Tonight, my friend and mentor Carrie Barnett took me to Neusole Glassworks for a two hour glass blowing workshop. We spent the first hour listening to the process and observing others make paper weights. After the first hour, the class was divided and her and I were alone with an instructor. We explained that we are both in visual arts and education and would LOVE to touch the work, to dip the glass, to put it into the heat, to roll it in color and to form it! We got our wish and got hot in the process, working with a material we were both unfamiliar with. Below are photos of us making the work, stay tuned for the final product (we have to wait for them to properly cool and be filed before we can pick them up so that will come later but I wanted to share this now!)

Arty On!

Gearing up for Dr. Seuss's Birthday and Read Across America, the 2nd graders were enthusiastic to make Seuss-ical fish! The students worked on this lesson for two days. The first day, the book One Fish Two Fish, Red Fish Blue Fish was read and the students were interested in the style of drawing used by Dr. Seuss. After the book was read, students were reminded (from the book) "not one thing will look like another" which was my motto for the lesson! Students were given a Sharpie and asked to draw one large fish, it could be swimming or walking, old or young, hairy or bald, their choice!
The second day, students painted horizontal lines for the background and had the option to add glitter (which most did). Our use of color was using the three primary colors because Dr. Seuss focused on primary colors often. Students cut out their fish and added details using oil pastels. We glued the fish down in the center of the page and hung them up!

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Gearing up for Dr. Seuss's Birthday and Read Across America, our kindergarteners got the chance to hear the story of The Lorax. The Lorax was chosen because it is a popular Dr. Seuss book and the movie is coming out soon and many of our students have been talking about it! I read the book to the students, which is a long story but captivated them with the rhymes and riddles. Such a fun book to read and hear! The students then worked on making 3-D Truffula Trees! I worked with two different groups of kindergarten students and each group created a different tree.
The first group used pipe cleaners and twisted them together to make a trunk that looked striped. They made 4 trees and used pom pom balls for the truffula tree tops! The base was a green piece of paper and a ball of Model Magic that the students painted green.

The second group used dowel rods painted white and they painted black stripes around them for the trunk. This group only made one tree due to drying time and assembling stages. Their truffula tree tops were made of yarn balls which were cut in different places to create a pom pom effect! Their base was also a green piece of paper and a ball of Model Magic that the students painted green.
Everyone enjoyed the project and getting to choose what bright colors to use for their trees!

Arty On! Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss!

In the spirit of Valentine's Day, the 2nd graders worked with images from Cincinnati artist Jim Dine as inspiration! Jim Dine was known well for his paintings of hearts, said to be done because he loved his wife so much! The lesson began with a discussion of Jim Dine and his use of color, our emphasis was on warm and cool colors. Each student was given one piece of cardboard. On the cardboard, students drew a heart using a Sharpie, and outlined it with glue and laid a piece of yarn on top. The students then put a large piece of aluminum foil on top of it all, able to feel the yarn, giving the work an embossed feeling. Students use a black Sharpie to divide the spaces using strong art lines (straight, curvy, curly and zig zag which is prior knowledge to them). The foreground (inside of the heart) is completed using warm colored Sharpies, where the background (outside of the heart) is completed using cool colored Sharpies. What a fun way to incorporate a local artist, holiday and new mediums for the little artists!

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_Friedensreich Hundertwasser created beautiful landscape paintings with simplified trees with a strong emphasis on shapes, lines and patterns. First grade students learned about the artist and saw some examples of his work. Our inspiration came from his tree paintings. We had two large pieces of paper, one orange and the other blue. The reason for this was to easily remind students that we were using warm colors (on the orange paper) and cool colors (on the blue paper). First, we painted five lines with each color scheme. The lines were straight, curvy, curly and zig zag which students are familiar with. Day two we added Sharpie lines in each section to further define the shapes, after, we used oil pastel to add shapes such as hearts, circles and triangles. Day Three we cut trees, flowers or bushes out of our cold paper and glued them on the warm color scheme paper. Final details were added and the projects were complete! Such beautiful patterning and color choices!

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This concludes my second week at SCPA and my first week of teaching projects from the beginning to end! I was so excited when my mentor mentioned her love for tiny little Matryoshka dolls (Russian stacking dolls). I was excited to work with her to plan this project! Several sets of Matryoshka doll examples, both 2-D and 3-D were on display for the students to see. Kindergarteners used stencils to cut out three different sized dolls. These dolls were decorated with lines, shapes and patterns. Then, they were glued together with popsicle sticks between to hold them up in their foamboard bases (making them look like large game pieces). Students chose matching eyes and cheeks from buttons and foam shapes and had a pipecleaner smile!

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As I began my student teaching, the 2nd grade class was working on a Vincent Van Gogh unit. They studied his paintings of sunflowers and recreated them. Before I got there, they had drawn them, painted the orange and yellow bright sunflowers and the blue crisp backgrounds. When I got there, we continued by making frames from newspaper and decorated them with a variety of dry noodles. After this, we used gold paint to paint the frame, making it appear to look old and 3-D like vintage frames in the art museums.

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As I began working with the 1st grade students, they were in the process of a 3-D project, using a water bottle with a newspaper ball for the head which they covered in paper mache. The bodies were painted black and the belly was white. This was when I began to work with the students on the project. Next, we added faces to the penguins and talked about finding google eyes that matched in shape, color and size. The noses were added by the teachers with hot glue and pom pom balls were added along with a pipe cleaner for earmuffs! If this wasn't cute enough, they each got to choose a fabric scarf to tie around the neck. The final detail was adding wings using black construction paper.

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As I began my student teaching, the kindergarten classes were working on a Pablo Picasso unit, with a strong emphasis on his colors and time periods using them. The project was influenced by his Rose Period so students were using red, orange, yellow, pink and peach. Since Valentine's Day is approaching, our subject was hearts. Students used paint, oil pastels, scissors, construction paper and glue!

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Today I began student teaching at School of Creative and Performing Arts (SCPA). This school is a magnet arts school in Cincinnati and part of the Cincinnati Public Schools (CPS). I am working with eighteen classes of students who I see one or two times a week depending on their grade, which ranges from kindergarten to third grade. The students audition in the third grade for majors/tracks in the remainder of their schooling. Most of my classes will have 20-27 students.

I am excited for what I will teach, learn and experience with my students.

Arty On!