Professional Development

We've had a professional development workshop this weekend. Here are some resources that relate to what we were working on:

http://www.pdesas.org/ the Pennsylvania Standards Aligned Systems is the one-stop-shop for our cross-curricular needs.

http://www.artsconnected.org/toolkit/explore.cfm the artists toolkit has several interactive activities to explore a few (but not all) of the elements and principles of art and design- this is a very kid-friendly site that could be shared in the classroom.

http://artsedge.kennedy-center.org/educators/how-to/from-theory-to-practice/formal-visual-analysis.aspx  this webpage from the Kennedy Center has a  teacher-friendly explanation of all the E&P of A&D

Here are some resources about the artists we looked at:
http://diane-arbus-photography.com/ This is a portfolio of work by Diane Arbus- but note that not all images are appropriate for children.

http://www.brooklynmuseum.org/exhibitions/basquiat/street-to-studio/ fabulous kid-friendly interactive website by the Brooklyn museum about Jean-Michel Basquiat.


Here's a video of Gerhard Richter painting.
Here's one of Brice Marden comparing Mark Rothko and Barnett Newman:


Here is a website for finding videos on artists- http://www.artbabble.org/artist we'll have to see if it is accessible at school or not.

Here is a website for searching images: http://www.artstor.org/index.shtml however you need institutional remote access. To get this- visit the Wachovia Education Resource Center in the Perelman Building of the  Philadelphia Art museum.
Thanks for being great "Students" everybody!

Week of January 23rd

It was Spirit week at Comly! Everybody's trying hard to keep kids engaged as PSSA's approach. We had a lot of fun in Artslink this week too:
2nd grade:

To round up our weather project we created radial design compasses to show the cardinal directions. We'll use these when I bring our windsock back. The windsock is about halfway constructed and will be completed soon. We'll need to find a spot outside for it!

 Everyone started with the same foundation in various colors, but then they did their own radial symmetry design. It was great timing for this project as the kids just started doing lines of symmetry in math class.

 3rd Grade:
Ms O'Donnell and Ms DiDonato's classes began the money/shapes collage project. We started off trying to find the shapes to match a specific value, with each person at the table coming up with a different solution. The kids did a great job with this- many naturally started arranging the shapes in patterns and designs while they waited for everyone in the class to catch up.

 Then they had an opportunity to begin their own design, first planning it out, then gluing down the pieces. They had o use at least one of each color paper, use repetition or pattern, and try to use all the space on the paper. They were encouraged to show some symmetry as a starting point, but then add an asymmetrical element to make the composition more exciting.
Ms. Lex's class had an opportunity to complete their designs and then began tallying up the "value" of their pictures. Next time we'll do a "making change" activity.

 4th grade:
Ms Yancey and Ms. McGinley's classes began the lego/fractions project. They had plenty of time to build and play in response to my challenges- I realized I didn't give Mr Willis's class enough time for that the week before. So we began making something with 12 pieces and then tallying up the total of each color to show how to make a fraction- with the "color part" as the numerator and the "Lego total" as the denominator. Then they made a sculpture of 2 colors to show a 1/2 and 1/2 relationship. As we looked at the sculptures I wrote up the equivalent fractions on the board so we could see that 1/2 all the way up to 10/20 meant the same thing. Next, the kids tried a 3 color sculpture to show 1/3,1/3,1/3 relationships and again listed their equivalent fractions on the board. Finally we did the big lego sort-out to see which color had the largest fraction.

 Mr. Willis's class began with some extra time for building exploration and equivalent fractions which they missed out on before. I thought we were going to have a longer class period, so I did a demonstration on how to do our print project as well- but the kids didn't have time to try it out themselves this week. At least now all the 4th grade classes will be on the same schedule.


1/3 blue, 1/3 yellow, 1/3 white sculpture

 5th grade: Both 5th grade classes are continuing their geometric soft sculptures.

 Check out the great craftsmanship in careful stitching!

 Ms Gelfand's class is nearly finished since they've had more time (poor Ms. Albert's class has had 2 Monday holidays this month!). Several children have gotten to the assemble and embellish stage of their sculptures. In the 5th grade classes this week I handed the camera over to a select student or 2 for documentation. When downloading the photos I was surprised to find one student had set up a little backdrop to take some closeups- not realizing the fixed focal depth of the camera doesn't support closeups.... so here are a few inventive, yet fuzzy photos:

 That's a duck wearing a fez, complete with tassel. It was made with a cube, a cylinder, and a hexagonal prism.

 This is a rather adorable kitty with very expressive whiskers. It was made from a cube, a square pyramid, and a triangular pyramid.

 This will soon be  a turtle with a green cylindrical head and pink cube and blue square pyramid shell.

My photographer with her duck sculpture and awesome "crazy hat" for spirit week. I told the kids who were finished they could try to make a movie with their sculptures next week!

Week of Jan 17

There were no classes on Monday due to MLK day, but this week was the beginning of our new schedule to accommodate an extra day and 3 new classes.

2nd grade: Ms Drossner and Mr Pitt's classes missed out this week, but I met Ms Spangler's class for the first time. They are a lively and quick-working group! They accomplished in one meeting what I expected to take 2 sessions!. We passed out their brand new books and started off with a compass drawing to show North/South East/West. We did a kinetic activity to help differentiate the 4 directions by standing and completing a different motion to each direction. We talked about radial designs in art and I walked them through the steps to create a collaged and drawn compass using different colored squares of paper, drawn radial designs, and an arrow attached with a  brad. I look forward to doing the lesson with the other classes next week.

3rd: Ms O'Donnell's class missed out on Monday, but I got to meet our new teacher, Ms Lex, and Ms Didonato's class in their new Wednesday slot. Ms Didonato's class completed their sound unit with some review, practice and performance time, and a chance to paint their bridges. Their patterns are so colorful! It was a real luxury to meet them first thing Wednesday morning with plenty of time to work! See the previous post to hear/view some performances!

 Ms Lex's class began with introductions. Most of the students were excite to get to be a part of Artslink again as they all had been in either of the 2 other 3rd grades before the classes were split up, and had met me before. We picked up with the money concept they had left off with, as the 3rd graders need lots more practice. I brought pre-cut colored paper shapes to represent each coin value. Green squares = $1, smaller blue squares= $0.25, long purple rectangles = $0.10, short yellow rectangles= $0.05, and small red squares = $0.01. We talked about patterns a little. The kids worked in teams to create arrangements of the papers to represent a specific value. or example $1.25 could be represented by a green and a blue square. They practiced with several values. Then they created their own pattern collage by arranging at least 1 of each shape onto a background paper. They were asked to make a geometric design that showed repetition and did not leave too much empty space. When they are complete we will find out their "value", and then make a second composition to represent "change" back from a specific value.

 4th: Ms McGinley and Ms Yancey's fully completed their coordinate grid map projects. All painting was completed and grids drawn. Then we played a coordinate grid game. We established values for each possible item on their maps. When I called a coordinate, the kids had to find it on their maps, and tally up the points for whatever was in that square. The table with the most points at the end got to be the first to hang up their pictures.

 In Ms McGinley's class we also had enough time for a reflective writing piece about what they liked or disliked about the project and what they learned. She had some students type up their responses to add to the pictures in the hallway!

On Wednesday I met Mr Willis'sclass for the first time. There were many familiar faces from last year's 3rd grade class! First I passed out their new books and asked the kids to write a bit about what they liked about math, science, and art as a way to ease into the artslink program. Then we started off our fractions project. I thought legos would be an interesting material to work with as I've recently found lots of lego"hacks", or ways to use a tool for alternative purposes. The kids were split into 5 groups by random numbering. Each group was given a basket of legos and asked to sort them by color, then tally up how many of each color they had. They then added up their total, and had to show what fraction of each color was in the basket. I thought they'd be able to reduce their fractions, but apparently that's a bit ahead of the curriculum, so Mr Willis asked them to use their calculator fractions function for the activity. Finally I asked each kid to pick out 12 legos, build something, and we found out who had 1/12, 1/6, 1/3, 1/4, and 1/2 colors in their little sculptures. Next time we'll begin making a printmaking matrix from the legos to stamp an edition. I had so much fun on Wednesday!

5th: Ms Gelfand's class continued sewing their geometric forms. Some students were able to begin stuffing them and combining them into the final sculptures. It was interesting to see that some students found that creative thinking step a challenge. Although we started our sculpture unit by identifying the underlying geometric forms in sculptures, the reverse process of turning the forms into more imaginative sculptures was not as concrete. I don't think they are quite used to the possibility of an open-ended result in an assignment. They need to work their imagination muscle.

what can you do with a cube and a cylinder?

More kalimbas!

Kalimbas!

Weeks of January 3rd and 9-10

We're all back from Winter break and have jumped back into our projects. Last Tuesday I forgot to take pictures, Ms. McGinley and Ms. Yancey's classes continued their map-making, Ms Gelfand's 5th grade had a practice stitching day in preparation for soft sculpture sewing, and Ms. DiDonato's class began construction of their thumb pianos.
This week was my first day back with the Monday crew.
2nd grade: The kids had time to write about their weather pictures using some sentence starters: "In my picture it is...(weather description)", "You can tell because... (description of picture details)".Writing about art is an important art skill and literacy skill! After writing, some kids got to share their descriptions to the class. Then we gathered on the carpet to decide how to organize our pictures for our group wind sock. The kids in both classes agreed that it would be better to have them organized by weather than to have them mixed up randomly.
3rd grade: Ms. O'Donnell's class had a day to review and wrap up our sound unit. We made a diagram of the parts of our instruments, reviewed how sound starts with a vibration and ends up a our ears. We even found a video about the ear drum to see how it works. Then we practiced playing our kalimbas. we tried playing a rhythm while counting by 1s, 2s, 5s and 10s. Finally they got to make up their own  rhythm for a little performance in front of the class. I have a video of it I'll post later.
Ms DiDonato's class continued constructing their kalimbas- all that's left is painting the bridge and getting to play.

4th grade-:Both classes are nearly finished the map project. With Ms. McGinley's class we did a sketchbook exercise filling in a coordinate grid in a directed drawing. They completed painting their landforms in watercolor and drew a coordinate grid over their maps. Those that finished early made note in their books where each symbol in their key could be found on the grid.

Ms Yancey's class still has some painting to finish, but we'll be able to do the coordinate grid next week. Their maps are really fun and creative with imaginative place names and drawing styles.

5th grade: Ms Albert's class had their day of stitch practice to focus on craftsmanship. I'm sure it was worthwhile to spend a day on practice because today with Ms Gelfand's class the kids were able to confidently begin stitching their forms.Everyone got at least one finished, and many got 2 complete. They worked much faster than I expected! Hooray!

week of Dec 19-20

 2nd- We've added the FOREGROUND details to our weather pictures. The kids had a chance to draw in Sharpie marker first and then carefully paint in the details. Some are farther than others. I'm not sure whether to allow another painting day or take them as is for our windsock when we get back from break.

 It's very interesting to see the range of artistic development in this age group- from figure drawing styles to carefulness in painting.

 I think we'll have a little writing activity next time for the kids to describe their pictures.

 3rd grade: Ms Didonato's class began the sound lesson with drawing high and low wavy lines to match played notes on my recorder. Ms O'Donnell's class completed making their kalimbas! There's one last detail and some playing and reflection time in store for them.

 4th grade: Ms. McGinley's class continued their maps. We thought about the purpose of maps and what features might be on a map. I only asked for 6 but they came up with over 20 things that might be found on a map. The Smartboard came in handy as we looked up images of lots of different maps. The students finished sketching and began crayon coloring the details on their maps. Eventually we'll use watercolor to paint the background water and land. Ms. Yancey's class completed their collaborative sculpture and began sketching their maps after a brief map brainstorm. They're catching up quickly.

 5th: Both classes have completed their 3 form templates and cut out their felt pieces t begin stitching. When we get back we'll have a short practice stitch piece and then begin stitching their forms. They've all had a chance to brainstorm what their forms might become, but it will be easier for them to visualize once their forms are constructed.

Hoping everyone has a relaxing Winter Break! See you in 2012!