If you follow my Pinterest Board, you would have noticed among the 13,000+ pins, a large amount of pigs being pinned. You might remember last year at about this time, there was a bunch of monsters being pinned... That was to prepare me for my Monster Mediums that are hanging in my room right now... and the pigs are preparing me for next year...
I'm excited to introduce you to #ProcessPigs ! This is part of my Summer Goals for 2015. I will be creating pigs with many mediums and many different processes. I will be documenting the process and again, having the students learn about each pig created throughout the year as a warm-up. The goal is to have students understand the what the word process is, but more so, to let them become excited for trying different process in art.
My friends would laugh at me pinning or picking pigs as a subject. I grew up on a farm and I'm not really an 'animal person' as you find in the suburbs where I live now. I have friends who dress their dogs up, bring them to Starbucks, and let them sleep with them at night. I have NO problem with this in anyway, shape or form... it's just so not me. I enjoy the love people have for their animals. Anyway, why pigs? Because it starts with 'P'. I don't have to be in love the the subject to be in love with the process.
Another Process Pig!! This was really fun because I made it a bit surreal. Do you know what surreal means? Surrealism is a type of art that looks like it comes from a dream. In your dreams images are kind of real, but kind of not. For example, I made these pigs really round like a balloon. They seem to be floating in the air. The landscape looks real and pigs are real but you usually don't see pigs floating like balloons in the sky. That's that part that makes this Surreal.
Before I made this artwork, I practiced making pigs. I recorded the process of using oil pastel to make a pig.
When I was making the artwork you see on the wall, I took pictures along the way. First, I drew VERY light to show where the pigs would be and the landscape. It's so light, you might not even be able to see the drawing. Can you?
I started with the sky. I was thinking of a sunset so I used peach and yellow for the sky. After coloring the oil pastels, I blended the colors together.
It took LOTS of layers to make the landscape below. I used lot's layers of colors to make the ground.
Then the PIGS!! These pigs were a lot of fun adding all the colors and blending. They each ended up with their own personality.
The final work of art was framed behind glass and is ready to hang up in the classroom.
Today on Everyday Art Room I'm sharing how we have so many things to cover as Visual Arts Teachers, sometimes it's hard to know what to focus on. For many years now, I have worked on one small aspect, one concept, and made it so big that ALL students will know that term or that idea or concept for the rest of their lives.
Here is a little more about the Monster Mediums! (Click Here)
Want to see more about the Bit-O-Bios?? Here ya go!
Or how about Process?? Is Process what you want your kids to truly understand?? Here's how I focused on that small concept in a big way. Check out my Process Pigs by clicking here.
Tag me on social media to share what concept you are focused on this year. I would love to see what you are doing to make that small idea into a Big Deal in your classroom!
Twitter chats can be a great way to connect professionally with other educators. It is an activity that I have found so beneficial and want to invite you to give it a try. Here are a couple things that you need to know to give Twitter a try. If I lose you on any of these terms, check out the Twitter Help Center by clicking here.
1: You need to start a Twitter Account:
When starting an account you will have to decide what you want your Twitter username to be. This is what people will call you on Twitter so choose wisely. I would stay with a short name and one that is near and dear to your heart... You'll never guess that mine is @MiniMatisse
In addition to your username, you have to come up with a short description of yourself. This you can always add to. You can keep it as simple or as descriptive as you would like. I have kept it simple on mine, sharing my blog, and explaining that I'm an Art Educator from Minnesota. I would suggest having some description on your profile to allow people to know if they want to follow you or not. It lets people know how you are using Twitter. I keep Twitter very professional myself, my primary reason for using it is to talk to other educators and educational leaders.
2: Find a Hashtag that you want to follow:
A hashtag means a subject. So the one that I'm inviting you to join is #K12ArtEdChat. This is a a group that 'meets' on Twitter every Thurs. at 8:30 CST. A hashtag can do many things...
#'s can organize your post: For example, I have been labeling #ProcessPigs for all the pigs the posts that are part of the Process Pigs found here on MiniMatisse.
#'s can help you find something of interest: For example, if you want to see all the cool artworks that were created in Tim Needles and Arlene Shelton, Art Challenge you could type in #K12ArtChallenge or #TERPart in the search bar on Twitter. This will bring you to the greatness of this very social Art Challenge.
#'s can help you participate in a Twitter Chat: So let's say you go online at 8:30 CST. You would type in #k12ArtChat and it will show you the feed for what everyone is writing for the discussion. Actually, what it first will give you is the TOP Tweets of the hashtag.
What you want is the LIVE Tweets, simply click where it says live. This will allow you to watch the chat happen.
3: Join in on a chat!
So here is how a chat goes, the host will formulate some questions that you will answer. Others will answer as well... All voices are heard in a Twitter chat (it's why I think it would be fun to do one in class). Most of the time the host of the chat will post the questions ahead of time. Here are the questions for this Thurs. #k12ArtChat that I am 'guest-hosting'
Most of the time a host will ask for an introduction such as, Please introduce yourself and let us know your favorite Musical Artist.
You would write something like.
Nic Hahn, I'm from MN teaching K-5 Art. I love to listen to @Maroon5 #K12ArtChat
See how I did that, I kept it short because Twitter must be 140 characters long. I put @ before Maroon 5 so that Adam will see I'm talking about him again ;), and I was sure to include the hashtag (#K12ArtChat).
Now the host will post the first question, for example:
Q1a: Have you ever made an Artist Trading Card before? #K12ArtChat
Now, the Q is short for Question, the 1 means first question, the a means there is going to be a second part to the first question. Here is an example of how you might answer it.
A1a: I have not done ATC's before, but I would like to #K12ArtChat
The discussion would continue with another question being asked every 3 to 5 minutes. There is one more question that you might see that could be confusing. If you see something that says BQ that means Bonus Question.
4: Make it as easy as you can.
I really enjoy using a website called Tweetdeck. I talk about it a little in the video below. It helps you organize and see more at a time. If you like Twitter chats, Tweetdeck will help you manage the conversation.
So now here is a challenge for you. I invite you to join me for a Twitter chat this Thursday, July 30th at 8:30 Central time. We will be talking about Artist Trading Cards. ATC's are a good solution for many classes, ages, and subjects. Join my valuable #PLN.
Below is a few other events happening this week. I would like to mention a couple of other Twitter Chats that you might want to check out. #EdBeat, #Satchat, #Sstlap, #PISDMusic... Do you have other educational chats that should be added to this list?
Crayons are the most common Art medium in the Art Studio, so it's important that you spice it up once and a while. One way that I like to do that is shifting the shape. This is something you can do with old crayons that you might have had donated or simply from use of the art room. The best part is, I didn't use an oven for this. Check out my previous post.
Water soluble crayons are a lot of fun too. They blend well (with water) and they give students a new way to think about crayons. I used them for my process pigs but found them to be a little soft and therefore breakable. I think I would use these for 'small group' or for my own kids at home. Here is a video showing the process of this pig.
For the organization of your crayons, I have created little pouches for my kids. This was more for my mini's at home, I wouldn't do this for classroom use, but my kids loved the crayon pouches and use them even today, several years later. Click here.
My favorite use of crayons is Construction Paper Crayons. If you have never brought these into your classroom, this is a 'must add'. Crayola identifies these crayons differently with a black paper label so I can easily keep them separate from my other crayons. I even keep them in different containers and only bring them out for special projects. It makes the kids get a little more excited about the medium.
These crayons literally do what they say... They draw on construction paper! They are surprisingly effective as well! One project where I used these crayons is my 'They All Saw a Cat' lesson. Instead of using the medium on construction paper, I used them on tempera cake paints. It worked really well! Clicking here will bring you to the cat lesson.
Another construction paper crayon example is these continuous line owls. I'm always amazed by this lesson and how unique they turn out. Lesson plan and video can be found by clicking here.
And then there is crayon resist!
Using crayons as a resist is always a good use of the medium. I have often worked with my young artist to encourage craftsmanship using crayons. I talk about how to 'make sure all the white spots are gone'. I have them check with neighbors to assure that skill is done correctly... some might call that peer assessment.
When ordering, I always order several multicultural pack of crayons for self-portraits. I talk about how there are many 'right answers' for skin tones and in the past, I have opened up a skin check station for students to really focus on matching the color of skin they have with the best fit of a crayon.
Once the crayons are applied correctly, it's safe to watercolor over them. If you want to read more about the self-portraits project, please click here.
Another crayon resist project is my Mackintosh Lesson. This one has video and student examples as well. Click here
Finally, another way to spice up the medium crayons is by creating a three-dimensional project like a stuffed fish with them. We used the crayons in a traditional way, however, the end result was exciting because we took the project and 'stuffed it' to become a soft sculpture. Click here for the full stuffed fish lesson.
We have another guest artist for the #ProcessPigs! Let me introduce you to Aunt Carolyn (at least that is what we call her around our house). Aunt Carolyn is Mr. Hahn's Aunty and a true artist of many mediums. One thing that Carolyn always does with her artwork is reuse discarded materials. She is much more into process than product although her product is always really amazing!
Aunt Carolyn made a Crazy Quilt pig out of old men's ties. I love it, don't you. I asked her to document her process so I can show you how she came up with this final pig.
First Carolyn created a design. I love that she is already thinking about that amazing spiral tail. Once she had a plan, she created a pattern.
She gathered the materials for the pig and got started!
She started to sew the body and head out of the ties. She did this by sewing them onto a dryer sheet (I think), and cutting the circle out after all the ties were sewen on.
Then she created the background, Carolyn explained that she was thinking of the sky and the muddy pen that the pig lived in when she chose the ties to use for the background.
Did you see how that pig looks like it's stuffed? Well it is, but this artist didn't leave anything for waist. She used all the scraps to stuff the pig! Great ideas Carolyn. Look at how she did that, she took and cut a small hole in the back of the pigs body and placed all the scraps inside.
Then she took the pig, turned it around and sewed it onto the background.
A border was added to the pig as well as eyes, snout, and a tail. What do you think the eyes are made out of? How about the snout? The tail?
Here it is, Aunt Carolyn's #ProcessPigs! I'm so excited to add this pig with the rest of the pigs on the Hassan Elementary Art room wall!
