Week Eighteen

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!