ART for 1170

Just out of the kiln, this years first batch of clay owls...stay tuned for more!

I was very happy with the results from this year's clay masks. I have over 150 fifth grade students and the variety of styles was clearly evident. Each mask was to have a subtractive quality (clay taken away), an additive feature (clay added to the mask) and texture. The most successful used all three qualtities. We created the patterns using this method http://artfor1170.blogspot.com/2011/04/clay-masks-making-pattern-fifth-grade.html .   I'm also really liking the stroke and coat glazes I purchased from Saxs.

When the kindergarten class from Mrs. Creech's room brought back their pumpkin paintings to their room they shared with Mrs. Creech the "How". I love the way she created a visual thinking poster for their room.  I don't even have to tell you the "How" part because they did it for you, including using a WHOLE lotta Yellow and a little bit of red !  Thanks Mrs. Creech!

At both schools I keep a couple of buckets of books. The favorites are definitely the I Spy books.  I only have 30 minute classes but there's always a couple who seem to finish early.  I also have blocks at PKE but sharing seems to be a tougher skill this year so I had to put them away for awhile.  The books get pretty beat up but I scour garage sales and Ebay for deals.

  A kindergarten lesson I do every year. I decided at one school to have the students fill in the spaces with washable markers and then let the students use water to "Color" the space. At the other school I used Alphacakes and I definitely like the painted lesson much better.   TASTE OF CLARKSTON!!   My Boys enjoying the great food!

Our school district has a very cool program called "Blessings in a Backpack".  The purpose is to support students who receive free and reduced lunch during the week who often go without on the weekend. Through local fundraising support the student receives a backpack with non perishable food items on Friday afternoon and returns the backpack on Monday morning.  I took this picture for my Masters program. I wanted to show multiple backpacks and the volunteers delivery.

I can't take any credit for this idea. I saw it a while back BP (Before Pinterest) and now I can't find the teacher's website who had a great monster painted on a commercial sweeper. If you know, send me a message.  I painted this over the summer and it is great to see students get excited to clean. I find a student that needs a job and say quietly, "Hey, you wanna be our monster sweeper today?" They often pick a partner to help.  I should have come up with something like this for my own kids when they were young!

I got this idea from http://mrspicassosartroom.blogspot.com   I numbered the stools at each table to match a robot job. To give each student a chance at a new job I velcro'd the numbers to the robot jobs so I can move the numbers around.  So far it is helping to keep students in their seats plus they seem to love having a table responsibility.

    The 8th grade students started a unit on color theory by creating a 4" square design with a 1/4" border. The designs were copied x 8 then painted to show complimentary, analagous, warm, cool, black white, etc... Then they took their design on a double slab of clay and cut out their design on one slab and attached it to the other slab to create the raised tile.  I wish I had a close up of the tiles to show the dimension. The tiles were arranged and mounted to wood and hang in the office.  One of my favorite all time projects!  

I have a wall in my front hallway that has photos that I have taken of my kids, family and friends. The running joke in my home is when I have a good photo that needs to go on "The Wall", are the people in the photo, Wall Worthy?  Other than the picture of Missy with the flower and Jeff in the "Thinker" position, I have taken all of them. Most are Christmas card pictures added every year.  I just realized that there have been a few additions to the wall since this was taken and YES, everyone is still Wall Worthy! Oh, and I hope you like the new banner and page color on the blog. I'm not so sure about the background color of the banner but it's a lesson in tech patience.

I saw this last fall on Pinterest on a T shirt. I wanted to give credit to the origin but when I Google'd it I found it on all kinds of things including statues, stationary and clothes. Help me out if you know who said it first. I knew it would be a fun board with a great message.

It's a bit early to post my actual schedule but rumor is that I will only be at TWO schools this year. Wow, I am so happy! I will miss my students at the one school but am excited about what I will be able to accomplish with this schedule! This will be so much easier than when I had FOUR schools a couple years back!

We used terra cotta clay to create these bells. A simple inverted pinch pot and an added rectangle piece to the top. The students used a straw to punch a hole in the bell if they wanted to hang the bell and a small hole by the top to hang a small ball of clay to hang inside the bell.  I love the different animals they made.

These are super fun and easy.  Each artist started with a small slab of clay and lots of cutting and texture stamps, alphabet stamps.  They cut the strips, draped them across their wrist to measure, then laid them flat, added texture and joined the ends.  You have to remind them not to glaze the bottom edge of one side. 

One of the projects the Clay Camp Session 1 students did was to make pinch pot birds.  I ran out of wire to attach the feet and tried to use pipe cleaners but wire would work best. I got this idea from Pinterest (Flickr. Apparently the ceramic teacher's name is Janet Burns (I always attempt to credit the artists and instructors)  The students need to put holes in the front of the bird and in the feet. Some students added the top holes to add feathers. I think they are awesome! The students are from 2nd to 4th grade so it's a great project for multi ages. More to come...