Parent-Teacher Time and My ClassDojo Discovery!

Parent-Teacher interviews snuck up on me this year. Not sure why, must have been focused on too many other things. About a week before Parent-Teacher, all teachers, all over the world start panicking, each with their own unique reasons. 12 hours straight of interviews, don't have enough marks for the students, have not communicated home yet about issues, the classroom is a disaster, etc. For some reason, I don't panic. I actually look forward to it...

I enjoy a few things about Parent-Teacher interviews. I absolutely love meeting students' parents for the first time. That one 10 minute conversation tells a teacher so much about the student. Gathering information like that, the good and the bad, helps me to a be a better teacher, and helps me to understand and connect with my students. I also love the conversations with the parents. They love talking about their children, if they understand that their child's success is my primary concern, the conversations are positive, friendly, and enjoyable. Now, I have not yet experienced a negative Parent-Teacher conversation, and I am sure that it will happen, but if I keep the interview centered around the child, how can it not stay positive?

Here is a glimpse into my classroom on Parent-Teacher Night!

A nice welcome sign for the parents as they enter the classroom!

And of course, flowers and candy on the table for the parents and students... well, actually, the candy is for me. :)

I always have a slideshow of pictures from the art class since my interviews are usually in my FSL classroom! Good for conversation starters, or distractions if needed! Still need some posters or visuals on that orange bulletin board up top...

My little bunny sculptures in their garden! I love a  bright and colorful classroom!

Parent Teacher Conferences can be very productive too if I use my time wisely! I clean my desk, which I had not seen the surface of since the beginning of the year!
UPDATE! It is messy again... :(

I was also able to get all my TPGPs from the last 4 years hung up by my desk! Good for inspiration and reminders of what I need to work on!

Man, I was so productive this round! I also got my student work bulletin board changed...

...and my homework board which I had been putting off!

Moral? Keep is positive, keep it welcoming, and keep it student centered.

Area for Self-Improvement...

One of my major goals this year (in fact, it is goal #1 on my TPGP), is to communicate more effectively with parents on a more regular basis. I have gotten better this year compared to past years, but I am still not where I would like to be. I have kept D2L (our online tool for news, grades, due dates, etc) up to date, and I have emailed home once to the parents whose child is missing one or more assignments. I would like to email home on a more regular basis, commenting on not only the needs of the students, but also their successes. I need to make this more of a priority for the next few months.

I actually discovered an awesome online tool that could be used for formative assessment, providing feedback for the students and the parents beyond that of assignments and tests. It is called ClassDojo! Teachers can attach a little adorable monster character to each student. The teacher then creates badges, which are worth points! There are positive and negative badges (I'm not a fan of the word "negative", I would prefer "areas of improvement", but I can't change it..). They can be anything that the teacher would like to provide feedback on, for example, "Hard Worker", "Spoke French", "Up to date on all Assignments", etc. Teachers could have it projected during class, and subtly give out badges as students complete them! Teachers can also add comments to the badges, and students can create accounts so that they can log on to see their badges, their points and the attached comments! There is even a Parent email tool! Check it out! I am starting it with my French as a Second Language classes this week! I'll let you know how successful it is!

The First Few Days With Grade 6

I have only been teaching Grade 6 for two years. I have approached both years completly different. In my first year, I had two classes, all year long. We had so much time together. All of the projects were done in portfolios, so students were given 3-4 projects centered around a theme, and could work on any of the projects during the class. All the projects would then be due on one date. This year, we organized the Grade 6 classes differently. This year, I have 3 classes, who rotate through Art, Music and Foods. So, I am able to see the students twice throughout the year, but not necessarily twice in a row. This year, I have basically divided up the two sessions in Art into 2D, providing one assignment at a time (drawing, watercolor, collage, etc.) and 3D (mixed media, sculpture, clay, etc.) I am not quite sure which way I prefer, and maybe it depends on the timing and organization.

I really do love the Grade 6 students in the Art room. They are young enough that they don't question their creativity and ideas, yet old enough to create some really amazing artwork. They are excited, and enjoy being in school. They try almost everything I throw at them without worry or complaint, and are quite positive and open when having class discussions. They are ready and willing to learn, which is so beautiful. It is a really interesting age. They of course have their challenges, as any grade does, but overall, I really enjoy teaching this age.

Anyways, I was looking through my pictures and found a few gems from the first few days with my Grade 6 classes that I thought I would share with the world. The first few pictures were from our very first day of school. The Grade 6 students rotated into the art room for about 45 minutes each, and I needed something that was exciting, yet doable for the first time in the art room. I decided to do a large collaborative mural that would have a number of different sections to provide a number of different media and a variety of experiences at different levels of difficulty.

This was an old school sign that was found behind a bookcase! Perfect shape and size for a collaborative mural! I drew out squiggly sections before hand and planned out a a variety of media to use in each section. This was after day 1.

Zentangling on the left, and layered tissue paper with matte medium on the right.

Layered tissue paper on the left and yarn designs on the right.

Magazine roll ups! This station was quite hilarious, because the kids started to battle over who could make the largest, longest roll up. The really long ones unfortunately fell off...

I had anticipated that a lot more of the mural would be finished after day 1, so we turned it into the "I'm Finished" mural! So now, I have the stations in large ziplock bags, so when a student finishes an assignment early, I ask them which section on the mural they would like to work on, grab them the baggie, and they get to work! This way, there is never a student with nothing to do.

I am a little nervous that we are not going to have enough time to finish it. I am going to try and have a day every now and then that we can dedicate to the mural in hopes to get in finished. I guess it wouldn't be the end of the world to continue it next year in Grade 7, but my worry would be that they would get bored of it if it took that long. So the goal will remain to get it done this year. I'll keep you posted!

 The next few pictures that I found were from a few days into Grade 6 Art. I began the year, with short, in class activities that got them playing around with lines, colors and textures. The goals of the activities were not as much to teach specific skills, but more to get them experimenting and playing, not worrying about finished pieces. Secondly, they were to get them comfortable creating spontaneous art together, looking at each others art, and feeling safe in the art room to be creative and make mistakes.

This particular activity was called Abstract Continuous Line Exploration. This how I approaced it.

1. Students were to grab 3 contrasting colors (any media, colored pencils, crayons, markers, etc). Here we discussed contrast, and why certain colors contrasted with others. 
2. I told them that when I said go, they were to choose a first color, and begin to fill their page with one, continuous line. Their pencil was to stay on the paper, and they were to play around with shapes and using the entire space. 
3. I gave them about 30 seconds, and gave verbal encouragement and advice as they drew. 
4. Next, they were to choose a different color, and do another continuous line over their first. They could follow their previous marks, or cross over them. I gave them 20 seconds for this one. 
5. They now took their 3rd color, and did one more continuous line with only about 15 seconds. 
6. They now had to search for shapes that the three lines created and color them in. They could use any colors, patterns, and could choose any shapes, large and small. 
7. We then got up and took at look at each others. 
8. Then they got three more colors in a different media. We followed the same directions, except, before adding the next line, they passed their sketchbook to the person to the right. After the final 3rd line, they returned the sketchbook back to the original artist and then completed the final step of finding and coloring in the shapes.

This activity was really fun. It provided some good discussion points on artistic terminology such as abstract, collaborative, continuous lines, contrasting colors, organic versus geometrical lines, etc. It also had them create some extremely spontaneous, and then forced them to work from someone elses spontaneity! It also led us to a number of different in class activities such as continuous line observational drawings, and then blind contour drawing! It would make a really good sub plan as well!

Playing Around With Watercolor = A Ton of Fun in the Art Room

Watercolor. What a wonderful media for Middle School Students. It can be so technical when you are aiming to do a detailed painting, yet it can be so freeing when you let students go wild with few restrictions and requirements!

I have done two assignments with watercolor so far, and both have turned out to be some of my favorite assignments of all of them. Here they are.

Grade 6 Mini Watercolor Paintings.

I was shown this assignment during one of my practicums in a local junior high school, and fell in love with it. (Thank you Mrs. Cook!) The first two times I did this assignment in my classroom, it was an instant success. I began the assignment with a brief intro about watercolor and the various techniques that I wanted them to play around with.  I then showed them a massive pile of miniature watercolor paper pieces, and told them that they could go wild, and create as many as time allows over 2-3 classes. At the end, they would hand in their favorite 10 for marks. The assignment was a huge resounding success, and it was so amazing to watch it unfold.

Here is how I introduced this assignment the third, and most recent time. "Here are some mini canvases, here is a watercolor palette, a paintbrush and a bucket of water. Go."
The most amazing thing happened. Students created the same kinds of mini paintings, with a variety of colors, patterns, textures, techniques, images, etc. But this time, the experience was even more amazing to watch. Because I did not begin with a demo, the students discovered the techniques themselves! Each discovery was monumentally exciting for the individual, and rippled throughout the class. That discovery, led to another, which led to a related idea. It really was beautiful to watch these students explore the media with no restrictions, uncover techniques and skills all by themselves, produce amazing little artworks, and come back the next class begging to do more.

This assignment is a keeper.

Playing...

Experimenting...

Trying...

Some finished pieces! So different from one another!

More finished pieces...

...and some more finished pieces. Sorry that this picture is upside down, I can not figure out how to rotate it... but it had to be shown! The ninja panda paintings are so great!

Grade 7 Watercolor Doodle.

This assignment came about because my first group of Grade 7 Art students was coming to an end and I only had three classes left with them. I knew I needed to do something short, and I knew I wanted it to be a painting project as we had not done any painting projects yet. So I came up with this based on something I had done when I was living in Spain. I used to carry around a small watercolor palette, and I would do these small watercolor abstract paintings. I would then later go back into the painting with a pen and doodle on top. I always loved how they turned out, and it was fun making them because it was abstract, and I never knew how it was going to turn out.

So, at the beginning of the first class, I gave them a large sheet of watercolor paper and gave them a few guidelines. I wanted them to work abstractly, filling up the page with colors, designs and layers of watercolor. The more layered and complex, the more interesting their final product will be. We talked about abstract art a bit, and we also talked about spontaneity combined with thoughtful composition.  

Phase one. Play with watercolor.

At the beginning of the second class, I laid out ton of different colors of sharpies, and I told them that they were now going to doodle on top of the watercolor using sharpies. I asked them to keep in mind the idea of an abstract painting, spontaneity, and thoughtful composition. But this round, the sharpie additions needed to be inspired by their watercolor composition.

A result of phase one, playing with watercolor.

Phase two. Doodle with sharpies.

More doodling.

More doodling.

This one was mine. It started off as a demo piece, but the more I saw the kids pieces, the more I wanted to do on mine! It was so much fun!

The students absolutely loved this assignment. On the course evaluation, it was almost unanimous that this was their favorite project. The loved the freedom that it gave them, and idea of taking experimentation one step further by combining it with composition and mixed media. Once again, a huge success.

This assignment is also a keeper!

The other art teacher who I share the art room with also does a watercolor painting in Grade 8, wear the students paint a scenic background, then add a black silhouette of a something in the foreground. So it seems like a nice progression from Grade 6-8, beginning with complete experimentation, then abstraction, then moving to more detailed realism. 

Questions for Future Improvement:

1. Does giving guidance and demonstration before hand help or hinder the creative process? I would think that it would depend on what I wanted out of the project. For example, the Mini-Watercolor Paintings, I want to students to have complete freedom resulting in discoveries, so the demo hinders that process a little. The Watercolor Doodle assignment on the other hand requires some guidance in terms of the abstraction with thoughtful composition, and having the doodling work with the watercolor, not against it. Or does it? 
2. With the Watercolor Doodle assignment, I gave them the instructions in steps, so they did not know that we would be going back into their paintings with sharpies. I quickly discovered that if I was going to keep this a secret, I needed to constantly remind them during the painting phase to keep the colors light, and layered, so that the sharpie would show up. The result was mostly positive, but there were a few students who discovered that they had gone too dark too quickly, and many of the sharpies did not work. Should I have kept the second part a secret? What does it achieve in doing that?

To Collage or Not to Collage...

I have approached this project in a few different ways in my two year career as an art teacher, and each time, I think that I have improved the concept, but each time, I am still not sure. Let me take you through the journey of the Grade 7 Collage Assignment.

Attempt #1: The Collage Portfolio.
In my first year in the art room, I organized most assignments into themed portfolios which consisted of a few assignments. The first Collage Portfolio consisted of three collaging projects.

#1. Collaborative Color Wheel. In a group of three, on a large piece of Mayfair, they were to design an interesting twist on the regular color wheel, and collage in the colors using magazines.

#2. Color Collage. Students chose an image which they liked, and which was multi-tonal. The purpose of this collage was color matching. They had just studied the colors of the color wheel and practiced finding those colors in magazines. This was a continuation of this color matching skill.

#3. Grey Scale Collage, same size as the color collage, and of the same picture as the color collage. Instead of using magazines for this one though, they had to create a grey scale with their pencil, and then tear that up to create their grey scale collage. The purpose of this was to take the next step of studying colors, and matching them to different shades of grey. Which colors were closer to a light grey, which ones were closer to a dark shade?

It was immediately clear that there was way too much collage in this Portfolio. It took a very long time, the assignments were too large, and the students quickly got tired of the same, tedious techniques. On almost all course evaluations, students said that there was way too much collage. I still thought though that the collage technique, the color matching, combined the with transferred technique of grey scale matching, was an important skill to learn. So I modified it this year.

Attempt #2: Double Collages.
This year, I took out the collaborative color wheel collage. These students were in Grade 6 Art with me last year, and so they had done a previous color wheel assignment. I felt that they did not need to study those colors again. This time, we just did the two collages, the color and the grey scale, in the same way as before, but on paper half the size as last year. Some pictures from this are below.

Color collage in the making.

Beautiful mosaic collage of a parrot.

The beginnings of a torn grey scale collage beside the completed color collage.

A beautifully finished bird, beside the beginnings of a mosaic grey scale collage.

The color collages turned out beautifully. The grey scale collages were much more difficult, and many did not turn out as the students did not use enough contrasting greys. There were too many middle greys used. In the course evaluation, many students said that they liked the color collage. They found ti challenging, but loved how they turned out. Many also said that the grey scale collage was too challenging. They found it difficult to match the colors with the shades of grey, and as a result, they felt discouraged by the process and the final product.

So, I have a new group of Grade 7 Art students, who will be beginning this project in a few weeks. I question a few things about this project and potential modifications...

1. Should I go smaller? It is a tedious process, and I don't think that the size of the paper would make a difference in their achievement of the skill. Would they enjoy it more if it didn't take as long to reach the desired result?
2. Just because a student finds the process tedious and in turn becomes frustrated, does that mean that it is necessarily an unworthy assignment? I don't think so, but an important part is the product, so if they are finding the process tedious, and the product is turning out poorly, that is when the assignment probably isn't working.
3. Should I eliminate the grey scale collage, and just do the color collage? The students learn the skill of color matching, and end up having a positive experience with collaging. Is the addition of the grey scale collage ruining that positive experience? Is the skill of transferring color to a grey scale possibly too advanced, or unnecessary?
4. Is the whole idea of the traditional collage too...traditional? Is there another way that I could get across the same skills sets of color matching?

So many questions... the big one remains... to collage, or not to collage...

Let's go back in time... Environmental Art!

Wow, I am amazed at how quickly the summer has gone by. I know, every teacher says the same thing, every summer, but I really felt it this time! I think it was because for the first time in my 27 years, I took the summer off! I did not get a summer job (well, other than an awesome week long musical theatre camp) It was glorious! I can not believe that I didn't take advantage of this summers off business earlier! I will not make that mistake again!

Not only has the summer flown by, but the time since my last post has flown by as well. Turns out, I am not the greatest at keeping up to date with blogging. I am going to work on that. I would like to get caught up with everything I have missed since my last post, and I will, but I am having technological difficulties with my camera... So, until I can get that figured out, I am going to go back in time, and over the next few posts, I am going to reminisce over some things that happened before my blogging days! To begin, I thought I would show one of my favorite activities that I have done with my art students.

This project was completed at the beginning last year, late September, early October, with my Grade 6 and 7 art students. This is a key time of the year for this project, as it was Environmental Art. The students were asked to go outside, within a specific area, and create art out of whatever they find on the ground.

We began this lesson looking at the work on Andy Goldsworthy. The image to the right shows one of his pieces sculpted completely out of snow, using only a stick! We discussed the aesthetics of his work, as well as the philosophy behind his work. The students absolutely loved it, and found it extremely interesting that he would complete his artwork entirely out of nature, take a picture, and then leave it!


We then went over a few rules for their own environmental artwork. They were to stay in the specified area. They could work by themselves, in partners, or in groups of 3. Finally, they could use anything that they found on the ground, but they could not take something that was alive, such as plants, leaves still on trees, flowers, etc. This is why fall was a perfect time to do this project, as there were lots of leaves that had fallen from the trees, in a variety of colors, giving them a broader range of materials to choose from.


Then I let them loose! They had a little under an hour to complete their work. I took pictures along the way, and took a finished picture at the end, one just of their artwork, and another of them with their artwork. Here are a few examples of what they created!

 The students had an absolute blast with this project. Not only was it nice to spend a class outside of the classroom, but they found it inspirational to be able to work with a different media, especially since it was all natural. I will definitely do this project again this year once the leaves start falling!

And of course, be sure to make some time to play in the leaves! :)

Passions

In my evaluation last year, the 3rd thing that my principal said that I needed to continue to work on, was maintaining a healthy and balanced lifestyle. He was so right. I have discovered, this year especially, the importance of eating healthy, staying fit, socializing, and most importantly, pursuing my passions.

This last one has been difficult for me at times. Teaching is one of my passions, but I have more than one, and for a while now, I have let my excitement and commitment for my work trump all the others. I am dedicated to my career choice, and becoming the best teacher I can be is one of my biggest goals in life, but one of my other goals this year is to make more time for my other passions. Spread myself out more. Balance my life with work, play and relaxation... it is tough, but worth it!

My girl friends and I recently had a night of food, wine and creating vision boards! It was a great way to spend an evening. We got to chat, eat great food, and let our creativity fly. It felt great to be creative and artsy on my own time, not just connected to my job. 

Here are all three of our creations - so unique, and if you knew us, I bet that you would be able to guess who created which one!

Here is my vision board!

It is a simple idea, but complicated at the same time. Make time for all the things that make us happy in life. I am still working on it!

Transformation Portfolio

Here is the most recent portfolio completed by my Grade 6 students, and one of my favorite so far! I called it the Transformation Portfolio. The idea behind the name was taking a found object, and transforming it into something else. But, in retrospect, isn't all art transformational? Anyways, may have to rethink the name!
This portfolio consisted of three projects, an altered photograph, a wire sculpture and a collaborative altered book! Here are the project descriptions, as well as students examples from the Transformation Portfolio!

PROJECT #1: ALTERED PHOTOGRAPH - Student had to bring in a photograph, and using the subject matter in the photo, alter the surface! They could take away, or add on! Turned out great! Love what this student did with the different media! She really experimented!

This altered photograph is much more subtle, but she added that little ladybug that you see in the center! So cute!

PROJECT #2: WIRE SCULPTURE - This was the best project I have done yet as a teacher! Start with a piece of wood, and hammer in two nails to create the holes. Next get a coat hanger and cut off the hooked end. Have students twist the coat hanger into any shape they like. Try to encourage them to keep it abstract, and to try not to twist it with an idea in mind. Next, use a hot glue gun, and glue the coat hanger ends into the holes. Once that is dry, take a stocking, and stretch it all the way over and around the board. You then take white glue, water it down a bit, and coat the pantyhose with 2-3 coats, letting it dry in between each coat. Once the pantyhose is firm, the students can begin to look at their shape, and turn it into something! This is easy for some, and tricky for others, but it really is the fun part!

A toucan!

A wolf!

A person throwing up! Ewwwwww! I was super excited for this one!! This was created by a wonderful kid, but he literally can not sit down for longer than 1 minute. This is the first assignment that he sat, worked on, and finished ALL YEAR! So happy for him, and it turned out great!!!!

A shark!

A waterfall!

PROJECT #3: ALTERED BOOK - I absolutely love this project, but it turned out to be fairly complicated because I began it so late in the year. I provided the class with a picture book. I tried to choose books that had pages filled with different pictures and text (I actually scavenged the old library books that the library was getting rid of). Each student gets the book for  certain number of days. If I had started this earlier in the year, each student would have it for a week, but because I began so late, I had to create a complicated calendar system, as seen above! Each student gets to choose a two page spread, and must alter their pages to express what art means to them! There were no limitations on how they could do this, except for that they could not rip the page out! At the end, we will have one, massive book, that the entire class contributed to, almost like an art room yearbook! This project is still going, but here are a few pictures from a week ago!

After a few weeks, you are already unable to close the book. So excited to see it at the end!

String, paint, felt and sharpies!

This student chose to work around an image from her pages, adding to it by using collage!

Paint and tissue paper!

I will add more pictures of the Altered Book project as it goes. I love this project so much, I would like to do it every year! It is a beautiful memoir of the students of that year.

Extension!
ARTIST STATEMENTS - Because the students were so excited and proud of their wire sculptures, I decided to take that opportunity to get them talking about their art, and expressing why they did what they did through Artist Statements. First we talked about what an artist statement is and how to create one, then they sat down with their sculpture and went through a number of brainstorming questions to get them describing their artwork, both visually and thematically. They then used that brainstorm to create their artist statement, which are now on display beside their sculpture in the Learning Commons at our school!

Potential Addition!?
Have students incorporate a pic of themselves, make it more about them, and what art means to them. This will make it easier to remember, years later, which student created which page. It would also ask the students to create something more personal.

Question!?
I want the students to be able to remember this collaborative piece as well, but I have not quite figured out an easy way to do this. A picture of their pages for them? Pictures of everyone's pages burnt onto a CD? Still thinking about this...