Digital Art Open!

This week first through fourth grades are reintroducing the painting studio through watercolors and watercolor pencils.  The kids were having a great time writing secret messages to each other with white crayons and giving them to each other to paint and see the message.

Students help each other tie aprons.

We went over specifically cleaning up routines for painting, since we are "real" artists and have to clean up after ourselves in the Dragonfly Studio!  The students enjoyed painting my arm to test the cleanliness of their paintbrush washing.

I also am introducing the digital art studio, in which I have created a wall on Symbaloo for the students to access art websites using our two new computers.  The idea with TAB is for students to become "experts" in studios and eventually begin teaching and helping each other in different studios while I circulate and interact with students both individually and in groups.  This philosophy allows each student to work individually.  Our goal is to clean up in time to share our discoveries and difficulties during class.  Sometimes we have suggestions to help each other problem solve or sometimes students have discovered a way to work through their issue and want to share the experience. 

I have also made a couple of adjustments for next quarter.  For quarter 2, students are required to create two W.O.W. pieces before December 13, 2013.  A couple students have already submitted one!  This allows students time to experiment with art materials that I introduce before committing to a W.O.W. piece.  Students will also only be able to submit individual artworks for W.O.W. pieces for quarter 2.  

Students have also been enjoying a slide show on the Smartboard of our Pecatonica Elementary school gallery on Artsonia!  Be sure to leave comments!  Young artists love praise for their work!

 I think Art is Awesome, too!

It's amazing when third grade boys are so immersed in creating, they don't notice me taking pictures!

A Grant from the IRTAF!

This week the Dragonfly Studio was the proud recipient of a grant from the Illinois Retired Teachers Association Foundation towards the purchase of two digital cameras and a version of Photoshop Elements!  We were selected as one of "a few" out of 75 applicants!  During Mrs. Lagerhausen's class, a representative  came and presented us with the check.  I look forward to opening a digital photography studio with our fourth grade students soon!

I also had the pleasure of assisting Ms. Durand with the students singing the Star Spangled Banner at the Pecatonica Indians football game Friday night!

We opened the painting studio this week, but have limited it to watercolors at this point.  Students are working on responsibility of setting up and cleaning up after themselves, just as "real" artists do! Cleaning up after overselves has been our biggest challenge this far, however I am optimistic we will get into the routine soon! 

I am working on getting images uploaded to Artsonia as quickly as I can.  I have a wonderful parent volunteer that has been helping me, as many students waited until the last week to submit their first W.O.W. pieces.  My hope is they will become more staggered as the year goes on and the students learn the process of TAB more.  The feedback from students has been very positive!  Make sure to leave comments on your students artwork and share with family and friends!  They love feedback!

October, here we come!

Students have had a great time exploring the drawing, inspiration and collage studios in the Dragonfly Studio!

The tessellations have been a big hit!  Think of them as a stencil drawing puzzle!  The fourth grader above is making his tessellation piece 3D!  How creative!

Many students are finishing their W.O.W. pieces for the first quarter, which are due Friday!  (This does not apply to kindergarten.). Be sure to check out our Artsonia gallery!  Join our students' fan clubs and leave them comments on their artwork!  Artists love feedback!

We also experimented with chalk pastels (very messy and very fun!).  Love her use of blending colors!

My fourth grade "special project" group created a web as a team building activity on Friday, which led into the concept of "One Well."  All of the water on earth comes from "one well."  What can we do to conserve and protect that well?  They are working collaboratively creating posters to hang around the school promoting water conservation!  What an awesome group!

Special Project Group First Meeting

We had a great first meeting with my 4th graders Special Project Group!  We discussed ways to save water and did a variety of activities.  We ended the hour with an un ordinary coloring sheet, which I think was the kids favorite part!

The app is called colAR mix.  The bird is free, but to get access to the other pages, it's a $2.99 fee.  Works best with leaving the background white.  The group was pretty impressed!  I look forward to our next meeting! 

Happy Peace Day!

For the third year, Pecatonica Elementary students participated in the International Peace Day!  During art last week, students created pinwheels and listened to The Peace Book by Todd Parr.

Here are all the pinwheels in the display case waiting to be "planted!"

This morning, all of the students planted their pinwheels in front of the school for "whirled" peace!

I even took a little video of the peaceful pinwheels spinning in the wind....

Ask your child what peace means to them tonight!  Their answer might surprise you!

Pinwheels for Peace and Cool FREE stuff!

The children have been hard at work on their couple of "have to" projects for me this week!  After watching the video of Todd Parr reading his book, The Peace Book, we decorated pinwheels.  On Friday, September 20th, we will plant our pinwheels in front of the school to celebrate the International Peace Day on the 21st!  The past two years, we have been featured on the 5 and 6 o'clock WREX 13 news!

Mr. Dale delivered us a box today that contained a bunch of FREE art supplies from Sargant Art Supplier!  We love free stuff! 

First Full Week!

We have had a great start to the school year in the Dragonfly Studio!  The kids are excited at the freedom to create and are eager to earn more studios to open!  I decided to have a modified choice for kindergarten classes at individual tables instead of the full studios.  

Students started making their Idea books  to travel and sketch or write artistic ideas in to bring to class and their portfolios, which will house W.O.W. projects until the art show in the spring.

We also had a wonderful Back to School

Party provided by our PTO on Tuesday evening. Our fabulous firefighters even came out and cooled off our kids on the hottest day of the year!

Hope everyone has a great 3 day weekend!