Monday, August 13, 2012

Back to School!

Today was our first day back to school at Carroll. It was so nice to know so many of the students' names already! I think my second year is going to be easier than my first.

One of my 5th grade students is already counting down to summer. I have a board in my room with Week 1 through 36 listed all the way down the side so I can post the "Artist of the Week" each week, and she saw it and said, "this is week one....so....only 35 more weeks of school! Yay!"

After my "intro to art" talk today, I introduced my students to 3 artists with distinctive styles: Van Gogh, Vermeer, and Hokusai. After I helped the students discover what is unique about each artist's style (such as Van Gogh's brush strokes), I gave each student a postcard-sized picture of a work by one of the 3 artists. They had to identify the artist and put the picture on the board with a magnet by the correct artist's name. It went pretty well.

Afterwards, depending on if we had time left, I let the students draw a little. I told them they could draw anything they wanted, but that they should tell something about themselves in their picture. Vermeer tells us that he pays attention to details; Hokusai tells us that he is Japanese; and Van Gogh tells us that his favorite colors are blue and yellow. I told the students that they could share their favorite color in their picture, or tell about their favorite sport or favorite pet, etc. I had one student in 1st grade who was a move-in (she attended a different school last year) who traced her hand and made a turkey. *Sigh*....but she'll learn soon enough the different between real art and cutesy crafts.

1 comment:

  1. Maybe she was trying to tell you that she is a turkey. Or that her favorite holiday is Thanksgiving. :)

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