Moments you teach for.....

It's been a while since I have put a blog entry out there, and I promise it's not because I don't want to.  My phone is filled with photos of projects that I say "I'm going to blog this!" and then, well, I'm still wondering where the time has gone!  But at last, here it is!

So, these are some things which have happened the past week or two that are truly those moments when you think to yourself about these moments that you've been working towards with students, and they are finally a reality.

Above is a Bancroft ROAR, but an Art Specific one.  Kindergarten did a printmaking lesson on castles, and we talked about some tough vocabulary like the term "arch".  I make sure theres some easy, medium, and tough vocab introduced, and typically upon the first introduction to a word, students can recall the easy and medium terms.  Alejandro on the other hand not only remembered the more difficult vocabulary term, but he connected it (without prompting!!) to our current unit on seascapes. Above you can see the Art ROAR I wrote him, he not only met expectations, he surpassed them and really made my week.  Now, if only I could figure out exactly what I did, or how I did it, to teach this term, and ake it stick!!  WAY TO GO ALEJANDRO!!!!

 The artist featured to the right, is a current Pre-K 4 student who took a project above and beyond.  We focused on self-portraits this week and watching our faces change in the mirrors.  While the prompt was to draw ourselves feeling a specific way(student choice) Juan let his imagination soar!  He explained to me that he wasn't just feeling serious and mad, he was able to tell me and show me in his art exactly why he felt that way.  And it made total sense!  Below is the caption of what he said which is written on the art:

      "This is me and my face, and I'm mad at someone because I'm a special agent and you can't see my eyes.  I have glasses on."

Juan proceeded to discuss freely that special agents get mad at the bad guys, and so he wasn't mad at me but in fact was protecting me.  He also let me know part of their "clothes they always have to wear" as he put it were the sunglasses.  Not only the creativity excited me, but the way the student boasted about his art.  He is proud of this.  When a student is invested in their work and truly feels proud of their creations, that's a moment I teach for and try to foster within the art room.

The moment to the left is simple, but HUGE progress.  Second grade is a big year for art.  I begin to prompt students to be more descriptive and informative when they discuss their art.  I'm always saying "tell me specific details, about why you do or do not like your art. " and "tell me one thing you really want to make better in this piece."

This week was the moment I realized, we are doing great with this.  I found second grade students already identifying and asking for help, on their first draft of their self-portrait.  Second graders are creating, reflecting, and seeking to better themselves as artists without my prompting!

Stay tuned for more proud moments in the Bancroft Art Room from the past month.  The next post will spotlight fifth grade artists who have been working hard creating a piece of visual poetry from their own written poems!

Turkey Survival 101!

  As a teacher the three day week before Thanksgiving is great, but leaves me with the question "what do I teach?".  Many students are absent due to travelling, energy levels are high, and there's an overall excitement that can sometimes distract students from being 100% focused on their artwork.  So projects pause for a week and students are given a challenge:       

        ..... you are now a turkey, it's the week of Thanksgiving.... how will you survive and not get eaten?!..                           

  This prompts students to begin to think creatively.  How will they hide, disguise or flee the USA in order to survive?!  We talk about the character of our artwork (the turkey), the setting we will choose, and the problem (survival!).  Here are the responses of some of our Pre-K 4, 1st, and 3rd grade students this year!!

Lego Castle Printmaking!

  The Early Childhood Education classes in my school use an amazing and inspirational curriculum called Tools of the Mind.  The curriculum travels through the  Magic Tree House Series with Jack and Annie throughout the Kindergarten level.  Kindergarten students are traveling to medieval times  through the land of castles and knights.  I stumbled across this project concept on pinterest, and had to try it! We began of course, with our learning targets (the goal of what students are learning and able to do by the end of this lesson): 

 I can name different parts of a castle.

I can design my own castle through printmaking.

We began with understanding the word architecture, and architect.  We then moved in to some architectural elements of a castle.  Our four vocabulary words specific to castles were.....

Tower         Drawbridge         Arch         Turrets

We practiced saying some of those tough words, figuring out and finding them on different pictures of castles, then learned what printmaking was.  Students were best able to connect it to stamping like they have done in their classroom.  Now came the fun part, explaining to the students we were using legos, but not to build, but to print/stamps!  I wish I could have captured the looks on their faces as I did a demo of how we do this responsibly.... They're minds were blown away in shock, excitement, and a little confusion(because legos are for building after all!).  Check out the photos of the process and final products below! 

As you can see we had a blast becoming architects and designing our own castles!! 

A very special Bancroft ROAR to the parents who donated some legos to this awesome project!  Without these parents responding on such short notice to a request of such a loved and cherished item, we couldn't have had this fun and great learning opportunity!!

Career Week Thank You!

Chef Visit to Kindergarten Students!

 A week or so ago, Bancroft held it's first ever College & Career Week!  

We had many guest speakers come to talk with students about their chosen career and the path they took to get their!  The school was decorated with different college posters and information in all the halls and teachers decorated their doors to tell about the university or college they attended!

A huge thank you to the pilot, doctors, musicians, fire fighters, police officers from the 4th district, chef, and K-9 officer who came out to speak to our kids about future careers!  Check out the photos of the speakers I was able to catch in between classes!

Fire Fighters taught us about fire safety through discussion and showing us their awesome gear! 

This DC MPD K-9 was an exception to the "no dogs" rule on the playground!  We learned that even he went to school and became a K-9 police dog!  We watched him run around chasing his favorite green ball toy!  Then we got to pet him!

Art, Literacy, and Emotions!

  Students in kindergarten and first grade have been learning about drawing ourselves, showing emotion, and connecting colors to emotions in their artwork! At the beginning of each class we read aloud our "targets" or "goals" for the day.  Here are our goals for this multi-class and multi-step project!

* I can draw myself using shapes.                                    

* I can draw myself showing how I feel.

                                          * I can match colors to feelings in my artwork.

   We started out by simply practicing drawing ourselves, using ovals, circles, and all sorts of shapes to represent our body.  Then we focused in on our face and how it tells the way we feel about something.  We read the story "Today I feel Silly, and Other Moods that Make my Day" by Jamie Lee Curtis.  While I read the story each student made the face of the feeling on each page paying special attention to the changes they saw on their face.....

 Afterwards we chose four different feelings to illustrate ourselves.  While students drew themselves they focused on using shapes and really capturing on paper the changes in their eyes, nose, mouth, and especially eyebrows.  Students all chose different feelings which made it a unique project because each picture is different!  

We then looked at two pieces of artwork and talked about the ways an artist can use color to help create the mood within an artwork.  We noticed through discussion, that dark colors typically match more negative feelings and light colors tend to match positive feelings.  This conversation also brought up that each person has their own thoughts and opinions about which colors go with positive feelings, and which go with negative feelings.  Finally, students used colored pencils to assign one color to each self-portrait based on it's feeling.  Check out the results! 

Line, Color, and Shape!

Students in the Bancroft Art Room have been busy this year so far!  We have spent the first month of school really focusing in on three elements of art; Color, Line, and Shape!

 Students in the Bancroft Art Room have been busy this year so far!  We have spent the first month of school really focusing in on three elements of art; Color, Line, and Shape!  The photo above shows some line studies we did focusing on naming and drawing at least six different kinds of lines!  Some of the lines we discussed are: Bumpy, Zig-Zag, Vertical, Horizontal, Diagonal, Wavy, Curly, Curvy, etc. 

 LINE PARENT CHALLENGE: While walking around your community, ask students to look around and find different kinds of lines they see in the environment of your community!

Students in third, fourth, and fifth grade were challenged this year by beginning our projects with a lack of color.  We explored the concept of art made only in black and white.  Above, you can see a series of different shades of grey cards laying on the tables, students had to organize these from darkest to lightest.  Next students were challenged to create an abstract piece of art which included the 6 shades of grey from the color cards they put in order.  I found students have a much larger appreciation for color after doing this assignment!! 

Students in earlier grades, focused on the story mouse paint in order to review the primary(RED, BLUE, YELLOW) and secondary colors(ORANGE, PURPLE, GREEN) and how to mix secondary colors from primary.

COLOR PARENT CHALLENGE: Parents, can you encourage your child to complete a drawing but only in pencil?  Encourage your child to push soft, medium, and hard, to achieve three different shades of grey.   

 

Last, but certainly not least, we have focused on SHAPE!  The two images above are self-portraits by a Pre-K 3, and Kindergarten student.  We have been focusing on using shapes to draw ourselves.  We read the story "One" by Kathryn Otoshi in Kindergarten to learn about being a good friend.  On the right, you can see a student illustrated how they could be a good friend if someone fell down at recess!  

SHAPE PARENT CHALLENGE: Parents, when your kids are drawing at home, or anywhere outside of school, challenge them to really focus on shapes they see all around them.  Students know that if they can identify a shape, they can draw anything they want!  Please encourage the practice of looking for shapes to draw at home!

Art Room Organization, Routines, and Procedures!

I frequently have teachers ask me about how I organize and lay out my room.... so rather than frantically scrolling through my phone, and showing tiny pictures on a tiny screen, I figured why not do a little Classroom 101 post!  So here goes! 
 

Above is an overall view from my desk, it looks a little crazy because I did the Panoramic view with my iphone to capture this shot.  I find it a blessing and a curse to have those red cabinets and counters around two sides of my classroom.  I love them for laying out all supplies, but I hate them because they would be more space for students to work if they werent there.  You can see on the counter, each supply has it's spot and there are always 6 containers of each supply ready to go.  This makes it easy for students to get supplies they need and put them back.  This has stayed the same the past three years, and I found that really helps students know the routine.  Theres a small carpet area along the right side of the room for Early Childhood Classes.

Here's the rest of the room, the painting center and all it's supplies are on the left.  The board partially hidden behind the door is where I now have emergency sub plans, seating charts, district standards, and project learning targets available at all times.   Organization is key!

I've found that posting school norms, and our daily learning targets are key for students to succeed.  I constantly refer back to our voice level chart, and learning targets to help students check in with how they're doing.  Each table is a color for early childhood classes to help teach colors, and direct students to their seats.  Finally, there's my wish list bulletin board.  The lower right has an art room volunteer sign up sheet which has been great for recruiting parent volunteers this year!!
 

You may have noticed on my bulletin board with voice levels and learning targets, I have a poster of our visual timer.  I bought this used GraLab 360 on ebay, and it helps students budget their time. Yellow means lesson, Green is independent work, Orange is a clean-up warning, and Red means Clean up Now!!  Students use this to track their time in the room and I find they are cleaning up without being reminded by the third or fourth week of school!

Hopefully this gives a look into the art room at Bancroft and hopefully there's some useful ideas, tips, and tricks in there others can use for their classrooms!