'I Love My State', Inspired by Minnesota Artist, Adam Turman

I am so excited to do this Art To Remember project with. my 4th and 5th grade students this year. I am teaching students in-person as well as online. It has been a tricky balance (maybe balance is the wrong word, because... I don't feel balanced right now). I was excited to create a lesson inspired by a local Minnesota Artist named Adam Turman. He is really well known to our local area. His work is so bold and impressive that it could be inspiration for classes in any location while working on this lesson.

Here is how I introduced this lesson to my students (both online and in-person).

That led into showing this 'lesson video' in portions over the next couple of weeks. 

As I always have, I am presenting the lessons to my students on a smart TV in the front of the room. I'm glad to have this in my practice already... this is also how I present the lessons to my at home learners. This first lesson was created using Adobe SPARK. You can see that I broke down the steps into time.  See our State/District has allowed families to move into and out of Distance Learning at two points in the year. I need to keep all my students at the same point to easily bring them into and out of both platforms of learning. So, I would teach in person a week and then edit the times and how far the classes got... then I would share the lesson with my Distance Learning students. 

Adobe Spark is awesome... but it has one flaw that I couldn't get over. I like to show videos in chunks. I know Google Slides allows me to do this. I can edit and show only a portion of a video... so that is why I switched back to Google Slides (Slides is such a great platform). So, here was the lesson for day two. You can see that I'm able to gather students examples. This has been helpful (I hope) for the kids at home.

Moving into week three, we are really starting to see the product develop. Students are bringing their own supplies and tool boxes to create an environment where less materials are shared to reduce germ sharing as well. You can see that they are using different mediums to create their work. I love this! It gives choice. 

The final week of working was when the kids created their unique backgrounds. On a normal year I would have had them paint their backgrounds. This year, I'm just not ready for that yet. I need to figure out the logistics of painting and sharing supplies and NOT stressing myself out.  I hope to be able to 'get there' this year. 

Here are a couple of awesome works from my classes.  I hope the families love them as they make their way home this school year.

Brushes Redux Ornament

For the last week, I have been teaching my 2nd through 5th graders an introduction to an App Called Brushes Redux. It's my favourite free drawing app by far. I love putting this app in my student's hands so if they want to download it at home, there is no charge. 

This lesson was very focused on a couple of technology systems.  I believe you don't teach an App, you teach the systems the app uses. In this case, the BIG one is using layers.  Layers will be found in any Art based program such as illustrator, photoshop, and so on... if students as young as 8 can start learning the power of layers, they can have higher success later in their education career when they are in classes such as media and TechEd in our district. 

The lesson above is what was taught to the kids. It will most certainly have to be paused if used, I go through the information fast.  Every student was amazed and focused during. When you listen to the way I taught, think of what other subjects you could create with your students as the school year continues. Trust me, your kids will love this app (and so will you).

Sewing a Recorder Case

As I mentioned in a previous post, I'm presenting at the Wisconsin Art Education Conference Oct. 25th and 26th. I'm very excited to have the opportunity to present on several topics. One workshop I will be teaching is "How to Make a Recorder Case". I did this with my 4th graders last year and I have been asked several times to provide details for the lesson. I have put together a lesson that is student ready.

A lot of my Teachers Pay Teachers lessons are a PDF when downloaded, and then bring you to a Google Slideshow. This slideshow is divided into 5 parts. 

1) Supplies (one of the slides is shown above)

2) Preparation, what the teacher needs to do to prep for this lesson

3) Student Samples (one slide is shown below)

4) Instructional Videos, there are five of them listed below

5) Final Steps  

The videos that are included are also divided into segments of this lesson. 

1) Threading a needle

2) Practice Sewing

3) Drawing a Pre Plan

4) Sewing Shapes

5) Closing up the Recorder Case

These videos are recorded directly above the hands so students are able to get a clear picture of the instructions. The videos have good lighting and audio. They are designed to show students directly.

I have added this lesson to Teacher Pay Teachers to share with you. I'm excited to share that I will be throwing a sale on this item and many of the others that I'm presenting on in Wisconsin on Oct. 24 and 25th.  Be sure to visit than for the 'best deals'!

Family Portrait Lesson Plan

Today I am presenting at The Art of Education, #ArtEdNow, an online conference for Art Educators featuring Artist and Art Educators. It's specific PD for Arts Education. That is why I love it, it's presenting to my TRIBE!! 

This conference I will be presenting on family portraits.  This lesson is an opening for a big question, What is Family?  It became more than just a pretty picture and more of a conversation between my students identifying the fact that EVERY family looks different. It was a powerful lesson.

If you are attending the conference today, I'm sure your head is swimming with ideas from all the amazing presenters.  I gave you lot's of tips and tricks that worked well in my classroom for this lesson. Most often when I present, teachers want to get ahold of the resources I used.  In this case, one resource is the Hair Reference Sheet. Because we were drawing Dad's in some of the family portraits, we had to talk about how to draw beards. Also, there are so many more hairstyles than what we see in the classroom, so I designed a sheet focused on different ways to create hair. I also spent a lot of time customizing my instruction to individual instruction with this lesson. I have provided this resource sheet on Teachers Pay Teacher if you are interested, click here for the Hair Reference Sheets. 

I also created the lesson itself. Take a look at the following video to get a short overview of what this lesson looks like.

Most of my lessons are in slide format so you are ready to present this via projection. In this case, I have some slides for students and others for teachers. The blue slides are tips, tricks, and things to consider when you are preparing and teaching this lesson. The white slides are instructions for students, prompts for them, students samples to discuss and the steps to create this final product. I took the time to make this lesson great because it's one that I will be teaching over and over for many years to come... it's that powerful.  I don't often repeat lessons, but I will need to for this one. It's a treasure. If you are interested in this lesson plan, please click here for the Family Portrait Lesson Plan.

If you want both, I have created my very first bundle. This is both the Family Portrait Lesson Plan and Hair Reference Sheets for a reduced price. Click here to go to the bundle. 

Inspiration from Lauren Lowen

I recently shared a lesson about drawing characters using illustrators as inspiration. I mentioned Lauren Minco Lowen who I found on Instagram. She is represented by a group called Jennifer Nelson's Artist.  Amazing work and inspiration from this group.  The thing is, I shared some of our works with Lauren tagged on the images on Instagram, she responded...

Now, I have had Artist respond before with a 'good job' or 'awesome work'... That usually makes the kids day to know that a famous working Artist out there is commenting on their work. Lauren went a little above and beyond that single comment.

This lovely lady chose to send my students a note and a BUNCH of mini artworks to share with them. They were amazed! They were excited! They were inspired even more!   Look at the kind words that she wrote to my group of kiddos...

Isn't this what we tell our kids all the time?? All subjects are important, practice makes us better, you can be and do anything you want when you grow up. WOW! She sums it all up right here. I also like how Lauren explains what an illustrator is and how you can become one. 

So allow me to publically Thank Miss Lauren Lowen once again for supporting the arts, for communicating with our school, and for being an inspiration to both me and my students! 

Character Illustrations

Last year my 4th-grade students had a lot of fun becoming illustrators for their last project. I wanted to share the video lesson along with the so many tips, tricks, and project samples in this post.

I have always been impressed with Illustrators! I have found inspiration by looking at books, posters, and magazines... but nowadays, I used social media to find my inspiration. I wanted to create a lesson that would allow my students to become an Illustrator by creating a character of their own.

We first looked at inspiration.  While in Seattle for the NAEA 2018 conference, my buddy and I went into a store called Sloth vs Robot. It was filled with the Artwork and products from local Artist to Seattle. I adored it and bought several products from the shop to bring home to my kids. One of the items was a t-shirt featuring the Artist Lauren Rudeck or La Ru as she signs her work. This T-shirt put this lesson plan into action!

Then I saw the work of Lauren Minco Lowen on Instagram. She is represented by a group called Jennifer Nelson's Artist.  You want to find some fun inspiration... start there. Anyway, Laurens work was perfect for the direction I was going to take this lesson.  She creates characters with lots of personality, expression, color, and texture.  Everything I wanted my young artist to bring into their own work. Read about how Lauren responded on this link after July 22nd.

I started by asking my students to brainstorm an idea for their character.  I suggested that the character had to be an animal. I only gave them 10-12 minutes to do this in.  That allowed for my students to have enough time to get one drawing on their paper and for some... it was many character ideas.  I emphasized simplicity and texture.   At the end of the brainstorm, they were allowed to go around and ask their friends, "What would you vote for?" Many students used this peer critique to guide them to make a decision.  Once they had the idea solidified I explained that they would be creating this same character over and over using the same shape. They also were to come up with different expressions and different 'extras'. I explained the extras to be a tie, scarf, hat... something that will make each character unique. With the remaining time, the students continued to sketch in their sketchbooks.

The next class, I gave each of the students a rectangle piece of paper that was 1/4 of the sized of their page.  I explained that they were to draw and cut the tracer into a shape that would be cutting the least of paper off.  I wanted the largest shape they could make... I showed them examples as well. This became the outline of the character space. Then they took the same tracer paper and drew the shape of their head for their character they then traced a head shape in each of their shapes. The next step was to give each of their characters expression and extras. For most students, this took up the whole hour.

  

  

In the final day, students were able to outline and color their characters. They then cut the shape out and laid out their composition. Once they had a good composition, they glued them on tight.

I used this work of art for Prairie View Elementary's Art Show through Artomè.

Underwater Clay Sculptures

This 4th Grade, Underwater Sculpture is not nearly as amazing in the photographs as they are in real life.  I adore this project that Tracy Hare created with our students this year for Clay Week 2018. To see all the projects, please click here. 

Tracy and I are from Minnesota and both of us went to Florida for Spring break with our families (not together). She must have been inspired, and so was I. I had plans to do some observational drawing with shells and she had plans to make this sea life sculpture with our 4th grade. I was able to share my shells and some texture tools with her as she instructed this lesson plan. 

Again, the base of this project was a pinch pot... Oh, the many things you can do with a pinch pot. The additive sculpture on top was what set this work of art apart from the rest. She had them creating seashells, seaweed, starfish and even mermaids.  There was so much choice within the theme that every one of these projects looks different. 

The finishing steps were once again similar to the younger grades work, (see previous post). We used the semi-moist tempera cakes to add the color and a pearl or a glitter finish (videos can be found on the 1st and 3rd-grade clay week posts) to seal their project. The students have lot's to be proud of. The projects are turning out amazing.