Thursday, October 24, 2013

Today was one of those days where the inspiration is almost tangible with these students. I decided that since the clay is already out and my room is in a state of dusty chaos, now is a good time to explore clay with a few other classes.

120, bilingual first grade, continued with their small group portraits.  Not much to report until those are completed. :)

118, monolingual second grade.  This class just finished drawing the buildings around our community as part of their observational drawing skills and their social studies curriculum.  We incorporated mathematical concepts, such as visually measuring using your pen or pencil to get proportions correct when drawing from life.  I think this reinforcement from a visual arts perspective is really hitting the curriculum home.  I brought the group who drew the playground to the studio and gave them clay and photographs of the playground.  I showed them architectural drawings, blueprints and then 3D models, explaining what each of those components are.  The students knew 3D only as a way to watch movies, so it was interesting to talk about height, width and depth with them.  When I brought the clay out, they knew it could be used to make the playground in 3D and I didn't have to say a word.

We talked about angles and measurement again and I was so excited to see that the angled monkey bars were being recreated with nearly the same angle as in the photograph and real life!

The kids decided to work in groups and both groups were using the similar angles and proportions. I can't wait to see the finished pieces!

108- monolingual first grade.  I've been using an exploratory approach to this class and today I thought, "Why not start with clay and tie in communities?" We did a taxonomy of places in the community and the students started building some places for community helpers to work.  I have a feeling this could lead into a community space with murals for the streets and background, street lights, maps, and a huge project might grow out of it.  

116, bilingual second grade- I took Group One to start drawing the non-living things in our community.  The school was the first choice and the church was the second.  We now have two huge drawings started of these buildings.  The students are using their drawing from observation skills to draw from photographs.  Tomorrow, we'll go to the computer lab to research images of our living things, which I will print so we can draw and paint them from observation.

103, preschool. The students have about learned color mixing using tempera paint, so I wanted to give them an opportunity to explore with all three primary colors. I set up areas where students could paint in groups and let them choose the subject matter.  Most of them practiced mixing colors.  I saw a letter A and some faces.  Two girls drew themselves and the other. "We are working together! This is fun!" They painted themselves near an apple tree.  A boy painted himself in his Halloween costume. 

"Me and my friend are by the apple tree."

A happy little guy.

Another first attempt at a face.

102, monolingual kindergarten. I took the students who didn't make self-portraits out of clay yesterday. 

"I made my legs crossed."

"This is me. And this is my pizza."

A nice seated figure.

The children of Room 102 in clay!

I've had a number of projects finish at the same time, so I've been on a crazy hanging/installation kick. Room 104 finished their tree, so we installed that today.  The students are going to find the biggest, most colorful leaves they can find at home and bring them in to hang on our tree.  The three will change as the seasons and projects change.