Art Gallery January 2009!!!

It is that time again! It's time to show off some work from my students! In the past couple of months, my 2nd-4th graders started a 'Watercolor Discovery' (series of projects) or PROJECT (singular) if I run out of watercolor paint and watercolor paper and thus have no way to order more supplies.

Before we began Watercolor, my 2nd-4th graders did a mosaic project that involved using the technique with paper scraps. I have a kiln at the school to fire clay and pottery, but not enough clay to start another clay series. My older kids (junior high) are asking for clay projects and I keep putting them off because of lack of clay. I'm also waiting for some glazes that were supposedly "ordered". but don't get me started on that one. Anyway....back to happy. Back to HAPPY!

Here is a couple of snapshots of the mosaics that were done when we returned from Christmas Break. These are for grades 2nd-4th. I have some others on display at the district office.


This one contains a rose made by a student named "Rose".




And as I mentioned earlier, here is the same age group working on Part I of their Watercolor Discovery. Part II comes next week when we add ink pen black outlines to portions of their masterpieces.

These pictures are from my Wednesday (1/21) 4th grade group:


Currently, my 5th-8th graders are working on a One Point Perspective project involving their own "hallway" design. I hope to have some of those gems uploaded on here in a couple of weeks when the projects materialize from preliminary light pencil sketches and "trial and error" frustrations (that we are currently dealing with) with the ruler into some fun creative hallway designs.

Speaking of hallways, the arduous campus project of murals continues. My 5th through 8th graders assist on some of the wall drawings and some blocks of color and then I polish it up. These are part of the Character Counts theme. Each trait is assigned a color (the 6 traits are: Responsibility, Fairness, Trustworthiness, Caring, Citizenship, and Respect) are the "pillars" of character and for the younger grades, those pillars are also assigned an animal. Each hallway is assigned a character trait. For the pillar, I took the artistic license to also make the pillar one of the three main Greek "orders" (Doric, Ionic and Corinthian). So far, the two hallways that are now completed are both Doric pillars, but the next one is an Ionic one and the one that follows that one is going to be a Corinthian pillar.

Here is the first one that got completed. Our "Caring" hallway. If you click on the image and zoom in, you can read the meaning behind the animal name, symbol and description of the pillar.



The second one to get finished is our Responsibility Hallway. I had one ofmy 7th grade students sketch the pillar and some others did some of the base colors on the elephant, sign and pillar, and then I polished it afterwards. My 7th grader that sketched the pillar was upset that it came out slightly uneven, but I actually preferred that, because it is still done well and it's slight imperfection is indicitive of student involvement. This school, after all, is for the kids! (though of course our lovely officials and politicians that make "make or break" decisions are often not in the best interest of the kids). I actually went in on New Year's Eve to have this Reponsibility one FINISHED finally so when we returned from the holidays, we can start fresh with a new hallway!

As I finish this entry, I have prayers in my heart (some outloud) that the 200 million proposed educational budget cuts will not come to pass to make Arizona, an already crippled state when it comes to where we are on educating our next generation, even further buried in an educational pit of despair. I know AZ isn't the only state in this lovely economy to be dealing with such potential fates on the horizon, but if this state is anything like it's been so far, counter-productiove actions by our officials (local and on the state level) will just send our education into further oblivion. I sincerely hope that isn't the case. Please continue to pray with me for the positive fate of our neighborhood's, state's and national education to prevail positively despite this tough time in our nation.

End of soapbox.