DOT DAY!

Students celebrated International Dot Day the week of September 15th! International Dot Day is a global celebration of creativity, courage, and collaboration. Students were read The Dot by Peter H. Reynolds and then created dot inspired artwork!! Every grade created a different dot project. It was so inspiring to see their creativity flourish! Here are some photos of the bulletin boards created for dot day:

And here are some of the projects that students created:

First Grade: Students painted primary and secondary colored dots on their paper with watercolor paint, and then did printmaking on top of their paintings by dipping a cardboard tube into black paint and printing circles!

Second Grade: Students created a dot on their paper using negative space. They left a white circle (negative space) on their paper and then painted around the circle with abstract or realistic watercolor paintings! Students also painted paper plates and created circle loom weavings inspired by this post from Cassie Stephens: http://cassiestephens.blogspot.com/2014/04/in-art-room-circle-loom-weaving-with.html

            

Third Grade: Students were introduced to the artist Kandinsky and created layered concentric paper circles which they glued on their paper. Then they added dots and circles on top with oil pastel and then painted more circles and dots on top with watercolors!

 

Fourth Grade: Students created Impressionist paintings inspired by the art of Georges Seurat. Students created a painting of their choice using qtips to paint with. Their dotty masterpieces turned out great!

 
 

Fifth Grade: Students learned about the art of Aboriginal Dot Painting from Australia. They created their very own unique dot painting in the Aboriginal style using neutral colors and q-tips to create the dots!

Thanks and have a colorful day!!

~Miss Flood

New year, new school!

I am SO excited to be starting a new chapter in life! I have started in a new teaching position in Woodstock CUSD 200, and I am thrilled to be teaching art to grades 1-5 in a great district that is much closer to home. I am very excited to see what this year will bring!

I also completed my Adobe Education Trainer course, and am excited to share my official badge and certificate :)

Thanks!
~Katie

AOE Conference, MI Vacation, Adobe T4T Update, and BOOKS!

Hey there!
     So the AOE Conference was last week, and it was AMAZING! It was such a breath of fresh air to be able to attend a conference from home. I was actually on vacation with my family in Michigan, and thanks to WiFi I was able to participate in the Art of Education online conference from our beautiful vacation home in the Upper Peninsula! Here a few pics from the trip:

                         

        

Eagle's nest!!

 

 

 

                  

 

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Now for the conference recap!

There were so many great presentations!! In the first half of the conference I learned about new ways to use songs and (silence!) in the art room, teaching art online, teaching 21st Century Color (what IS magenta?! :), the importance of pulling from popular culture to drive student choices, making clay, giving simple and authentic feedback (great ideas for formative assessments and using QR codes & video for feedback), and tips for managing temporary and shared spaces. After a short break, the second half of the conference started off with a bang: a hands-on project!! Selfies! :) Blick Art Materials  http://www.dickblick.com/ put on a hands-on workshop titled: Selfies-Student Self-Portraits. Here's mine: 

I was so fun to MAKE some art, and it gave me great ideas for new projects in my classroom!

After the selfie project, I watched presentations on choosing a tech-free art room (Cassie Stephens is super fun http://cassiestephens.blogspot.com/), using an iPad app called Sketchbook Express (very cool!), Evernote, an inspiring presentation by Malcom McCrae, a great guide to the first day of school, teaching peace and keeping peace, infusing contemporary art into the K-12 curriculum, collaborating with sister schools, success before the mess, and a printmaking curriculum for 1-5 that built upon each grade level. 

OH, and I had posted a pic of my swag box to the AOE FB page and it was featured at the conference!! 

Overall, it was a wonderful conference and I can't wait to attend again next year!! http://www.theartofed.com/

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I've been taking an Adobe Education course called Train the Trainer, and I have been learning so much! I am really finding the discussions on creativity in education very informative and interesting. So far we have learned about several Adobe products: Apps for Education,  Acrobat, and Photoshop. This week we will be introduced to Illustrator. If you haven't yet, check out the Adobe Education Exchange for FREE and USEFUL Professional Development. https://edex.adobe.com/

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Finally, I wanted to share the AMAZING amount of books I got at the local library book sale!

Every summer the Algonquin Public Library has a Friends of the Library book sale. http://www.aapld.org/ Well, if you go on Sunday it's half off their already great prices... I got these 30, that's right 30, books for $3.50!!! How incredible is that?!! I was super excited to find some Peter H. Reynolds books, art and artist books, and a book by one of my favorite illustrators, David Catrow. I cannot wait for the school year to start so I can share these books with my students!!

Thanks and have a colorful day!

~Miss Flood