Blog Archives

Week One

1/27/2018

New Semester with New Students

This installation was completed by over 200 students in our school. It encircles a tree that was planted years ago to honor our veterans and is also next to the entrance of our school and flagpole.

Our Art classes run in semesters, which means I get to greet new students after 18 weeks and start over again with them. It is fun to see how this new set of students approach the content already covered by first semester and bring their own experiences to the table to complete various pieces of content and creation.

One of my favorite things about this first week, was getting to finish our installation of painted rocks inspired by the story "The Dot," by Peter H. Reynolds. I have been using this story for at least the last five years with my students to inspire legacy projects in our school. We have made paintings, paper globes, and now these painted rocks as a way to make our own mark on WMS.

Each year I do this, I am usually doing something with my students for the first time and not 100% sure how and if it will turn out. I openly share this with my students and explain that taking creative risks is one of the duties of an artist and it is up to all of us to be courageous in this class with the work we make. I am very pleased with this year's outcome and look forward to seeing what legacy project we come up with for next year.

Here are some thoughts from the students on their work:

Avery: For this project I created a rock that displays an abstract pattern of dots. I decided not to focus on a specific pattern in order to incorporate the Dot story. The Dot story talks about about how all artists work is unique and anyone can create art. My piece, and all the other rocks created in class, are different in order to represent diversity and beauty in art.

Gage: This is like in the story the dot because we started with one dot and we began to do more. Also it represents that anyone can be creative. Finally, it was the first project of the year.

Brady: I made this amazing piece of art because of the book, The Dot. I just made one dot and went on from there. This rock was made from a bunch of random dots and then I made more.

Katie: In this artwork, I started with one big dot--the sun. It popped into my head as soon as we started. This connects to the book because starting with one dot made a bigger thing called art. It connects to real life because we are leaving this artwork behind just like we will have to leave other things behind as in our legacy.

This is a more complete view of the work.

Empty Bowls

For years, I have engaged students with clay on the first day. This semester, I switched around some activities and actually started with paint and waited until our third day together to work with clay.

When I informed one class that we were going to work with clay, it was greeted with a "Woo Hoo!" I know that not all of my students will choose art as a career, but I do hope that they will continue to create and appreciate art as grow up and react with a "Woo Hoo!" during those experiences.

It was fun to see students work with clay in this way and for 7th graders to create bowls for our annual Empty Bowls night. Even better will be once these are fired and we get to glaze them in a variety of colors.

Henna Hands

Something new was tried with my 8th graders for our first clay experience. Instead of making bowls like they did when they were in 7th grade or the leaves like last semester did (because it is January in Michigan and there are no leaves), students created Henna-inspired patterned hands.

Inspired by this post and henna-painted hands, I decided to try this out with student and see how they turned out. For the most part, there has been success so far (only a few repaired fingers along the way). In the future, I would probably have students keep their fingers closer together or use the slab roller in order to avoid some of those issues.

I am excited to see how they finish out and what happens when we apply a glaze treatment to them. This was a great alternative to the leaves and students seemed to really enjoy the process of creating patterns.

Collaboratives

Collaboration is something I am passionate about in my classroom. I feel strongly that success in team format is much more powerful than individually. It takes much more skill and understanding to work with others and find common ground than it does to go it alone.

For the first day of our STEAM class, we brainstormed ideas that show what we value at WMS: Academics, Arts, and Athletics. These symbols were then drawn by students on canvases with WMS on them and a grid. Every time a shape changes on the grid, so does the color (keeping cool colors for the backgrounds and warm for the letters/objects).

We are more than half-way to our end goal with these works (once they are done they will be showcased in the office) and we hope to complete them next week. This is my first time teaching STEAM as a class, so it will be a learning experience for both my students and me this semester!

Can you see the WMS?

Drawing in Space

For our second collaboration in 3D, students had the opportunity to explore the concept of drawing in space by using wire. In teams of two and three, students selected an object and then sketched out the object using contour lines. After, they turned that line drawing into a sculpture using wire.

It was interesting to see that multiple groups selected cameras as their object. Below are some process and final images of particularly successful attempts.

#FirstMillion Funding

On January 25th, our latestDonorsChoose.org project was funded thanks to the matching funds from #FirstMillion, celebrating the first million funded projects on the site. I am so thankful for the additional materials we will now have due to the generosity of others.

If you are interested in helping fund a project, I recommend visiting their site and seeing a variety of opportunities to do just that!

Woo Hoo! Thanks @DonorsChoose #FirstMillion pic.twitter.com/DK8mBl6Wbv
— Janine Campbell (@campbellartsoup) January 25, 2018

This week was really packed with a lot of amazing things. I am so thankful and excited that I get the opportunity to be a part of all of it.

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Week Eighteen

1/20/2018

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Goodbye with GIFs

For our last week of class, students focused on their exams. In Art, there are two parts to their final exam before leaving for a new rotation in second semester. The first part is to create a GIF using works from our Intermediate and Elementary students art that is posted on their Artsonia sites. The second part is a test that asks students to more formally answer questions based on the content they learned covering media, artists, and techniques.

To help students study for their test portion, we use a study guide and play a game called "Stump the Student" where students ask each other questions on teams for points. It is a fun way to end the semester and creating the GIFs gives students a chance to make some art as a final way to express what they have learned in the class. Here are a sample of what was made (a special thanks to Ian Sands for the idea years ago):

Final Thoughts

Areas students said they felt were covered in class and through projects.

In the effort to improve what I do as a teacher, I ask students to provide me some feedback for the end of the semester. I ask them what areas they feel like they learned new information about, something that was the best part of the class, something that I should do differently for next time, and then a section where they can send me a message of their choosing. This is anonymous, so I never know who left what as their comment and it also opens students up to give me genuine responses.

From their responses, a few things are clear: 1. Students appreciate having choices in their learning, 2. Students would like more opportunities to collaborate, 3. Students appreciate the work I have put into making this class what it is.

It was fun to read through the messages and it offered a nice boost to the ego as we complete the term. This was a really nice group of students. I look forward to getting to start a new term on Monday with another set of great kids!

Just a sample of some the things students said was the best thing about the term.

Some lovely final thoughts from my students as we gear up for a new term with new classes.

First Projects Complete in 3D

Last week students worked on collaborative drawings based on the work of Heather Hansen. This week, students took those drawings and translated them into relief paper sculptures. It was really fun to see how far students stretched their original works and ideas to land on their final projects.

In this challenge, students were asked to create an asymmetrical and symmetrical relief sculpture. Here are some of the results:

This was a pretty action-filled week and I know next week will be even more so with a whole new group of kids to teach in art. And we are starting a BRAND NEW class next week, called STEAM. It will be fun to post more about that in the coming weeks!

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Week Seventeen

1/12/2018

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Finishing up the Semester

As we near the end of the semester, students were asked to go through their portfolios on Artsonia and select a piece they would like to revisit in ways that would help them show growth over the term. This is a variation on a project I ask students to engage in annually as a way to pause, reflect, and react to the learning that has happened during their time in the art classroom.

It is very exciting for me to see students use this project to show what they have learned. It is also interesting to learn why students select the works they want to revisit. For some, it is because it was their favorite thing; for others, it was something they struggled with at the time and this is their chance to do something better. Regardless of the reason, I am thankful that students had a chance to do this and I really enjoyed reading their statements that went with the work.

Ashlynn: I did this flower because in fifth grade I did a water color flower, and for something old something new I decided to take the techniques from the fifth grade art work and make it better. So I colored my flower and used water color paint, just like I did in fifth grade.

Kennedy: For this projects I decided to re-make a shoes drawing i did with pastels in 5th grade. I started out by looking at my shoe and drawing out the outsides and the lines, then i colored it in. I did the same thing with the other shoes, only using pencils instead of colored pencils. For my background I used water color to make a splash pattern by blowing on it.

Serenity: I decided to recreate my watercolor flower painting from 5th grade. In the original I didn't make it look like a flower very well. The flower was too zoomed in. However, in this piece I zoomed out and made it look more like a flower. I made a new work that focused more on the content of the painting. The original also had colors that were not blended and causing the work to have poor craft. In this piece the colors that I used were blended together more, causing the work to have good craft. This art work helped me personally by helping me show the improvement I have made not only as a artist, but as a person. I wanted to revisit this project because I honestly thought it looked bad when I original created it in 5th grade. I wanted to take this opportunity to recreate it and make it look better.

Finn: My new project shows improvement in creativity because before I just grabbed a bunch of images off of google and placed them inside my profile, and in this project I made the background inside my face, made the planet, and I made the stars. I also improved my craft. I did this by spending more time on the quality of the components in this project, and in the other project my background was just made out of a bunch of random colors and scribbles. I made this piece the way it is because I love the way galaxy or space things look and also how greens, purples, reds, and blues look together.

Jackson: In the old water color abstract I had diferent clear sections which looking back on I didn't like so with this one its more non objective. Also in the old one I had random scribbles through out it making it worse. I feel like this one was a lot more crafty because in the old one it was just crappy and scribbly but with this one it actually took time. The composition on this one was a lot better too because it used a wider variety of color. I don't really have a personal connection to this artwork because it was "Non objective". I wanted to revisit this because in my last one it was awful and I didn't like it so I thought of this as a retry.

Evie: I remade a piece I made in 5th grade, the year I came to Byron Center. It was a portrait of what I looked like back then and it was supposed to be realistic. Remaking it, I took everything I've learned and made it in a style I draw with more. I decided since this was a remake from an old drawing, instead of keeping the drawing of me in 5th grade, I'd make it how me and my friends draw me currently. I'ts like a persona in a way, it's something my friends have helped me with and I am very grateful for their help. I also made it digital instead of traditional. I took the circles in the background from the last drawing and made it a ball type thing with words my friends have called me and use to describe me. The art remake is very important to me, it shows how much I've grown with people and especially with art. I used far more shading and took aspects from the last drawing (circles and words) and made them into something new and even combined them! I'm far more content with this piece and I hope to learn more in art.

Khiem: This art is the continue of the last art in 7th grade challenge 3 treasure or trash. Some of the thing that I change is the way I chose to color it. In the old art I use the different color but in this one I chose to use My old fashion way, pencil. Something new that I do is the point of view. The first one is up looking down but in this one I chose to look from a wall. The first C is creativity is that I use shading pencil instead of markers. Another C that's different is the content I chose to take a different point of view from the original. This my room that change a little by using my imagination like the fish tank.

Mary: In the revision of the autobiography I did last year, I wanted to re-do my attempt at 'anime' and wanted to improve. I was honestly horrified at the older version, so I just had to redo it.I am also remaking this character; putting in more depth and such.I hope you enjoyed this piece, I cannot wait to make more like it!

3Doodler Fun

This was an exciting end of the week in our classroom as our latest funded project from DonorsChoose arrived! Thanks to generous donors and the matching funds from 3Doodler, we were able to get 6 3Doodler pens for our classroom!

Students spent today experimenting with the pens, even completing some of the projects from the booklet. I am so excited to be able to use these in the classroom and cannot wait to see what students make next with them.

Week One of DE

For the past seven years I have been able to reconnect with my former middle school students as high schoolers in the Kendall College of Art and Design Dual Enrollment program. Each Spiring, I teach a course in either Color, Photo, or 3D. It has been an awesome experience and one that I look forward to each year.

This week, we had our first class in 3D Design. It was fun to see students I once had years ago and meet new students, too. We started out this week with collaborative work, creating sculptures on the first day out of styrofoam cups and some drawing exercises on the second day to prep for some relief paper sculptures based on the work of Heather Hansen.

From what I have seen so far in this short period of time, I know we are going to have some stellar work made by some stellar students over the remaining 14 weeks of class.

Next week, these drawings will be translated into paper relief sculptures (one symmetrical and one asymmetrical). It will be interesting to see how students use 2D images to inform the 3D work they make. This is my first time approaching this project in this way and it was amazing to see how engaged students were throughout the drawing process (one commented that they would like to do more of this kind of work on their own).

Part of my job as an art teacher is to teach the fundamentals of seeing and making art; the other part is to instill the idea that there are multiple ways to make art and that anyone can do it.

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Happy New Year!

1/6/2018

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SchoolArts Magazine

Ever since I was around eight years old, I wanted to be a writer. I used to create newspapers by hand, documenting stories in my house. When I was in high school, I joined the newspaper staff at school and ended up becoming the features section editor my senior year. With the support of the rest of the newspaper crew, we split that section into two: student life and arts & entertainment. Because of that move, I actually had an award named after me in the class.

I am proud to say I am writer. I write on this blog, I write stories for myself, I write lesson plans and papers for school, and I even write for some publications like the one featured above in this month's issue of SchoolArts Magazine. One of my goals this year is to write more articles for submission to SchoolArts. It is a great way to share processes of successes in classroom management and outcomes and it is a great way for me to reflect on and grow as a teacher. If you are interested in learning how to submit, I encourage you to review the requirements here.

This was a great way to start 2018, especially since the work featured in the article happens to be our ArtPrize 9 piece, "Painting Under Papercuts."

2018 Scholastic Art Awards
West Central Michigan Regional Results

Our students worked really hard this year to try new media, push their ideas beyond the obvious solutions, and work with ideas that explored concepts both personal and universal in theme. I am really proud of the results of their efforts and how they took the creative risk of placing many of their works into competition this year for the 2018 Scholastic Art Awards.

This year seems to have been a particularly tough competition. Our district had 55 works place for recognition:

High School
Hallie Baker: Silver Key and Honorable Mention
Krista Bartholomy: 4 Silver Keys and 4 Honorable Mentions
Leah Cook: 2 Honorable Mentions
Lauren Daly: 6 Honorable Mentions
Lauren Doyle: Silver Key, Honorable Mention
Saige Dykhouse: Honorable Mention
Kennedy Emmons: Silver Key
Harrison Kosak: Silver key
Ryan Lotterman: 2 Gold Keys, 2 Silver Keys, 2 Honorable Mentions
Emma McCloud: American Vision Nominee, 3 Gold Keys, Honorable Mention
Anna Pavlak: Silver Key
Elise Pechler: 2 Silver Keys, 2 Honorable Mentions
Ella Petit: Honorable Mention
Ethan Pipe: 2 Gold Keys, Honorable Mention
Sydney Randall: Honorable Mention
Middle School
Sophia Bentley: Gold Key, Honorable Mention
Ava Bont: Honorable Mention
Leila DeHaan: Honorable Mention
Cade Fortier: Honorable Mention
Chloe Grabowski: Honorable Mention
Evan Granger: Honorable Mention
Sophie Millhouse: Honorable Mention
Emma Pavlak: Honorable Mention
Hannah Reda: Honorable Mention
Tara Rood: Gold Key
Bryanna Tromp: Gold Key, Silver Key

We are so excited for our students whose works were awarded Gold Keys that get to go on to the national competition in New York City. It is extra exciting that we also had a high school student achieve an American Vision Nomination. We will find out the national results later this spring.

To view the works that I helped enter this year, check out the images below. I am so proud that these students were willing to put themselves out there and I look forward to seeing what they make next!