The Dot

Welcome back students!  I'm so excited to begin my 9th year of teaching!  Where has the time gone?! 

For the first week of art classes, we had just enough time for a mini art project after we reviewed the art room rules.  Students listened to the story, "The Dot" by Peter Reynolds and then created their own dot-inspired artwork. Check out some of their creations below! 

Careers in Visual Art

One of the goals at Yowell Elementary School is to help our students to become college, career, and citizen ready.  It's never to early to start planning for the future and asking big questions like "What do you want to be when you grow up?"  So many of my students LOVE art class and I want them to know they have options!  Check out the careers in Visual Art bulletin board that's on display in the art room now! 

What are we doing today?

This question seems to come up almost daily in the art room!  When students walk in, they are excited and want to start making art right away, even before I can tell them what the assignment for the day is! To help answer this question, I've created a new way to display the daily objectives in the art.

Before the objectives were written on a "Daily Objectives" chart in the corner of my room- lots of words, very crowded and not very eye catching. (See picture below)

 Out with the old, and in with the new!  I've changed my daily objectives to more colorful "I CAN..." statements.  (See picture below) Now students can easily identify where to look to find out "what we are doing today" and what they will be learning.  Each grade level will have an "I Can..." statement posted that describes the goal for the day.  I've also written the Virginia Fine Arts SOL that the lesson focuses on too.

100th post!

Wow, I can't believe I'm at 100 posts already!  Thank you to all my followers!  Here's a look back at some of my favorite projects!

2nd Grade: Space & Planets 

 4th Grade: Birch Trees 

1st Grade: Peacocks 

5th Grade: On A Starry Night...

Kindergarten: Warhol Hands

1st Grade: Monet Lily Pads 

3rd Grade: Royal Dogs

5th Grade: Kente Cloth

Kindergarten: Sock Monkey

Where's "Mrs. Timmons & Mr. Collins" Bulletin Board

1st Grade: The Artist Who Painted A Blue Horse And....

5th Grade: Adobe Landscapes

1st Grade: Cezanne Still Life

Why Is Art Important?

The first week of art classes always feel so rushed!  There are rules, seats, emergency procedures and everything else to cover that there is hardly time to start an art project!  This year I tried a different approach.    After going over the information part, I had students work on a collaborative bulletin board about "Why Art Is Important."

First, they talked to their face partner about who can make art.   Ideas they came up with were: students, babies, teachers, moms, dads, Everyone!!  After establishing that everyone can make art, students talked to their shoulder partner about why people make art. After sharing ideas with the class, each student wrote down a reason of "why art is important" on a colored piece of paper.  Some students even added illustrations to go along with their reason.   Check out why Yowell students think art is important below!

Creativity

Here's an end of the year bulletin board I made.  I found the original idea on Bulletin Boards to Remember

Facebook Bulletin Board

 I found the idea for a "Facebook Bulletin Board" on the Bulletin Boards To Remember blog. It really gets the kids talking about artists! Check out my featured artists below!

Claude Monet:

Vincent Van Gogh

 

Roy Lichenstein

More to come soon! 

Where's Waldo Bulliten Board

Wait, change that title! It should say, "Where's Mrs. Timmons & Mr. Collins?" 

The first week of art classes is always a little tough to plan.  There are so many things to go over! Rules, emeregncy procedures, where supplies are, student seats, etc.  All of thoes introduction things usually take up the 1st of my art class, which leaves me with only 20 mintuets to teach! So for the first project, I had all students create a self-portrait.  My only rule was, no stick people! I let the kids draw themselves how ever they wanted, doing whatever they wanted!  Next, I collected all the self-portraits and hung them up to create the "Where's Mrs. Timmons & Mr. Collins?" board! Students, partents and teachers have had a great time look for our principals and themselves!