Remembering 9-11 Sims Park

OMG!! Tomorrow I am back to work. Gotta go back tomorrow, even though it is my birthday. A really BIG birthday........ SIX-O or 60! When did this happen???? I sit here shaking my head.......

It is all good! I LOVE my chosen career! I LOVE the people I work with AND I have a brand new art room!

Soooo in planning for the new school year, I have many ideas flying around in my head. According to the Art Teacher Facebook page many art teachers plan self portraits for the beginning of the school year and again at the end of the school year. It's a great way to see student progress. I LOVE THIS IDEA! And I actually got a box ready to do this at the end of last year. I even took the box home so it wouldn't get lost in the move.

However, I put an event on my phone for the first day of school: Peter Max Liberty 9/11. This was to remind me about the Memorial Service my school district does every year at a local park. They expect the art teachers to provide student work. Nothing crazy-fill up a poster board.

Here are most of them from years past-in no special order. I always provide a photo of the poster and the event information to each student.

 

 

 

  

As you can see from the variety, I have done something different each year. (The teardrops were from the same year.) Now let's take a good look at the posters. You will notice that with the exception of the "forget me not" flowers, that not many children participate in this project. To fulfill this request for art and only include a few students is tricky. Some years I have done the 9-11 lesson with just one class, but that always puts that class behind the others. It also hurts the feelings of the students I don't pick, sigh.....  Some years, like last year (see top photo) I picked my top artists in the 5th grade. They came in during my planning time and I inspired them with the following:

 I do realize that most of the art was expanding on a shape that I drew and they filled in. It can be debated that it isn't completely original student work. I get that. It is quick AND at that point, at the very beginning of the school year-it NEEDS to be QUICK.

Okay-so here's what I looking at this year. I will see students for two 50 minute classes before I need to send out work for 9-11. (And we all know the first class is all about rules and seating charts.) I REALLY, REALLY want to start the year off with self-portraits. However, my plan this year is to go deep NOT wide. In other words really explore a few themes deeply, not rush through lots and lots of themes.

Soooo we will start out by doing portraits of The Statue of Liberty!  AND since I want to introduce them to the art of Peter Max, I will use photos like the one below that I can grab off the internet. I want to go into a little history and use words like patriotic and symbolism. I think I also want to corrode some copper pennies in front of them......

Anyway, I knew both Peter Max and Romero Britto have done Lady Liberty art. I saw beautiful examples on my last cruise. For further inspiration I Googled: Statue of Liberty art lesson plans and then clicked on images. There is a lot to choose from. Check out this link for step by step directions from Art Projects for Kids.

In addition to Lady Liberty, we will explore other portraits to see what we can learn about the person posing. We will study our facial features and practice drawing them in sketchbooks that I plan to have for them.  Still working out the details. Students don't start until the 24th. I have time?!?

So it remains to be seen what I will be able to do. I will certainly blog about it!

Thanks for reading!

Home at Last!!

 Those of you reading this blog on a regular basis probably know I have been located for the last 2 years in a middle school down the road, from my elementary school, waiting for MY school to be renovated. AND for all of us to move back. The moment has finally arrived.....drum roll please!

 I walked into my BRAND NEW room, in a BRAND NEW location on campus over a week ago. VERY EXCITED to see NEW tables & NEW chairs, everything bright and shiny!

Containing ALL those boxes I packed up, starting last March and finishing after all the students were gone in June. WOW!!!

It didn't take as long as I would have thought to unpack. I think that was because I decided to open a few boxes and set them up near where I was planning to put things.

So how and where and why do things go where they go? Great question. I figured that out my first year there. I needed a place to gather up students, a place to store art work and room at the sink for all the messy stuff.

 

 In the first picture you can see the yellow chair I sat in and the carpet the students sat on. The blue cabinet held what was necessary for me to teach the lesson. The second picture is how I stored art work. The boxes are from cases of water purchased at Sam's club. (A very long time ago.)

By the sink are paint trays and brushes and containers for water. This worked out pretty well, so when we were relocated temporary, I configured the room out the same way.

 

 Since the science counter was in the way, I worked off the little table in the middle. Students gathered on the colorful floor mats. Storage was a little tighter, so I put art work into tote trays by my desk. Below by the sink, are the paint trays and everything else messy.

So in my new room again I have my teaching area, art work will be stored on my new shelves. I plan to use the colorful bins (thank you donorschoose.org) for class sketchbooks.

 

Here's the room from all 4 sides.

 Standing at the entrance to the room.

 The wall with the entrance door.

 Back by the sink.

Wall opposite the entrance. Below is my storage room and kiln room.

 

Okay, not completely unpacked.......... 

I want to label the cabinets for everyone to find things easier. So I took photos of stuff and will stick them onto the doors.

 

 

Not allowed to hang stuff from the ceilings, so the cool plastic crayons are gone. I feel that I still need to personalize the space, especially after seeing all the art teachers posting photos of their rooms recently. It WILL HAPPEN! Eventually..............

If you are an art teacher in FLORIDA and are planning to go to the conference in Naples in October, you can register for it starting tomorrow. I will be doing a mini studio titled: Look! Listen! And Learn! on Thursday at 8:45 am. It will be about learning to use museum activities in your art room.

And on Friday at 11:45 I will be presenting Born to Blog about how to start your own blog.

I do believe both will work with all grade levels! Hope to meet some of you there!!

Thanks for reading!!

Off to See The Wizard....

If I have not made in clear in the past, I shall make it very clear now! I LOVE MUSEUMS!!!
I love walking around, taking my time, reading wall text AND learning amazing things. It is just SO inspiring to ME! Really gets my brain fired up to do fun things.

In addition to loving museums, I am rather partial to The Wizard of Oz. It was the very first show that I directed for my community theater. And yes, that is my husband in the back row, he played the wizard. Besides directing, I made costumes (Dorothy and the trees) and did set design.

 

Soooooo when the opportunity presented itself to go to a museum AND there was a Wizard of Oz exhibit on display.............. I was pretty excited!!!! Now since this exhibit is at a children's museum, you MUST have a child with you to get in. And thankfully I knew just who to take! Okay, the reality of this situation was my daughter told me about it and drove me, along with her 2 children, my grandchildren to see it. The display is in Tampa at the Glazer Children's Museum.

 

 

 

Above are some of the photos that I took, but if you really want to see it all check it out here.

 

You may want to check out the schedule of future tour dates that I also found on the Curiosity Corner blog along with all the awesome photos!!

Some of you might be doing some head scratching about now as to what this has to do with teaching art. But I see so many, many ways to use what I saw there that day. Either with The Wizard of Oz or another favorite children's book. How amazing would it be to use a book as an interactive exhibit to inspire learning in art? How about if the older students work together to create some exciting centers for the younger students? Students could design games, signs or posters, costumes, puppets, prizes or merchandise for the book OR write a book together and develop an exhibit for it. WOW!!!

Just how many future art careers are we exploring with this concept??? WOW again!

What children's book would you use or like to see as an interactive exhibit? Please leave a comment and please consider following me!

Thanks for reading!!!