Showing STEAM with Frank Stella...

Celebrating a lifetime of work
with a little bit of STEAM

Frank Stella, 1964, photo by Ugo Mulas

It is an exciting time to visit the Whitney Museum in New York City.  To begin with, the Whitney opened its doors in a new location and an amazing new building this year, bringing along the lifelong, trans-formative work of Frank Stella.

In my art class, I found this the perfect opportunity to inspire my students with Stella's early work, emphasizing a steady hand and protractors.

Along with my student teacher, we developed a lesson that challenged the students to transform a familiar analytical tool in their artwork, referencing the ideas and work of Stella.

The Venn Diagram

Frank Stella, Firuzabad, 1970 https://www.sfmoma.org/artwork/2002.9

I use Venn diagrams a lot in art class as tools for my students to organize their thoughts when analyzing artworks throughout our learning process.  These simple interconnected circles became the center of attention but in a different way.  

Along with the Retrospective of Frank Stella, November 19th, 2015 marked an incredible day for Arts Education:

In the midst of the biggest shakeup of federal education law in over a decade, Congresswoman Suzanne Bonamici 

(D-OR) successfully added an amendment today to the rewrite of the nation’s Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) legislation that will integrate the arts into STEM education (science, technology, engineering and math).

http://www.artsactionfund.org/news/entry/huge-arts-education-win-in-congress-today

What does this mean:

Art is CORE:)

"Frank Stella's 'Harran II', 1967". Licensed under Fair use via Wikipedia 

Art is a CORE subject in developing our young peoples into creative and innovative problem solvers, bringing new perspectives, ideas and solutions to, what used to be, the fundamentals of education.

It is about time.

This art unit, not only studied the work of Frank Stella, but demonstrated to my students that fine artists, like architects, designers and....doctors, all use tools to achieve the best outcome and precision, steady hands and accuracy are important attributes.

The instructional sequence was developed within a three week time frame for 4th grade (seeing the students once a week for one hour).

DAY ONE:  Investigate Frank Stella's "Protractor Series", focusing on the elements, techniques and attributes that made Stella's work special. (Shape, color, line, overlapping, precision, big)  Allow the students a little bit of "play time".  Although the students may be familiar with using a protractor, anticipate their challenges:  moving the protractor, making lines to dark, moving the protractor too little...  This time, also, helps the students evaluate their own skills and what to do to achieve their best outcome.

DAY TWO:  Designate the second day for a quick review of the day before.  My students were given a homework assignment, in which they were to compare and contrast Firuzabad with a work by Kandinsky using a Venn Diagram.  After a group discussion, I demonstrated a process of transforming the Venn Diagram into something extraordinary.  I emphasized the process of overlapping to be simple and visually to appear consistent.  Erasing the overlapping shapes demonstrated to be a consistent challenge, but students found their way to working through the problem.

DAY THREE:  The last day focused on choosing a color scheme and piecing together our drawings with color.  I took the time to demonstrate using our color choices to complete our designs, emphasizing overlapping by deciding whether colors will "go over, or under" each other.  There was sense of hesitation at this stage in the project because the students expressed their confusion amongst all the intersecting lines.  BUT...it, really, all came together for them when they were filling in their colors.

The results were fantastic!  Most importantly, the students felt proud about what they accomplished.

These are just a couple of examples.  More of my students work (and works in progress) can be seen at

https://instagram.com/p/-R0d57O2HR/?taken-by=sanborn_smockroom

The resources and complete lesson is available HERE :)

xoxo, Smock you.

First Grade and Ellsworth Kelly

Exploring Shapes and Colors 

with 

Ellsworth Kelly

in First Grade

First grade brings a wonderful sense of exploration and play to the art room.  These young students are eager to manipulate materials and seek out answers.  They bring a great energy to the room every week.  An on going theme throughout the year, is exploring various artists by following the story of Anna's Art Adventure.  

With adventure books in hand, we start with the work of contemporary artist Ellsworth Kelly with his simple, yet grand shapes and colors.  

The instructional sequence allows the students to play and explore geometric shapes and primary colors, using few methods of learning.  The year long goal for these young students is them to develop the initial skills and vocabulary in their art-learning and art-making.
For this particular lesson, the goal was for students to demonstrate their understanding of these simple shapes through identification, description and production.

The process was, also, my way of learning more about these students individual needs, their individual skills and their level of development in regards to introductory skills, such as, tracing, cutting, 

coloring, and painting.  

(After all, they are 6 years old and this is their first formal art education class.)
These snapshots illustrate the instructional sequence.  The sequence offered my students opportunities to explore, play and create, while building analytical skills, fine motor skills and art vocabulary.

Thanks for dropping by.

For the lesson click here:)

xoxo, Smock Room

modern twists....

Looking at the Art of Suzan Shutan....

in second grade

A component to the second grade curriculum engages my students in the theme of community.  Much needed, this theme builds on several important and vital skills in today's world:  cooperation and collaboration.

All that is great but we are dealing with 8 year olds.  Engagement and interest are key elements for creating an environment for 2nd graders to build and grow these skills.  They also need to feel like it is fun.

As their art teacher, I search out new  and exciting artists that will capture the attention of these wonderful students, while "teaching them a lesson".  I came across Suzan Shutan in my search (I can't remember if it was on Pinterest or just a Google search-but I found her).  She is an installation artist!  How often do you use one of those in your classroom?

I was inspired to by her Tar Roofing Paper installations in which thousands of paper are looped to created wonderful undulating designs across walls, floors and ceilings.

I thought to myself, "Well, isn't this just perfect".
"What if all 2nd grade students worked collaboratively towards creating large hanging paper installations in the style/work of Suzan Shutan?"

And that is what we did.



Along the way we had to learn something and along the way we had to use some critical thinking skills.  I created a "sub-lesson" (meaning a lesson within a lesson) for my students to look beyond just rolling paper and explore these installations with an imaginative, exploratory eye (or eyes).

In connection with Suzan Shutan's modern work, I introduced my students to the folk art of quilling.  We looked at the process of quilling in comparison to the process of Suzan Shutan.  With many different examples, we focus on a more contemporary approach to the folk art and reflected on different ways to combine the two.



The results were magical.

Groups of students worked very diligently for an hour, rolling a gluing strips of pre-cut, colorful construction paper.  Everybody had a role, and everybody lent a hand.

These wonderful installations were hung in our school's hallways, receiving amazing reviews by staff, parents and students.

Find the lesson here:)

xoxo, Smock Room

Pi Day.....

a delicious celebration

I really could not resist today:)

As I sip on coffee and indulge in a little sweet treat of the day, I thought to the beloved artist Wayne Thiebaud and his delicious renditions of pies (and cakes).

 I think it is something about how Thiebaud sculpts with paint that really makes me love him.  

Whitney Collection

So indulge a little today and celebrate with a little pie or Pi.     

Resources:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vI_QJ5D9Qm8

          

http://www.nga.gov/kids/interactive/cake.htm

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9QwWpvxQ3ls

Wayne Thiebaud art lesson.

Hani's Cake...click on the picture for Instagram feed

xoxo, SMocK you.

                                

Contemporary Inspirations for 6th grade Art Projects...

"It was hard to find that perfect word." ~Bobby

Every year I make an effort to create new projects for my 6th grade students, that are new and fresh and contemporary.  Primarily,  I want grasp their attention and then hold on to them, for as long as possible.  A challenge, to say the least.  So....Here goes something....

As all other years, the central theme to the 6th grade art curriculum is "Identity", answering the bigger question "Who am I?"  It's interesting, with all that 6th graders have to say, this question brings a hush over the room (along with some confused looks).  Throw in taking their pictures and they are just about to scream out of anguish and agony.  

I found this amazing photography project that sparked my interest and motivated me to find a way to use the idea of photography and text for the students first project.  The Identity Project: What defines you was the perfect connection (with some slight modifications). 

 The Identity Project: 

"This photography project seeks to explore the labels we choose to identify with when defining our gender and sexuality."  Intriguing but, not entirely appropriate for 6th graders, or my school in general.   BUT, most definitely adaptable for encouraging my students to reflect on their unique characteristics that make each of them special.

 I can't begin to try and explain ARTY FEMME to a group of 6th graders, but we can take a look at their photographs (without the label) and study their characteristics.  With descriptive words, we can 'label' their identity, explore their personality and breakdown some stereotypes.   

Our goal, for this component of the lesson was to take a picture and with one, unique word, capture their identity.

Taking the pictures was not all that challenging, but figuring out the most unique word, was.  My challenge was trying to encourage my students to think outside the box, get out of their comfort zone and think...just a little bit about their internal selves.  

WOW....like....what was I thinking?

Along the way, I was skimming through Facebook and took notice of a post from a long distance friend and her recent artwork: Define Me.  The theme related completely to my students' theme but I found a way to connect their word choice to their art.  Stacy Gibboni used words to emphasize word choice and the lack of words.  So, simple but amazingly powerful.  

Well.

That is what we did.

But how....how was I suppose to encourage my students to put aside common words, "nice", "funny", "smart" and rethink word choice.  

We used dictionaries.

A blast from the past but WOW, it demonstrates how technology, spell check and auto correct have hindered our students' ability to spell.  Not surprising, this activity took a little longer than expected, but the results were incredible.

The goal for component number 2 was to choose 6 different words that "define you" and be able to express why.  In doing so, create 6 different little drawings expressing the word choice, using two elements of art: color and shape.  Sounded simple enough, but I quickly observed the students mindful attention to the connection between drawing and word choice.

Simple tools and materials made the art project more engaging and the students felt a little more independent.  My students used 4x6 inch pieces of paper, traced a 31/2x 31/2 square template and used oil pastels for their drawing and word.

The concluding component to this lesson was a written and typed reflection statement, targeting specific questions about the students' processes and thinking.
The results were thoughtful, reflective and honest.
...And impressive.

This was only a small caption to an 8 week project. 

 It made my students think. 

 It made my students reflect.  

"It makes me feel happy to know about myself more."~Crystal

Check out the power point to this lesson!

SMocKyou.