Art Teachers Playing Around...

About a month ago, three art teachers packed up a Subaru and headed to 

Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville for the annual Art Education Conference.

And it was fabulous.  

We talked, just about everything on the ride down, and sang to our hearts out, on the way home but before that we were leaders.  We held workshops and presentations.  We shared our accomplishments, techniques, lessons, ideas, email addresses and we felt a community start to grow.

It was invigorating discussing art education trends, theories, philosophies...

It was fabulous.

But on the first hot day of the season and as the trees were in full bloom, 
the most fabulous time was when we paused.

I sat with one of the most energetic, driven and passionate art teachers (yes, you Jil) and sat....

I sat

and enjoyed a cup of coffee, outside, in the sunlight.

We took off our shoes, and it felt good.  We took a walk and just talked about...well...everything.
As we walked through the campus we came across an amazing sculpture, constructed out of big bold colorful Lego blocks, titled:
The Importance of Play
















  
  

This sculpture steered our conversation towards our own art-making and the issue of "playing around".

As art teachers, we thought, "how often do we gather to just make art?" 
Not for samples in our classrooms, not to engage in a discussion about practice, not to collect our professional development credits....
but to just make art.
...to just be in a space with individuals who inspire creativity, think big and laugh a lot.



Not very often.  In fact prior to this conference I held a workshop for art teachers at my school, in which I had planned the activities as to show that this is a 'valid professional development experience' (said in a very serious voice).
Yet, I threw my plan out the window because I realized we (the collective participants) didn't need another lesson at 5 o'clock on a Thursday evening.  They needed to pause, to have a slice of pizza and to play.


It felt really good.



















 So, take 20 minutes to play:
doodle
paint
draw
color
sculpt

Anywhere and everywhere.

I did and I ended up like this:

...and made something like this...

xoxo, Smock you.

Following the Smock Room...

I am super excited to see so many people reading my posts!
The best way to keep up with what is happening in the Smock Room is by checking out sanborn_smockroom.

It's a daily feed on the daily activities in my classroom!

Thanks a bunch!

xoxo, Smock Room.

Νικηφόρος Λύτρας...

Celebrating Tradition

While sipping my coffee on this Orthodox Easter Sunday, I began to think about tradition and the importance of holding on to history.  A simple red egg upholds more than just dye.  

It's a symbol of tradition, belief and history.

Greek artist, Nikiforos Lytras, captures the magic of the red egg in this painting.

Το παιδί (The Child or The Easter Egg)

Καλό Πάσχα

xoxo, SMocK you.

Crime Scene Investigators on the job....4th grade

Magnifying observations.....

"This was fun!"~Edward

Encouraging students to sit and look at art can be daunting, at times.  What do we ask?  How do we encourage?  How do we build a lively discussion about a painting?  Questions like these probably reflect a lot of art teachers and classroom teachers sentiments.  You are not alone!

What needs to be remembered is the acts of observation, investigation, reflection and evaluation are skills that students need time to learn, practice and develop....and the younger the better!

Prior to the year starting, I developed a set of cards (that I have yet to name properly), each focusing on the set skills for the development of visual literacy across all grade levels.  These cards can be used numerous different ways.  My brainstorming led to a modification of an idea I found on Pintrest that suggested ways students can investigate informational text.  I have to be honest, I didn't go any further than looking at the picture, but it did sparked an idea of another way to encourage my students to look  and respond to an artwork.

from converstations in literacy blog

There is a big buzz right now about getting kids to think more.  Common Core State Standards says so. (jk-but only a little) This is a great idea but how do we get them to think more (and just think, in the art room), without losing their interest and attention?  In answering this question, I experimented a little bit with my colorful cards and the art wheel to see just how much it would take for 4th grade students to independently investigate various paintings.  It really didn't take much.  I gave each 'investigator' his own magnifying glass for "reminding you to look closer at the little details" and the spinner on the Art Wheel was encouragement enough!

example: The Surrender at Breda--Velasquez

Here's what I did:

 I selected paintings that had action.  As I was searching through dozens of images, I focused on paintings that expressed "something happening".  Six different paintings were distributed to my six groups.  Along with the art reproductions, I distributed the necessary materials (see below).

The students' first job was to scan the art work from top to bottom, side to side and corner to corner for one minute. Then, each student took a turn spinning the red arrow on the Art Wheel and stopping on one of the four colors.  Each color notes a different category in quadrant of the circle, prompting each student in the group to answer a different question.  The varying questions opened lively and often loud conversations among all groups.  It was really great to see the students make strong statements and defend their thoughts with passion and conviction.  As each student was answering the question, they wrote their answers with a marker of the same color from their category.  Eventually the laminated poster board filled with thoughts and reflections, but also with criticisms and suggestions from other responses.

AWESOME! Everyone had something to say.  The biggest challenge....stopping them.

Watch a quick Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3wT1XGKuEHI&feature=youtu.be

Materials:

art reproductions

laminated white poster board

water soluble markets (Fiddle Stixs: pink, purple, green, light blue)

Visual Literacy Cards (I named them:))

 Visual Literacy Cards-- get yours here!

Art Wheel

Magnifying glasses (optional--but totally worth it)

Toward the end of the hour, we stopped to re-group as a class and discuss what we discovered about our responses and the responses of our peers.  The students found it insightful and said it was 'neat' being able to add to other peoples answers.  In the end...."This was fun".  I guess, I didn't lose their attention.

A quick favor, if you reading this post and have enjoyed other posts please follow me....it's just one little click.  Thanks!

xoxo, SMocK you.