Open studio

During a week of independent choices, children expressed new ideas by revisiting art tools and materials used during the past 11 weeks of school.

Grades 1, 2, and 3

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A peek . . .

 . . . at some familiar things in the art room.

Where would you find these?

Match the words to the pictures.

art map    book nook    child size sink    clay tools    construction paper    denim aprons    flat files    flowers    geometric shape templates    idea books    lava light    light box    Ms. H.’s clay bear      name tags    paintbrushes    pattern blocks    Prismacolors    recycled sun    rocking chair    rocks    tempera paint    tools and materials baskets    unit blocks    watercolors

 

 

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10 lessons

“Art is literacy of the heart.”

– Elliot Eisner


UnknownTen Lessons the Arts Teach

1. The arts teach children to make good judgments about qualitative relationships. Unlike much of the curriculum in which correct answers and rules prevail, in the arts, it is judgment rather than rules that prevail.

2. The arts teach children that problems can have more than one solution
and that questions can have more than one answer.

3. The arts celebrate multiple perspectives.
One of their large lessons is that there are many ways to see and interpret the world.

4. The arts teach children that in complex forms of problem solving
purposes are seldom fixed, but change with circumstance and opportunity.
Learning in the arts requires the ability and a willingness to surrender to the unanticipated possibilities of the work as it unfolds.

5. The arts make vivid the fact that neither words in their literal form nor numbers exhaust what we can know. The limits of our language do not define the limits of our cognition.

6. The arts teach students that small differences can have large effects.
The arts traffic in subtleties.

7. The arts teach students to think through and within a material.
All art forms employ some means through which images become real.

8. The arts help children learn to say what cannot be said.
When children are invited to disclose what a work of art helps them feel, they must reach into their poetic capacities to find the words that will do the job.

9. The arts enable us to have experience we can have from no other source
and through such experience to discover the range and variety of what we are capable of feeling.

10. The arts’ position in the school curriculum symbolizes to the young
what adults believe is important.

SOURCE:

Eisner, E. (2002). The Arts and the Creation of Mind, In Chapter 4, What the Arts Teach and How It Shows. (pp. 70-92). Yale University Press.

Available from NAEA Publications. NAEA grants reprint permission for this excerpt from Ten Lessons with proper acknowledgment of its source and NAEA.

National Art Education Association
901 Prince Street, Alexandria, Virginia, 22314 USA
T: 800.299.8321/703.860.8000
F: 703.860.2960 (INTERNATIONAL: DIAL 011+1+NUMBER)
E: INFO@ARTEDUCATORS.ORG

 

 

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Only One You / Nadie Como Tu

During art, we looked at many different kinds of lines and patterns in the book Only One You / Nadie Como Tu by Linda Kranz before exploring the technique of RESIST with oil pastels and paint. 

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Then, we drew lines, shapes and patterns with oil pastels on watercolor paper. Straight lines, curvy, zig-zag, loopy, dotted, dashed…

For the RESIST technique to be successful, our challenge was to discover:

How hard or soft do you have to push when you are drawing with oil pastels?

How thick or thin do the lines have to be? 

When brushing paint on top of the drawings, how thick or thin does the paint have to be?

Which color combinations stand out the most?

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Grades 1, 2, 3

 

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Drawing on top of prints

 

The next art class our prints were dry. We envisioned new possibilities to complete them using drawing materials.

How would you add on or transform some of your prints? 

We tested colored markers, drawing pencils, black drawing pens and Prismacolor pencils. 

Which work well on black ink? Which drawing materials do you prefer? Why?

 

Grades 1, 2, 3

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Printing

 

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Art is a language. Artists show their thoughts, feelings and ideas in many different ways. 

This artwork shows a technique called PRINTING. 

There are many printmaking techniques to discover and we hope to explore several more this year.

 We learned how to use and care for the following tools and materials:

  • Brayers
  • Ink trays
  • Printing paper
  • Printing ink
  • 2″ squares of corrugated cardboard

Then, we playfully explored ways to make marks, lines and shapes with 2″ cardboard squares dipped in black printing ink.

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What do you do with an idea?

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We read What Do You Do With an Idea? Written by Kobi Yamada and illustrated by Mae Besom.

Then, with the art tools and materials shown above, children envisioned and expressed their ideas in many different ways. 

“What do ideas become? Big things, brave things, smart things, silly things, good things. Things like stories, artwork, journeys, inventions, communities, products and cures. Everything you see around you was once an idea.”

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The possibilities of paper

 

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Bend it, fold it, twist it, roll it, cut it, curl it.

Tie it, tape it,

Connect it together!

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About gloworm

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Dear Friends,

This was first posted on gloworm in October 2012 and still holds true! 

One of the purposes for the blog is to communicate with the Park School community about what’s happening in art in grades 1, 2 & 3. What we teach in art and why are centered around the “Studio Habits of Mind.” 

To learn and grow as artists we encourage children to explore a wide variety of art tools and materials and to practice basic skills. Investigations in two and three-dimensional art media invite children to express their thoughts, feelings and ideas in new ways.

The 8 Studio Habits of Mind*

1. Observe  – Look beyond the ordinary.  Notice things that otherwise might not be seen.

2. Develop Craft – Learn how to use art tools and materials.  Understand techniques.  Care for tools, materials and the art room.

3. Envision – Picture mentally.  Imagine possible next steps.

4. Express – Create works that convey an idea, a feeling, or a personal meaning.

5. Stretch and Explore – Reach beyond the familiar and explore playfully.  Embrace opportunities to learn from mistakes and accidents.

6. Engage and Persist – Solve problems of personal importance.  Develop focus and follow through on an idea.

7. Reflect – Question, think and talk with others about one’s work and working process.  Evaluate one’s own work and working process.

8. Understand Art in the World – Learn about art history and current practice.  Interact as an artist with other student artists.

*Adapted from Studio Thinking: The Real Benefits of Visual Arts Education, Lois Hetland, Ellen Winner, Shirley Veenema, Kimberly M. Sheridan, David N. Perkins, Teachers College Press, 2007. 

I hope you will follow “gloworm” this year! Either subscribe or bookmark mshesaltine.edublogs.org

Sincerely,

Nancye Hesaltine

 

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Exploring balance

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What do you know about balance?

Practice balance with your body.

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Choose random wood pieces. Build and balance a structure.

What does symmetrical mean?

Is the structure you built symmetrical? 

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Does a balanced structure have to be symmetrical?

Test your idea. What does asymmetrical mean?

Show how a structure can balance and be asymmetrical.

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Dream Something Big

LA Art Tour 

 pwbaker via Compfight

watts

fe2cruz via Compfight

 Simon Rodia’s Towers of Watts, Los Angeles, California

Between 1921 and 1955, Simon Rodia transformed discarded objects and a dream to “Do something big” into the Towers of Watts, now on the National Register of Historic Places.

Rodia was a pioneer of reusing materials. His story of dreaming possibilities, initiative and perseverance will inform our explorations in the art room in the coming weeks.

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