My clogged up sink

I just thought these pictures of my half-clogged sink were kind of beautiful


In a disgusting kind of way.

Working on the mural

The Art Club started painting the cafeteria mural yesterday, and so far it's going well. The students started putting in the big areas of color, and boy it is bright.



There was almost too many kids for the painting that needed to be done, but I think we found a job for everybody. I'm very excited (and a little nervous) to see how the mural turns out.

Extra special thanks to Mrs. Bird, Mrs. Mullin, and Madame Meister for donating money to buy paint.

Johnny was a race car driver...

Another animation, this one by 6th graders Kobe and Jose.

What comes around goes around

These are some of the wire sculptures that we recently completed.
Ellany and Cedric

The students wound together different thicknesses of aluminum wire to make these people, and they placed them in dynamic poses. They drew a little bit of blood, but sometimes you have to suffer a little bit for your art.

Brent and Tiara

They still have to paint the bases, but the sculptures looked so cool, I couldn't wait to get them on the website.

Leopold

I especially like Victoria's frisbee catching dog.

Get some Perspective

I know these may be kind of hard to see, and I'm sorry. One of the biggest challenges, especially with this age, is getting the kids to draw dark enough. I think it's a confidence thing.

These Tempest-like pictures are the result of our one-point perspective unit. Perspective is sometimes hard for 12 and 13 year olds to grasp, but I thought overall they did a really good job. They have kind of a Tron/The Last Starfighter vibe to them.

Leopold always puts in a little extra something.

Black, red, and yellow, black and red and yellow

Two posts in one day! What am I thinking?

These are some collages made by the 2nd graders. We looked at the work of Piet Mondrian, and talked about horizontal and vertical lines and the primary colors. The kids then cut and glued black strips of paper to some white paper.


After that, they cut out squares and rectangles from red, yellow, and blue paper and glued them inside some of the white squares and rectangles. I love to see all the different compositions that come from using such simple elements.

These were made by Shana, Michelle, Chase, Celine, Taleah, and Niam.

We're playin' bas-ket-ballll.

Another short chalkboard animation. This one is a lot smoother because we didn't bump the camera halfway through like last time. The animation was done by Leopold, with an assist from James, Cedric, and Tiara.

Shiny tops and soda pops

My first post of completed elementary school work! It's been strange this year having K-5 classes every other week instead of every week. I've had to really focus on being as efficient as possible. Anyway, the first graders went outside and collected some leaves, and we looked at all the different shapes of the leaves. Then, they traced the leaves onto a piece of paper and colored them with crayon.

They painted the background with watercolor paints, but they could only use blues and purples.

These little masterpieces were made by Weilan, Kenneth, Joseph, and Joshua.

Our first chalkboard animation. It's a little rough, but hey, we're learning. It's a really enjoyable process, but you can't mess around with it, especially in a 50 minute class.

This was co-created by Kevin and Justin, with an assist from me.

Two for One

I'll show you a couple of different projects in this post. The first pictures are from a still-life that the 7th and 8th graders drew. I set up a small scene in the middle of the room consisting of a lantern, a couple of candlesticks, a toy car, an old iron, a teapot, and either a cow skull or a cowboy hat. The students had to draw them using the contour line method.

I don't know why blogspot turns some of the pictures, and I don't know how to rotate them, so I apologize. These were made by Talissia, Kris, Leopold, and Hannah.

Here are some pieces made by the 6th graders I call Variations on a Theme. They did a two color print, a contour line drawing, a rubbing, and a metal version of some foliage. It makes for some interesting compositions.

These were made by Thearion, Hannah, and Tori.

Hey, I'm Picasso

I don't have much to say about these. I think the pictures speak for themselves. These were created by the 6th grade class and they did a wonderful job and had some dirty hands to show for it.

These were made by Hannah and Chloe.

Mattie and Taylor

and Kobe. At least one boy is representing for the male of the species.

Great job, everyone.

Blockin' out the scenery, breakin' my mind

Well here are some of the finished block prints. I was very pleased with the way these turned out. The kids were very enthusiastic and surprised at the way the prints turned out.


They did three different kinds of prints. First, an offset, seen here in the top two pictures.

They also did a print where they had to print one color going one direction, then come back and print a second color on top of the first, this time turning their design 180 degrees, as seen in the top left and right pictures here.

Finally, they printed their design over someone else's first color, as seen in the bottom right . These produced some very interesting compositions just by the overlapping of the different shapes.

Overall, it was a very successful project. The kids got to use different kinds of tools and try new techniques, and I think they enjoyed it.

I work...I get the job done.

Proof that kids do work at school


First, middle school students working on their block prints.

And some first graders working on their first project of the year, tracing the shapes of the leaves we collected earlier. See I told you I 'd have some elementary stuff soon.