Kindergarten Tackles Texture

I had the students start by drawing a grid on their paper(This can be a

challenge with Kinderbabies!! ha ha). They then used texture plates under

their paper to create these crayon rubbings.

Students created texture medallions in clay.

They will be turned into necklaces once fired. Students created texture in the grassy area of their pictures by fringing the edges of their paper with scissors. This was one of the first times we used scissors and glue in class. They did an amazing job!!

Weaving: 3rd & 4th Grade

It's that wonderful time of the year again...WEAVING!!!! My 3rd graders have always done their circle weavings in the fall. My 4th graders usually do their tapestry weavings toward the

end of the school year(it helps them focus when they are all crazy with spring). However, this

year I moved it to come after my 4th graders social studies unit on TN Native Americans.

I like the idea of having that connection for my students, but not sure I like doing

the project at this time of the year.

Ends & Outs of Circle Weaving

Here is the "formula" you use for circle weaving for warping your loom. If any of you have questions concerning the lesson, please feel free to ask.

Crayola Christmas Gifts

Now that I have a baby, I've been looking at all the things Crayola has to offers little learners. They have several toys that I think will make great Christmas gifts for the baby in your life! This one is my favorite.

"The Crayola Beginnings Rainbow Tower develops and delights! This wonderful, light-up play station teaches baby to recognize colors with lights and music. The stacking and nesting activities help to develop a child’s size perception and hand-eye coordination. Special TaDoodles characters light up when placed on the base. They also combine to make new colors when one is placed inside the other."

Check out this and other gift ideas at:

http://www.crayola.com/products/list.cfm?categories=BEGINNINGS,BEGINNINGS%20BABY

PS.....I bought this for my baby girl!!! I can't wait to play with it...um...I mean....I can't wait for her to play with it on Christmas day!!!

A Newly Found Warhol Up for Auction!

Hopefully this link will be up for a little while! I have always found Warhol an interesting fellow!! SIDE NOTE: If you have not seen the "Dropping In On..." series DVD of Warhol, it is worth your time. My friends and I love it!!

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091030/ap_en_ce/us_hidden_warhol

Yarn Boxes

Sales on Art Supplies

In Nashville,TN....we have a wonderful selection of art, arts & crafts, school supply stores. Michaels, Jo-Ann's, and Hobby Lobby are the national chains that I frequent most for my personal art supply needs. Once and awhile I'll pick up things for my classroom, but that is usually taken care of through district approved catalogs. These stores are also where I"ll point my students to pick up art supplies. However, I always tell them...WAIT FOR THE SALES!! Jo-Ann's and Hobby Lobby always half 30%, 40%, and 50% sales on different iteams every week!! They also have amazing coupons!!!!!! You can sign up for those in the store, or check out their online site and print off coupons! If you do not have one of these stores near you...I think you can online order!! Check it out!!

http://www.michaels.com/art/online/home

http://www.joann.com/joann/

http://www.hobbylobby.com/

Fall Break....a week up north (nature as art..ha ha)

FALL BREAK IS A GIFT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Fall is my fav. time of the year, and this year MNPS has a week off for fall break. My wife, baby girl, and I are up in PA right now enjoying time with family & friends! It's a bit chilly, but the colors are beautiful up here!! I'm finding much inspiration for my work!!!!!

1st-3rd Group Landscape In Progress: PART 4 FINISHED!!!

1st-3rd Group Landscape In Progress PART 3

1st-3rd Group Landscape In Progress PART 2

1st-3rd Group Landscape In Progress

Tempera Paint Sea Creatures

I use to be very anti-tempera paint. I was trained in watercolor in college, and you know how you gravitate toward what you know. Over the past few years, I've grown to enjoy it more and more. I have develope easier ways of managing it in passing out supplies & cleaning them up. Plus, the results of tempera are undeniable. The colors are so rich! The kids love working with them also. This lesson was one of my fav. The students came up with such wonderful images, and their craftsmanship was pretty good as well.

..A Proud Papa Moment..

My sweet baby girl is 7 months old! She's such a joy!!!

..New Art at the White House..

So the Obamas have brought some new art to the White House! There are for sure some interesting choices in the mix, but I am glad that so many contemporary pieces have found there way into the collection! Here are some links that will show you different pieces they've selected. Wish I could have been on the list!!!

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/07/arts/design/07borrow.html

http://www.shelterpop.com/2009/10/07/obamas-choose-avant-garde-art-for-the-white-house/?icid=webmailwbml-aoldl1link3http%3A%2F%2Fwww.shelterpop.com%2F2009%2F10%2F07%2Fobamas-choose-avant-garde-art-for-the-white-house%2F

Scare Crows- Construction Paper Crayons

Lets face it, most of our 1st graders haven't moved too far beyond their Kindergarten abilities yet....they just aren't developmentally ready...YET! I push & push..but sometime forget and become frustrated. WHY CAN'T THEY DO MORE?!?!?! Each fall though, I take a step back and give them a project I know they will find great success with....and get heaps of praise!! These scares crows are great fun for the kids, and give them a chance to try construction paper

crayons(if you have not used these...they are WONDERFUL!). Please notice though..the

pumpkins they create are not Jack-o-Lanterns. This is a fall picture..not Halloween.

I do not do holidays in my room. I do seasons..the art lasts longer that way.

You can keep a fall picture up until after Thanksgiving!

Kindergarten Watercolor Painting -Color Mixing

Sometimes you just have to be brave! I decided that I'd do a fall watercolor picture with my kindergarten classes. They have been doing extremely well, and I felt that I could trust them with a little more than some of my classes in years past. Well, after cups of water being spilt daily.....I still feel they did a pretty good job. I did demo the lesson first and show them how to make orange. I use the BIGGIE water colors by Prang that have four large ovals of Red, Yellow, Blue, and Green.

Short Video About Van Gogh

I came across this video today, and found it very interesting. Hopefully the link will work for awhile...sometimes they pull them.

http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/up/player/popup/index.php?cl=15933932

TN STATE ART STANDARDS

So I was one of six art teacher picked from across the state to write the TN State Art Standards for the elementary level. We had a two days to get started. It was a pretty good mix of people, and surprisingly we got along well(this was not as much the situation when I was on the team that wrote Metro Nashville's art curriculum!?!?!). I felt we truly got a lot done, and there was a lot of work to do(and still left to do!!!). We'll be gathering together again in January for three days to finish the job!

Dr. Ed's Annual Art Drive 2009

Each year Dr. Ed has an art drive during the month of Aug. Members bring in $20 in new art supplies, and the get an adjustment! The art supplies are then divided between Hermitage Elementary & Tulip Grove Elementary! Mrs. Fritz & I are extremely thankful to Dr. Ed & the members of his practice!!! The drive allows our basic needs to be met(crayons, glue, scissors, markers...etc) and we are able to use our supply money that is given by our schools for the other important materials for running a successful art program. It really has freed up a great deal of funds for other supplies! The basics add up & can take a major chunk of our money! This is my half of the take this year(imagine...another table full with to Mrs. Fritz!!!). Plus, we received many gift cards that we're excited to go spend(ok..I already went to Wal-Mart last night and purchased a bunch of items I needed!!!) THANK YOU DR. ED!!!!!!!

Check out his website & if you are in the Nashville Metro area...consider making him your chiropractor!!

http://www.totalbodyhealthcare.com/

Art Room Bulletin Boards - Looking, Thinking, & Talking About Art

Last year I finally got a big boy's chalk board!! They had ordered new white boards for about half the rooms(all they could afford)...and where just getting rid of the old chalk boards. I love my chalk boards because I can put stuff on them with magnets!!! I have a magnetic word wall, art posters, and I keep a stock of sheet magnets so I can make about anything magnetic!! Anyways, I asked them for one...and they were happy to hang it on my other wall. They took the bulletin board from that wall and placed it here...going vertical. I knew I wanted to make an area to look/talk/think/write about art!!! My old little chalk board is a great place to hang prints to go with my lessons. And on the right side I have liquid nailed metal sheets up to the wall & that is where my word wall/vocab hangs!!!

This board has prompts for discussing art. I also printed out a ton of words to help the student talk about art. They are mostly adjectives that have a bit more meet to them than pretty or ugly! ha ha I created the boarder from old art text books that were going to be discarded.

My small chalk board is the perfect place to post the large Discover Art prints. I use the fatty clip magnets to secure them in place. I also printed out a sing that says Portrait Art that's up in the top left hand corner.

Please forgive the poor picture, but this is my word wall. I bought four sheets of metal at Home Depot and Liquid Nailed them to my wall. I wrote my words out on index card(the back cause I didn't like the lines showing), and placed sheet magnets on the back. I will grab the words from their and place them on my large chalk board with my teacher examples to reinforce the vocabulary with the art!

Art Room Bulletin Boards & Displays '09

Art Room Bulletin Boards - Discipline

I am trying a new "system" this year. With having all 530 students this year, I need to keep organized & simplistic. I have a chart with 36 boxes across(the number of times I'm suppose to see the students in a years time). At the end of the class time, I fill in the box with the color that matches their behavior for the day. Blue is a GREAT DAY! Red is OK DAY..but could be better. Yellow is NOT A GOOD DAY! I slide the color across to let the the kids know where they are at during the class time...every class starts on blue. Individual student issues will be handled individually...this chart is for class as a whole. The kids seem to like knowing if they're doing better than the other classes!

Hallway Display

At the end of the school year I have my students make me turtles with fun designs and patterns for the hallway outside my classroom. I change my color theme every year for five years(so that the students don't see the same thing twice..we're a K-4th school)...so I always know what colors I'm going with for the next year(primary, warms, cools, greens, and secondary). I started this 6 yrs ago...so I'm back to primary!! I thought the word CREATE! was fitting...and may use that idea again next year!!

Art Room Bulletin Boards - Is Your Mind On Art?

I just love this crazy head spilling over with art!! I'm not sure when or how I came up with this, but it is recreated each year to match my color theme(if you haven't noticed...this year is primary!)

Art Room Bulletin Boards - No-No Board

Argue it if you like, but students do need to be told NO! It will not stiffle their creativity!! We as teachers are there to instruct our students, and I've personally found a "No-No" board extremely helpful. Some students don't realize that blue clouds are just lazy clouds....that the sun is not a person & does not have a face....or that their mother did not pick up a stick and call it her child! So, this is my board...and I go over each point with my students EVERY YEAR!! My forth graders love my theatrical presentation!! ha ha

Art Room Bulletin Boards -Write Your Name

I'm constantly reminding my students to write their name on their paper. I decided a bulletin board would be a great reminder for them. Also, it allows me to have examples of where to place their name. If you've ever had to hunt for a students name on their art...you'll understand having a set rule of where to place their name is important! Does this solve all my problems....NO!....but it has helped this issue a great deal.

Mona & the Mug

Seems that the Mona Lisa was attacked again!

Some woman pulled a mug/cup out of her

bag and threw it at the painting. Thank goodness for the bulletproof glass!!!

Here's the link: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8196538.stm

Beauty & The Beast Camp

I recently finished with a two week Theater/Music/Art Camp. The musical they were doing this summer is Beauty & the Beast. This was my first summer working with this camp, and it was a real challenge. I taught two 45 min. sessions a day, each session having 30 students ages 6 to 13 yrs old! I was asked to create lessons based on the movie/musical. I had no desire to copy ideas from the movie, but instead pulled elements out of the movie that I thought would make fun projects(and that could be done by such a wide age range!!!).

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This first project is based off of the stain glass windows in the movie that explain the back story of the Beast. It is watercolor and Sharpie. I had the student use salt in some of the areas to create a textured effect.

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BE OUR GUEST!

I had the campers create paper mache bowls from construction paper and liquid starch! They turned out great, but unforunately did not do a song and dance number.