October/November

What two great months to be creative since Halloween and Thanksgiving are fantastic holidays. In art in the younger grades we made silly and scary pieces of art like scarecrows in Kindergarten, masks in 4th grade, spider webs, and many more spooky characters.

The older students have been painting away in drawing/painting plus fibers art where Pinatas are forming quite nicely. The extent that students have gone to make the pinatas look real has taken some time and they have worked outside of class to finish them as well. I can't wait to see the end product for each one.

Drawing and Painting has the famous shoe paintings in the display case for everyone to view and they are posting their cityscape watercolor paintings around the school for other viewers to see.

The Ceramics/Sculpture students are currently making abstract sculptures out of toothpicks, ice cream spoons, and Popsicle sticks. They will spray paint them with random colors to finish the piece or if they come up with another solution to finish off their sculpture it may be used.

September

September was an exciting month for our art department. The eighth graders went outside to have an Andy Warhol day where they created different art sculptures out natural objects. The statues had to sit outside for a day and let nature and human beings come in contact with them. The results were okay for some and not so much for others. Lucas Feldkamp, my aide, assisted my class, he created a turtle out of rocks that was smashed right away at recess because it was in the students pathway.

Homecoming was an exciting week for the art department since I am also the freshman adviser. The class was excited and did a great job at preparing all their materials for the hallway decorating/window decorating and the float on Friday. It was a success for our class this year for the most part. We also had concessions that Friday evening, thanks to all the parents support and my co-adviser we did very well that evening. Our crowd seemed to be pleased with the food and treats.

September was a busy month and I hope to have more fun times in this month now as well. I will keep you posted on all the fun events that happen in October. Have a creative and colorful day!!!!!!!!!!

Art Classroom 2011-2012

We are off to a wonderful start in the art classroom. In ceramic/sculpture I students have made masks and learned about several African cultures that used masks for religious and spiritual reasons. There was a good discussion on how masks fit into our culture and how the masks we wear take on a different spiritual meaning. Fibers art is starting their string art project and drawing/painting I students are working on self-portraits in the collage style. The elementary students worked on designing their name using line, shape, color, and space. They are working on learning about the elements of art; the elements of art are the foundation blocks to build upon in art class. As the year goes on there will be more posts about what is happening in the art room, feel free to check out my blog to read about the exciting adventures your children are having in art.

Valentine Week

In art class this week we got to make Valentine bags; students discovered how to make hearts by tracing them and using the teacher's version of making a heart. The supplies the kids used were: shiny paper, heart tracers, paper lace, neon paper, gold decorating metal as well. Each bag was made with a unique style that fit the student's personality. The kindergartners made the best Valentine's decoration; it was a Valentine creature. Each creature had curly hair made of paper, a colored heart for the body, heart eyes, eyelashes made of curled paper, and accordion arms and legs. A fun and exciting week was had by all the art students to get ready for Monday. 

Art/English Museum Trip

We recently went to the Minneapolis Institute Art museum trip this week in art. It was a co-curricular project with English; it was a great opportunity for the students to experience outside of Gilman. The students got to explore all the different levels of art and different mediums the museum offered. The students had an assignment to do in both classes where they had to find a piece of artwork, draw it out, and reflect upon the piece. It was an amazing trip and we plan on doing it next year possibly. If you are interested in seeing all the work at the MIA because you are unable to travel with us here is a link to the website. There is also another link for teachers who are interested in showing pieces of artwork; ArtsConnectEd. is a great resource link on the website.
Please Enjoy all the wonderful pieces of artwork
Links:

• MIA
• ArtsConnectEd

My First Blog

This is my first blog, I hope to share my own knowledge with other co-workers as I create my piece of artwork. I really do not know what I am doing, but I am going to try my best to make it work. I am excited to see how I can use this type of technology in my classroom as an art teacher.