him...The Chicken Man!!!! I love his art! It is just so fun and festive. With the end of the year quickly approaching, I thought that now would be the perfect time to discuss this famous local artist. For those of you who do not know the Chicken Man, he paints really cool, brightly colored, funky chickens. Now, he does paint other things as well, in fact, my husband and I own one of his awesome fish paintings, but he is most known for the chickens. He has been painting them for around 30+ years and has reportedly painted around 15,000 chickens for people around the city. He still paints daily and you can go and purchase one of his artworks from Mr. Lee himself downtown.
For our Chicken Man inspired paintings, students worked last week on choosing materials for the 5 different parts of their chicken: the body (fabric scraps), the comb (felt), the beak (felt), the wing and tail (feathers), and lastly the feet (scrapbook paper).

1st: To wrap up the year, I decided a couple of things. First, I wanted to begin to incorporate the Principles of Design into our last artwork and secondly, I wanted to create something summery. If you haven't found or read the book "I'm the Best Artist in the Ocean", by Kevin Sherry, you need to! It is hilarious! After finding that book again on my shelf, I knew that was what we needed to do. I asked students to think about their favorite ocean animal and then to imagine that animal creating art...aka their "Best Artist in the Ocean". This weekend, I will share our backgrounds and how we incorporated emphasis into our creations. Here are some of the sketches they created to start the project off...

2nd: Going along with the ocean theme or as I am calling it "Summer Celebration", I decided to continue it into the 2nd grade curriculum for the end of the year. After discussing the Principles of Design variety and pattern, students began sketching their ideas for our "Fancy Fish". I was cracking up at some of their ideas! So much fun!!!

3rd: This past week was a finishing day for the third grade. Students completed the final details on their artwork, as well as any critiques and journal entries. They are now ready to start a new project tomorrow!

4th: Fourth graders are still hard at work on their Op Art cubes. Some students began finishing theirs up this past week and assembled them using simple, clear Scotch tape.

 5th: To kick off our new project, students learned about quilts...I even showed students pictures of the National Quilt Museum and the National Quilt Show, both located about 20 minutes from where I grew up. It is really interesting to me to see how far quilts have come along from their traditional beginnings to ultra modern designs that look more like paintings. I was so happy to see students sharing my enthusiasm and interest!
Because we only have 3 real studio classes left this year, we really don't have the time to create a real quilt square using fabric and sewing techniques. Instead, we are drawing our favorite school memories and then will "sew" yarn around the edges of the square when the drawings are completed. 

6th: With the Art Show approaching, students used Wednesday of last week to add their final details to their Palmetto Trees. Now that we are all finished with our paintings, it is time for tie-dye!!!

No Art Club this past week :(

The Art Show was a hit again this year! In a similar style to last year, I chose one artwork to represent each student at our school. We partner again with the SpringHill Suites to put on this year's show. They set up the room and tables for us, in additional to providing some delicious food for all those who came to the event and Dr. Mr. Chance and I set up all of the art. I was really pleased with how things looked this year and very proud of all the accomplishments that students have achieved! I wish so badly that we could leave everything framed for a few more weeks so every family could see what we have created this year. But alas, all good things must come to an end...all the work has returned to the Art room and students will be receiving all of their projects Thursday to take home. Below are a few pictures of this year's show. Hopefully by the end of this week, I will be bringing a photo book to school to share all of the wonderful artworks and pictures I took!

It's Almost Here

It's time for the ART SHOW!!!! This coming Thursday, May 8th is our 3rd annual Art Show! I cannot wait! This year's art looks soooo good all framed up :) I hope that everyone can come out and see it! Now, if you cannot come out and see this spectacular event, no worries. I will be posting pictures of it.

There's not a ton to share in terms of updates this week. Every class has been finishing up their projects. I have already posted all of the finished projects by K5-6th grades (see below this post). One thing to note is that you might notice the smaller amount of pictures posted for each grade level. I purposely did not post the artworks that will be shown in the Art Show. If you are looking for your child's work and do not see it, you can see it Thursday night :)

There are three things to update you on this week. First and foremost, the K4 caterpillars have finally taken shape. During class next week, we will be adding all of the finishing touches.

Secondly, the younger group of Art Club members started a new project this week...well, not the actual project, but an activity to practice for our project. We started by reading the book "The Day the Crayons Quit", by Drew Daywalt. We pretended, like the crayons in the book, that all of the art supplies had quit for the day....to much hard work for them :) I told students that there was one little group of supplies that offered their help and instructed them to create a picture, a shape, and the first letter of the name using these supplies. It was a lot of fun! Students created much more than the three things I initially asked for. I was very happy with the results and feel that they are totally ready for our new project.

Lastly, the mosaic is FINISHED!!! Hooray! Mrs. Allen applied the grout on Thursday and it is almost ready to be installed!

Just because the Art Show is happening on Thursday does not mean that we are all finished creating art. Everyone will be starting new projects next week!

One last additional note, next weekend Mr. Chance will be graduating with his Ph.D. I will be unable to post next weekend, not only due to his graduation, but my family will also be in town for the event. I am going to try my best to post next Sunday evening, but if I am unable to, look for not only an update of our projects, but a recap of the Art Show on Monday!

Art Show and Updates!

Thank you to everyone who came out to the 2nd annual Art Night! It was incredibly successful! The artwork looked great on display and I was so happy to see students so excited about their art. I even had one student run up to me and say, "Mrs. Chance! I am a real artist!" :) I am so proud of all the work students accomplished this year. Congrats students!!!!

Even though the art show has come and gone, we will still be working hard until the end of the year. Many students will be starting new projects in the coming weeks (look for pics of their finished projects next week!) The K5 students just started a new project. We read the book Dragons Love Tacos by Adam Rubin. I am in love with this book...very clever and funny and the illustrations by Daniel Salmieri are fantastic! After reading the book, students drew their own long dragons. We will be filling the dragons bodies with pattern, a Principle of Design. Along with their dragon, students drew a food that their dragon loves. My example loved cheeseburgers :)

The 5th grade students are working on their South Carolina landscapes. Students practiced using watercolor paints last week and applied their practice to one of their final artworks this week. Students will make three landscapes total. Here are some of the examples from Friday.

The K4 students are beginning a printmaking unit. They will be creating three different prints using three different techniques. This week we created prints with bubble wrap. Students painted the bubble wrap bubble side up using tempera paint. I helped the students hold the bubble wrap as they painted and I also helped them flip it onto the paper. The students pressed the bubble wrap onto the paper and gently lifted it up revealing their print. They were so excited! It was almost like magic to them :) Not to mention, the prints turned out really well! I will have pics of them next week.

As I said, make sure to check back next week. I am going to be posting a lot of finished projects and progress pics!

 

Pre Art Show Week

This coming Thursday, May 2, we will be having Art Night at the SpringHill Suites! I hope that everyone can come out and see the artworks. EVERY student will be represented at this year's show!!! We had a great time last year and I am hoping this year will be even better :)

With the art show drawing nearer, I have been preparing all this week. This past Tuesday, I laid out each artwork by grade and chose which works would be coming to the show. I have also been busy framing all of the artworks preparing them to be shown off on Thursday night.

This week, I do not have any progress pictures to share with you, however I thought everyone might enjoy seeing a behind the scenes look at art show preparation. The two pictures I am posting today show all of the K4 artworks spread out in the art room awaiting the choosing process.