Monday, November 4, 2013

116, bilingual second grade
The students are studying their new fish tank. They are drawing the tank and the fish. I decide to push in and record dialogue, rather than pull them, because they are all engaged in this task.


Mrs. R- Tell me what you are doing today.
J- I'm drawing the fish. Right now, I'm making a title of the fish.
Mrs. R- Tell me about the fish.
L- There are two fish that glow in the dark.
Mrs. R- tell me more.
L- there's a frog in the tank. I'm drawing the frog.
Mrs. R- do they have names?
L- No.
Mrs. D- We haven't named them yet, but that's a good idea.
L- the frog was under a plant. Not a real plant. Like this. (Holds up cellophane from the breakfast utensils and shows me where the frog was hiding.)
N- do you why they call catfish? Because they have whiskers like cats. Walrus also have them, to dig, to find clams. Those big tusks are to fight with enemies. Their heads are like a helmet and they go boom! They break ice with their helmet heads! Never feed a walrus a fish because it will die!
Mrs. R- the fish or the walrus?
N- the walrus. They don't like fish. They like clams. So never feed a walrus a fish. And don't feed walrus meat to fish. They don't like it, either!

He has a pair of chopsticks and proceeds to show me what the walrus tusks look like.

N- I made seven fish, a sea snake and a sea star. They don't eat clams because they can't break the shell. I don't know what catfish eat.
Mrs. R- What do you think they eat?
N- maybe other fish, because cats eat fish. My favorite fish is the clown fish!

I move to another table.The drawings at this table are observational. There are fish tanks and an accurate number of fish and there's a serious attempt at realism and accurate details.
Mrs. R- tell me about your drawings.
A- I'm drawing the fish from the fish tank.
Mrs. R- tell me the fish. What do we know about the fish?
A- there's a glow in the dark one and a frog?
Mrs. Rose- is a frog a fish?
L- no.
Mrs. Rose- what is it then?
L- we don't know!
Y- one of the fish is big and one is little.
Mrs. Rose- so they are different sizes? What else is different?
L- the frog is much bigger and the fish are little
A- the frog is bigger and it eats bugs if it's hungry.
Mrs. R- what do you think the fish eat?
A- worms. And bears eat the fish!
A- I like his drawing! (Points to Y)
Mrs. R- what do you like about it?
A- it looks like a real fish tank and that's the pineapple. (The house is a pineapple.)

Mrs. Rose- what can you teach me about the fish?
An- the fish are shiny!
G- the fish eat.
Mrs. Rose- what do they eat?
G- they eat, um, leaves
An- leaves? No, I don't know what you call them. (Brings me the fish food.)
Mrs. Rose- they do look like tiny leaves!
An- I'm going to write a sentence about the drawing.

The children love to show me their work for criticism purposes. They are happy to get advice to improve their drawings. This is already a change from how students usually look at drawings, with great frustration if it isn't "right" on the first try.

118- I took a group to work on their playground. They made a lot of progress, but we didn't get photos today.  We were busy and messy!

108- Another group came to the studio for the second time, to work on their community clay buildings. We now have an animal hospital and a house. As they worked, they brainstormed other things they'd like in their clay community- trees, cars, people, the community helpers who work in the buildings.  I'm letting them choose if they want a roof, or if they want to make things inside the building, leaving the roof off to observe what's inside.  I figure we can make the roofs detachable or just not have them.  It's up to the kids.

112- Some kids finished their globes.  We're going to glaze the shells we made weeks ago, then we'll move on to a new project.  I think we'll see if the kids want to learn more about the continents they painted.  If so, each student can choose a continent (or work in pairs) to research and create an art project that tells us what they've learned.

101- preschool

The second group of students came in to create clay and found object portraits. One student, a boy who either had limited English or was perhaps in the silent period, became very animated with me for the first time. "I made a happy face! Look!"  He put Popsicle stick legs and made a puppet out of his clay portrait. His friend next to him used the same idea and they began a conversation as portraits. The portraits kissed and were friends. 

Portrait Puppet Friends

He then added other things to the face and said, "Now, it's a scary face!" Two other kids seemed to enjoy the puppet show, so they turned their own into puppets. The remaining two students worked independently. One was focused on a realistic portrait. She experimented with adding pipe cleaners that matched her hair color and even tried to curl them to represent her beautiful curly hair. Another boy held his puppet up like it was an ice cream novelty, causing the other kids to shriek with laugher. One girl used every single object on her tray. "This is a princess," she said. When a boy came in late, I wondered aloud if she would share her pieces with him. She was happy to help and it made her recreate her piece with more purpose and clear aesthetic choices.

104, kindergarten.  Their homeroom teacher asked if I could work on exploring shapes through art materials, so the students made clay triangles, which they glazed today, and the other students painted shapes at the easels. 

Friday, November 1, 2013

There was no blog post yesterday because I was out.

120 bilingual first grade. I brought a small group to the studio to work on their portraits.  Three students finished in that group.  I think these will be done shortly. We want to do a project centered around masks next.  Since day one, I've noticed that this group is very interested in holding up photos as masks and superhero themes and Halloween confirmed this love for secret identities. I am doing some research on the best materials for wearable masks.

108 monolingual first grade. Our little city is coming together.  I saw the final group of students to start the project today.  Now, I'll go through another round as students add to their initial structures.  We have the arch entrance to a zoo now.

116 bilingual second grade. I brought group one down to continue their drawings of the church and school for their community mural.  We sounded out "Bilingual Center" together because they wanted the full name of the school written on the school.  We practiced making bricks with different materials, so that they could choose the best one.  They wanted to use paint, but after seeing the colored pencils, they decided it made more sense, even if it was less exciting. 

Sorry for the sideways pic- I haven't figured out how to easily rotate the images.

118 monolingual second grade. My playground group is learning to work together and they're learning the importance of scoring and slip.  The piece for the playground that we had completed fell apart in my hands today.  Fortunately, they have been learning about scoring in their other art class, too, so now they are getting a better grasp on how to use the clay. The thing I am enjoying about this group is seeing how they are learning to work as a team.  They are improving at sharing the workload and speaking to each other- they even remind each other to use manners when asking to pass supplies.  I love the collaboration. This project is going to be successful at making them better people, even if our playground keeps falling down. (But I'm sure we can fix that, too.)

103 preschool.  We had a critique/storytelling session with our murals. I think it went really well!

Mrs. Rose- Tell me what you made in this mural. Or what you see.

J- I made a lake

Mrs. Rose- What do we see in her lake?

A1- I see blue

Mrs. Rose- What other colors did we use?

J-Orange

A2-Green

T-Red

B-Purple

A3- I made my nana

Mrs. Rose- What is a part you really like?

A1- The purple.

Mrs. Rose- What do you like about it?

The student couldn’t answer.

Mrs. Rose- What could they do to make it more beautiful?

B- I would like to make pink on it.

J- I would draw more on the purple part.

I brought out the second mural, which is less abstract.

Mrs. Rose- Tell me what you see.

T-  I see my doggie

B- I see people over there

E- I see me

A1- I see what I made

A3- yellow

B- I see my mom

A2- I see a spider

 

Our finished mural

Mrs. Rose to D- What did you make?

D- A monster

Mrs. Rose- Tell me about the monster

D- It can scare your mom

A2 is making monster hand motions- This is what he does.

Mrs. Rose- What else does he do?

This is the terrifying monster.

D- He scares my dad and sisters

A3- Monsters scare my family too

T- My doggie doesn't scare them. He's going to bite the monster!

A3- He goes ruff ruff ruff

B- I made my mommy. She's going to get the monster!

Brian- I made people. Lots of people.

Mrs. Rose- You know, we have what we need here to write our own story. Would you like to try that?  Who wants to start?  Okay, J, start with “Once upon a time…”

J- Once upon a time there were people, a doggie, Brooke's mom and A1 and E and a monster came!

T- That was my doggies dream. He came from my dogs dream and he saw Mario and he needed to defeat the monster!

D- I would dress the monster in pajamas

T- Then B’s mom killed the monster

Mrs. Rose- I don’t think killing the monster is very nice.  Is there some other way she could defeat him?

B- Maybe she put him in a cage

T- And slammed the door!

A3- Then locked the door!

B- Then they went into another room to draw!

 

The monster in the cage and the people celebrating.

(I love the ending. How do we relax after battling a monster? We draw about it!)

At this point, I asked if they wanted to add anything to the mural that would tell more about our story.  Of course, they wanted to!  They made the monster in cages, wearing pajamas, and the happy people drawing at the end. 

Some comments I heard while they drew:

I made the monster sad

I made him screaming

I locked him in now

He's a bad monster

I'm making the monsters pajamas!

I locked him up in the cage!

He's got his pajamas on!

I'm going to write his name- Saurus!

102, monolingual kindergarten.  I brought a small group down to paint their portraits.  One table did a phenomenal job and the other table decided to paint circles. In a regular art room, I would have forced the portraits, but I thought what they were doing was interesting to them and they seemed to be very interested in exploring with the paint, so I let them play.  We can always finish the portraits next time.

Wednesday, October 30, 2013

120, bilingual first grade. We had a great time sculpting gourds out of clay. The students all began the class with observational sculpture.  Some spent the entire period on this task, seeking to perfect their sculpture of their gourd.  Others created it, then couldn't resist the clay and the gourds and the possibilities.  I loved watching the students explore the clay in so many interesting ways.  At the end, I gave them a choice of keeping their creations to be fired in the kiln, or smashing them and reusing the clay another day. I was surprised to see so many let go and smash the clay to reuse it.  I thought there would be more of a sense of ownership, but they surprised me.  I don't see either choice as negative.

A little person sitting on a pumpkin. 

The following pieces go along with this dialogue:

Me- You made your gourd and then you turned it into something else.  Tell me about it.
E- We made a castle!
N- We like to make castles. There's a kitchen and a pool.
E- A big pool!
N- A deep pool.
E- And a baby pool.
N- There's a bounce house, too!
Mrs. L- Who lives there?
E- Us! And our families!
N- And all of our friends here at school.  Now it looks like a Bridge Castle.
E- It's for a bird.
N- We have pets in our house.
Mrs. L- What do you call this castle?
E- The Family Castle
N- The Bridge Castle. The bridge castle is in the backyard of the Family Castle. This is the backyard.
E- This is the bird.
Mrs. L- How do you get upstairs?
E- We climb here.
N- and there's a shower!

The Family Castle

Another view of the family castle.

"The Bridge Castle is in the back of the family castle."

 Some other pictures from the experience:

A camera. I assume this was inspired by all of the photos I was taking. 

116 bilingual second grade students had a test this period, so I proctored the exam. 

108 monolingual first grade. I took another small group to work on their community in clay.  We have a practice map to place the buildings on and I'm finding that even the most rough looking buildings are working when they are all placed on the map.  I can't wait to see the completed community.  I'm happy to let them take the time to explore the clay and try to perfect their important buildings, though I'm really looking forward to seeing them fired and assembled. 

112 self-contained class.  We worked on our globes.  I think these will be finished after one more class.  The globes look cool, but they lack the excitement of our shell exploration and I'm trying to put my finger on the reason. I think it's because the globe can only look one way and there's not a lot of freedom of expression. 

103 preschool- Students added "beautiful stuff" to their murals.  We'll spend the next class critiquing the murals through storytelling.  I want to give them a chance to describe what they made and what it means, then hear each other and try to tie it together to make a mural story.  If they wish to add more to the murals after this discussion, we can do that.

Details of our "beautiful stuff" added to the murals. 

104, bilingual kindergarten- We had a really awesome, unexpected opportunity.  As I walked through the building, I heard someone say that there were llamas outside.  I thought they were joking, but a few minutes later, another class was heading out to see the llamas.  I followed them and, to my surprise, there were two llamas in our playground area. 

The owners had been at a school near ours and stopped by to see if we would like a visit with llamas, as well.  The llamas ended up in our courtyard and the kindergarten class went to see them.  I ran to get pens and paper.  The students drew the llamas from life!  

They came into the studio and we had a dialogue to recall the details of our llamas. 

The students are numbered.

Mrs. Rose- So we had something unusual happen today. What was it?

Student 1- We saw the llamas. That was different.

Student 5-  A black and white one.

Mrs. Rose- Tell me about the llamas.

Student 7- They were big.

Student 6- The neck is really high.

Student 2- And the neck is like a rectangle.

Student 6- The face is like a circle.

Student 1- More like a rectangle. The neck was so big.

Student 6- The ears were like a triangle, like this.

Student 7- On top of the head.

Student 2- There were two ears.

Mrs. Rose- can you tell me any other details about them?

Student 8- They have long feet with two toes.

Student 7- They eat.

Student 6- They eat grass.

Student 8- I saw them eat grass. It was so beautiful. Do they have babies?

Student 6- I think yes.

Student 2- They are in the tummies

Student 7- Like we were in the tummies of our moms

Student 8- And my brother was in my moms tummy

Mrs. Rose- Do you have any questions about the llamas?

Student 2- The llamas eat like this (chews sideways with his mouth)

Student 1- The llamas have a tummy like this. (puffs out her belly.) 

Student 6- A circle tummy, too.

Student 7- Where do they live?

Student 8- They live on the farm, on the grass, outside.

Student 7- No,  they do not! I think they live somewhere hot. I know this because I saw a movie.

Drawing the llamas

After we had our discussion, I put the photos I'd taken of the llamas on the smartboard and asked the students if they'd like to try to draw the llamas again, to see if they could improve upon their initial sketches. They were eager to do this and the results show much more attention to detail. 

Their homeroom teacher said the class saw a llama in a book yesterday and they were so excited because they have a greater awareness of this animal now. :)