When I arrive at Pine Knob early in the a.m I often see Andy with his vacumm pack on his back and how can you not start singing the theme to Ghostbusters? Thanks Andy for keeping my room so clean!
Thanks to mesmrswhitesclass.blogspot.com who gave me the idea for this bulletin board. When our district kicked off the new school year, teachers spent time "Tweeting" each other as part of our break out session. While I lOVE lots of technology I am still a bit old school and like paper and pencil in hand. My oldest son is a SUPER senior in architecture and I remember him telling me how some students struggled with perspective drawing because they had learned only in a computer program unlike Jeff who learned the way I did over 25 years ago. Just today I had a teacher ask me advice about her son's college direction and I always say, "Tons of kids want to be game designers or graphic designers, do them a favor and make them take a ceramics or sculpture class, they need to experience 3D, hands on." Okay, off my soapbox. This was just a fun idea and by 2:00 the board was FULL of ideas on how "Awesome" a teacher is or how a grade level "Rocks!"
I have seen several art teachers do this lesson and I knew I had to try it. I purchased metal molds from Bed,Bath and Beyond. Day one the students push a ball of clay into the mold and cut off the extra clay. Then they form a pinch pot for the top portion adding any details. I have them put their name on a piece of paper to separate the two pieces so I can later add their names to the bottom. One piece of advice, make sure you have at least a 1/4 inch thickness around the mold. It it's too thin it will crack. Bisque fire then glaze, day two and three.
In past years I have usually done a two day lesson on Mondrian. We paint large black lines across our body and then paint in primary colors the next lesson. This year I have a young (er) group of students and since it's only week 3 they are still learning procedures in the art room. I decided instead to discuss line in a different way. On top of that some wonderful staff member put a HUGE stack of precut strips of colored paper on my desk. I HAVE AN IDEA! We discussed how lines can bend and fold and go over and under. The students were so excited. I also tried out plastic containers with sponges soaked in glue. Much less messy but make sure the sponges are just barely moist as water and glue make an adhesive that may not stick as well. An update on the master's research...10 more weeks and I won't know what to do with the 20+ hours I will have to, oh I don't know, create ART!
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