After seeing Grant Snider's cute and clever illustrations pop up on a number of blogs, I was led to his site where I ended up spending a good part of my
Today, we're going to provide you with quick downloadable reference tool that gives you 6 key ways you can access the Common Core through the Arts. Come get yours today!
Children will learn about the life and work of Leonardo da Vinci, then take inspiration from his process to create an artwork of their own.
Explore our comprehensive collection of classroom resources, including classroom posters, engaging activities, classroom management techniques, and more. Enhance your teaching and inspire your students with these valuable insights.
“It’s not how smart you are that matters, what really counts is how you are smart.” ~ Howard Gardner Did you know that there are at least eight different potential pathways to lea…
15 Memes Only Art Teachers Will Understand Professional Practice % %
TIME magazine recently revealed its 30 Must-See Tumblr Blogs which includes the highly creative, user-generated Newspaper Blackout. This blog is the
Elements of Art,middle school art,Art Education,Art Education Blog,Line,Shape,Color,Texture,space,form,Value,2 Soul Sisters Art Ed
How to Draw Faces Like a Renaissance Master. This is a lesson by studying artist and sculptor Leonardo da Vinci to learn face proportion.
Welcome to 31 Days of Homemade Music! Today we will be continuing to make a case for why anyone can benefit from studying music. To find other posts in this series, click here. Ever wondered if music is just as effective a brain developer as, say, math or science? If you remember my post from […]
After seeing Grant Snider's cute and clever illustrations pop up on a number of blogs, I was led to his site where I ended up spending a good part of my
It's taken YEARS to get my wall of wisdom. When I teach, I learn. I learn that kids are visual creatures. Stuff just sticks better if you show it with a picture. So, all the wise things I have learned over the 15 plus years of teaching I have put into a poster form. There's still a lot of ideas floating around in my brain, but it takes time to get them all out. I know not all art teachers have time to make their own posters. So i decided a few years back that very time I make a poster, I scan it and put it on TPT (Teacher Pay Teacher) to share the opportunity for other teachers to use it in their classrooms as well. Please visit my store. Here you will download the image of the poster only. You take that download and print it from your printer, send it to an online photo center and get it shipped to your house, or take you download to a photo store to have printed in house. My secret? I sign up for CVS and Walgreen photo coupons and wait for a 50% off everything sale. Then I print me some poster. That is how I get all mine down. People always ask me how they print out, are they pix led or high quality? I scan them at home on the highest digital capability on my scanner. so, when you print them big, it looks great too. Visit Store Here... https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/The-Lost-Sock-Art-Teacher I have included a lot of pictures below of how they turn out in real life. Tired of saying the same thing OVER AND OVER to your students! JUST A DOT, NOT A LOT!! I was. That's why I started making posters in the first place, just for me and my classroom. But things are so much more peaceful now when I have posters that say it. A poster speaks a thousand words, you know. Go see what I have I store for you and your classroom walls.. Oh, if only walls could speak.. WAIT, they can! https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/The-Lost-Sock-Art-Teacher My Newest Poster Get it here... https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Creativity-Takes-Courage-Poster-3413925 Visit my TeacherPayTeacher store here. Got lots of colorful designs to give your classroom "class" and brighten up your walls. https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/The-Lost-Sock-Art-Teacher Check it out Yall'. All of these poster ideas come from 14 years of teaching! I repeat the same phrases, rules or rhymes to my students and it just didn't seem to stick. Then I just started making illustrations of those things and there I was... with a big WALL OF WISDOM! I just keep adding and adding. Now I'm addicted to making POSTERS! I love lettering and illustrating. I love color and details. I love ART! If you have an idea for a design, something that you have learned or teach your kids, let me know. It may be my next poster! Please visit my Teachers Pay Teachers store where you can get your own posters for your classroom! Yay, you might just find a free one there... https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/The-Lost-Sock-Art-Teacher As an art teacher, there are things that I am continually telling my students. Things like... "You are responsible for your own mess", or "Art requires patience above talent!", "There's no excuse for messiness!", "Don't use a waste a new piece of paper when you can use an eraser!". Instead of repeating myself, I decided years ago to make a "Wall of Wisdom". It is full of ideas to make your art better or my philosophy of a good art attitude. This was my old wall of poster... New wall at new school... I've went Art Elementary in 2014 ;) after 10 years of MIddle School Elementary boys = PAPER AIRPLANES!!! WHat's the deal? And they are not even CREATIVE! Maybe if they drew windows with passengers peeking through... or something, but NO! SO, I have decided to BAN THEM FROM MY ROOM! "Let your Imagination fly... NOT YOUR PAPER!" T. Morgan Kill the dead space! Fill it up with life, learn to turn! Dear art student, I am not impressed by your speed. It's slow and steady that won. Love, Mrs. Morgan Improved version Purchase this Poster here... https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Slow-and-Steady-Wins-the-A-2710822 I have some kids that get super excited when they are the first ones done with their work. Being quick is not always a good thing. Remember the tortoise and the hare? Sometimes that means they did not take the time to be neat or to complete the work. So, slow and STEADY wins the race. Some kids work hard at first, then get tired, then quit doing their best. If you start neat, finished neat. Be consistent with your work. I let kids know on the first day of school, that I do not grade them based on talent. Nobody can pick their talents when they are born. I am sure if they had a choice, all students would choose to be artistically inclined. So, I grade on their "ARTtitude". Do they try, do the fix mistakes, do they improve, do they listen to advice? Or do they give up, give half effort, or turn work in knowing it could be better? It takes blood, sweat, and tears. It's about distance vs. speed. My pet peeve is when kids waste paper! They put one measly mark down and then throw it away! UGHHHHH! I want to just throw erasers at those wasters! So, I made this sarcastic ad for the NEWEST INVENTION... THE ERASER! You don't have to be talented to be neat. It just takes special care and patience. All you have to do is a back and forth motion with your hand while holding a crayon... it's not that hard. So, I do grade hard on kids who are sloppy. It is just them telling me they don't care. It's a bad "art"titiude. In most cases, it is best to color dark. It shows up better, it pops out, and it reveals the true color. At least if you don't color the inside dark, then emphasize it by outlining dark on the outside. Plus, coloring darker is harder and more time consuming, which in the end shows more care. I tell the kids that if the paper is big, draw big. Fill the space up. The picture is more important than the emptiness behind it. Drawing bigger allows the artist to include more detail as well. If you have the room, use it! Otherwise, you are wasting. Patience is a virtue... You have to practice patience while you create art. When my students work hard by showing patience, I like to post their work online. The great educational philosopher Harry Wong said something like this when I saw him speak. I just took what he said and make a poster for it. I let the kids talk while they work. As long as they do this responsibly, But, if they talk more than they work, inhibit others from working because of their talking, or they fail because of their mouth, then they have a problem that needs to be fixed. Art, the most important meal of the day. Shhhhhhh!.... Draw secret, soft & light lines if you're not sure in the beginning stages. If you draw hard, yiu make it harder on yourself to fix. I try to teach kids to avoid putting the too much pressure on their pencils in the beginning stages of drawing. So many times, they mess up, try to erase, but can't get rid of their original drawing lines. Then I make them use the back of the paper. If they already did, then I make them erase the lightest side. I do this to teach them to draw light till they KNOW they have it right. Kids beat, bang, and drop colored pencils. This tears them apart! Then they try to sharpen them and the lead falls out. It is a horrible result of an abused supply. I have this to encourage them to treat the pencils like glass. I keep the markers in a vertical storage tip down. This allows the flow of the ink to travel to the tip. It increases the life of the markers. Some kids do not close the glue. This open hole lets air in and that air hardens the remaining glue under the cap. Then kids think that jabbing a larger hole in a clogged up glue bottle will make it work better. It will temporarily make it work better for them right then, but in the long run, this massive hole they poked just makes the tip get clogged even more from the extra air that gets in it. This is a never ending cycle! Since this annoys me, I made a poster to try to get my point across. I also get tired of kids not cleaning brushes out. Then the paint dries on the brush, hardens the tip and it is never able to be used again. Or, they do clean it, but leave it with the bristles down. Then it dries bent and is permanently bent. My are teacher from High School, Mrs. Liddell, had a poster like this one. I liked it, so I made one for my classroom. "Your mamma doesn't live here, so clean up your own mess". My self made Principles chart... Self made Elements chart... Somplified my charts for elementary ;) I decided to make this motivational poster for my classroom just recently. I did some research behind it and found the history of the original very interesting. So, this is my parody of the We Can Do It poster. ------------ Think positive! Mini Masterpiece wall (Index card art) 4 kids per table, everybody has a purpose. Rules and rewards... Palette of positivity. Each class has a paper palette that colored stickers are added to for noticeable efforts. http://tabithaannthelostsock.blogspot.com/2013/04/we-can-do-itart-classroom-encouragment.html And that is my Art Class. Hope you are more the wiser!
Try DOODLING!!!!! Get inspiration from Mr. Doodle; Sometimes, the solution to your problem just won’t come into your head, yet your thoughts are spinning at a 100 kilometres an …
SILLY 4 is over… so sad!! SILLY 5 is currently scheduled for January 2012, but I am working on some other online classes for the summer and fall — stay tuned! (Or sign up for my newsletter to…
Effortlessly Communicate Your K–8 Curriculum With These Student Handouts Curriculum % %
What was your inspiration for the project/work you completed today? What was the biggest challenge you encountered on the project? How does this project tie together previous exercises and concepts…
Create a Syllabus That Your Students Will Actually Want to Read. Free Resource to download to help you create an Art Syllabus for your art students. Want to try your hand at a visual syllabus? We'll give you three helpful hints. This article will take 8 minutes to read.
As a child I really loved Alexander Calder's sculptures. Whimsical and colorful, they let me see that art can be fun too! Today I'm sharing a really simple paper sculpture project inspired by Calder's large scale metal ones. They take only minutes to whip up and certainly would also make for fun scissor practice with younger kids as well! Kids Calder-Inspired Art Sculptures This post contains affiliate links. Thank you for your support! In case you're looking for some great art books to go along with this activity, here are... Our current 20+ favorite art books: Colorful Dreamer Lester Fizz Bubble Gum Artist The Iridescence of Birds Modern Art Adventures Mix it Up Press Here Any Ed Emberley Book The Day the Crayons Quit Beautiful Oops Dog's Colorful Day Too Much Glue Harold and the Purple Crayon Day with No Crayons Artist to Artist Artist Ted The House Baba Built A Blue Butterfly: A Story of Claude Monet Sandy's Circus A is for Art The Artful Parent This Bridge Will Not Be Grey Art Workshops for Children I shot a video generally showing how to make one of these sculptures. Calder-Inspired Paper Sculptures from Pink Stripey Socks on Vimeo. But in case you like to read directions, here they are! 1. Cut out a rectangular piece of paper. I used construction paper, which stood up fine at home, but fell down with any bit of wind. If you want to make these sturdier, use cardstock (Optional: Decorate it with markers!) 2. Fold it in half. 3. Make cuts like pictured. Cut lines and curves until they almost reach the fold. 4. Optional, decorate with groovy circle stickerrs. 5. Open it up and fold the strips to the front or back in an alternating fashion. (This will help the sculpture to balance.) So on the left side you would fold the strips (starting from the top) front, back, front, back, and front. And on the right side you would fold the strips (starting from the top) back, front, back, front, and back. Once you get the basic design down, you can play around with your cutting ... like I did below! It's really neat seeing all of these guys standing up! They're kinda addictive to make... and I hope you try making them with your kids too! If you liked this paper art project, you'll like these other ideas as well! Easy Matisse Murals 3d Twisty Snakes Woven Paper Banner Jasper Johns Wall Art Slinky Paper Garland Paper Net Garland Kirigami Flowers Kirigami Stars Let's keep in Contact! You can always find fun ideas on my Pinterest, Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter accounts! (Or subscribe to my email mailing list by filling out the pink bar at the top of your screen.) Happy making, friends!
Types of Sculpture Media & Techniques % %
My blog focuses on the art and artists of vintage children's picture books, mainly from 1950's through 1980's.
Ismene's monologue is a dramatic female monologue from the famous Greek tragedy Antigone by Sophocles.
Your Ultimate List of AP Studio Art Resources Curriculum Design % %
Here is the Elementary Art Curriculum Map that all K-4 art teachers in Chelmsford follow. You can click on the picture for an enlarged view National Visual Art Standards BY grade 4 1.1 Use a variety of materials and media, for example, crayons, chalk, paint, clay, various kinds of papers, textiles, and yarns, and understand how to use them to produce different visual effects 1.2 Create artwork in a variety of two-dimensional (2D) and three-dimensional (3D) media, for example: 2D – drawing, painting, collage, printmaking, weaving; 3D – plastic (malleable) materials such as clay and paper, wood, or found objects for assemblage and construction 1.3 Learn and use appropriate vocabulary related to methods, materials, and techniques 1.4 Learn to take care of materials and tools and to use them safely 2.1 For color, explore and experiment with the use of color in dry and wet media Identify primary and secondary colors and gradations of black, white and gray in the environment and artwork Explore how color can convey mood and emotion For example, students mix light and dark values of colors or predict the results of overlapping and blending primary colors. 2.2 For line, explore the use of line in 2D and 3D works Identify a wide variety of types of lines in the environment and in artwork For example, students take a walk around the school and note jagged, straight, curved, thick, and thin lines. 2.3 For texture, explore the use of textures in 2D and 3D works Identify a wide variety of types of textures, for example, smooth, rough, and bumpy, in the environment and in artwork Create representations of textures in drawings, paintings, rubbings, or relief 2.4 For shape and form, explore the use of shapes and forms in 2D and 3D works Identify simple shapes of different sizes, for example, circles, squares, triangles, and forms, for example, spheres, cones, cubes, in the environment and in artwork 2.5 For pattern and symmetry, explore the use of patterns and symmetrical shapes in 2D and 3D works Identify patterns and symmetrical forms and shapes in the environment and artwork. Explain and demonstrate ways in which patterns and symmetrical shapes 3.1 Create 2D and 3D artwork from direct observation For example, students draw a still life of flowers or fruit, action studies of their classmates in sports poses, or sketches of the class pet having a snack or a nap. 3.2 Create 2D and 3D expressive artwork that explores abstraction For example, a student simplifies an image by making decisions about essential colors, lines, or textures. 3.3 Create 2D and 3D artwork from memory or imagination to tell a story or embody an idea or fantasy For example, students draw members of a family from memory; illustrate a character in a folktale or play; build a clay model of an ideal place to play; or make images that convey ideas such as friendship. 4.1 Select a work or works created during the year and discuss them with a parent, classmate, or teacher, explaining how the work was made, and why it was chosen for discussion For example, a first grader chooses a painting and tells how she mixed the colors, and talks about the decisions she made. 4.2 Select works for exhibition and work as a group to create a display 4.3 As a class, develop and use criteria for informal classroom discussions about art 5.1 In the course of making and viewing art, learn ways of discussing it, such as by making a list of all of the images seen in an artwork (visual inventory); and identifying kinds of color, line, texture, shapes, and forms in the work 5.2 Classify artworks into general categories, such as painting, printmaking, collage, sculpture, pottery, textiles, architecture, photography, and film 5.3 Describe similarities and differences in works, and present personal responses to the subject matter, materials, techniques, and use of design elements in artworks 5.4 (Grades 3 and 4) Explain strengths and weaknesses in their own work, and share comments constructively and supportively within the group 6.1 When viewing or listening to examples of visual arts, architecture, music, dance, storytelling, and theatre, ask and answer questions such as, “What is the artist trying to say?” “Who made this, and why?” “How does this work make me feel?” 6.2 Investigate uses and meanings of examples of the arts in children’s daily lives, homes, and communities For example, children learn and teach other children songs in languages other than English; interview parents and community members about dances, songs, images, and stories that are part of their family and cultural heritage. 7.1 Investigate how artists create their work; read about, view films about, or interview artists such as choreographers, dancers, composers, singers, instrumentalists, actors, storytellers, playwrights, illustrators, painters, sculptors, craftspeople, or architects For example, teachers invite an illustrator of children’s books to school to show how she creates her illustrations. 8.1 Identify characteristic features of the performing and visual arts of native populations and immigrant groups to America, such as • styles of North American native cultures of the East Coast, Plains, Southwest, and Northwest; • styles of folk and fine arts of immigrant groups from European, African, Latin American, Asian, and Middle Eastern countries For example, students look at examples of Native American clay containers from the Southwest, and wooden containers from the Northwest and compare the similarities and differences in form and decoration. 8.2 Identify characteristic features of the visual arts of world civilizations such as styles of ancient Egypt and Africa, China, Mesopotamia, Greece, Rome, and the Medieval period in Europe 8.3 Perform or create works inspired by historical or cultural styles 9.1 When using art materials or handling and viewing artifacts or musical instruments, ask and answer questions such as • “What is this made of?” • “How does this instrument produce sound?” • “Would I design this differently?” • “Who first thought of making something like this?” For example, students examine a variety of percussion instruments, experiment with the different sounds they make, and learn about the cultures in which they were made. 10.1 Integrate knowledge of dance, music, theatre, and visual arts and apply the arts to learning other disciplines Examples of this include: • using visual arts skills to illustrate understanding of a story read in English language arts or foreign languages; • memorizing and singing American folk songs to enhance understanding of history and geography; • using short dance sequences to clarify concepts in mathematics.
High school Teaching for Artistic Behavior is just like elementary Teaching for Artistic Behavior except the kids are bigger and have more executive functioning skills. In my situation, they all have their own computers and the Internet so that is a very big deal when it comes to researching or communicating essential content. Students meet at the beginning of the class period in a specially designed centers-based learning environment, typical of TAB art rooms. Attendance is taken and class announcements can be made at this time. Students may also begin independent work from this starting point. Teachers may also deliver essential curriculum content at this time, for example a presentation of Renaissance perspective utilized by Masaccio and Masolino at the Brancacci Chapel. Teachers may also present large-group demonstrations during this time. After the large group lesson, students acquire materials and settle into creative learning activities. "Look, Think, Create," is a concept sign inspired by "Room 13 International" website. I adapted it for TAB. There are several high school TAB and TAB-like art programs I have been thinking about since transitioning to high school TAB. Nan Hathaway, whom I met in 2005, is a TAB middle-school art teacher and has been a huge influence on me. Patricia Knott a high school choice-based art teacher has been a regular contributor to the TAB Yahoo Group since 2005. I first saw Jeff Pridie present in a packed room at NAEA Minneapolis in 2010. Jeff laid it out perfectly. Lots of opportunities for students to sink their teeth into meaningful learning experience because art is a big subject. Barb Andrews was offering student-directed learning experiences at New Palestine High School in her "Arts and Ideas" classes back in the 1990's when DBAE was being pushed from the top down by the Getty Foundation. Miriam Marcus was doing 'choice' with at-risk children in Flint, Michigan around 2005. Her stories of teaching children to knit with pencils because knitting needles were not allowed in her school amazed me. Of course listening to John Crowe's stories about "care and play," during his high school teaching days was very inspirational. Colleen Rose is operating a wonderful high school art program in Ontario, Canada. At Apex High School, Ian Sands, Melissa Purtee, Kim Sudkamp and Shawnda Rossi are running a spectacular art education program where choice is featured in their curricula. There are many other democratic/choice based high school art programs around the country, but these are the ones I am thinking about now. We are seeing educators adopting TAB pedagogy throughout the country at all grade levels. There are thousands of elementary and middle school teachers working with TAB and quite interestingly, the High School TAB Facebook page has 358 members in it. Educators are very much interested in the possibilities of what liberating the imagination and creative spirit looks like in K-12 Public Education settings and looking at the results of my own experiences with high school TAB there is quite an appetite for choice-based art education. My sincerest thanks to the authors of "Curriculum in Abundance," David W. Jardine , Sharon Friesen and Patricia Clifford for their insight into curriculum theory as contained in their book. A treasured resource!
Art Ideas for At Home during COVID-19
This is part 2 in a series called The Epic Guide to Character Creation . In this part I will show you different heroine archetypes. I will provide examples of characters from both literature and movies/TV-series to provide you with an overall understanding of fictional characters.
Use this quick and effective art critique technique to help your students provide valuable and reflective feedback in your classroom.
Many of you probably know of Ian and Melissa from Apex High School. They have developed a list of Artistic Behaviors for the high school level. I have been following along and seeing how they tea…
I'm an Art Teacher - and Proud of it! Professional Practice % %
this term i'm teaching advanced 2d art. it's one of my favorite classes to teach because it is so much about ideas. it's about the kids making their own work, not mine. it can be tiring but incredibly fulfilling for me...and for them. i spend the entire first week teaching them how to develop a theme they can work with for the whole term. this year what i did was to put pictures of famous works of art around the room. i then asked them to walk around and look at the work recording what they observed. on the worksheets you see below i asked them to generally record themes & concepts (what the work was about) and subject matter (what was the work a picture of). after a healthy debate about what i meant by themes & concepts, the difference between themes and subject matter, and a discussion about how anything could be a theme and the fact that many themes overlap we made this list as a group of possible themes to work with. we also decided as a group that a theme was a big idea and definitely something you could hold or touch. after this activity each student chose a theme they were willing to commit to for the entire term and they made a brainstorming web with their theme at the center. i use these webs as starting points for almost all the projects over the course of the term. some students chose themes that are way too big. some chose themes that will go cliche real fast. i tried hard to control my natural tendency to save them by correcting these mistakes. they will suffer a bit, but through the suffering they will learn either not to choose such things in the future or how to grapple with it today. either way i'm pretty happy. we'll see what kind of work we get.
I was determined to figure out how to teach Shakespeare to my children and maybe even learn a few new things myself.
Many of you probably know of Ian and Melissa from Apex High School. They have developed a list of Artistic Behaviors for the high school level. I have been following along and seeing how they teach their students. Seeing their list gave me the idea to create posters that shows kids what artists do and what exactly is an artist. I decided to simplify the behaviors for elementary school students and start from the basics. Start from the ground and … Read more... →
Curated by Riposte magazine, the show features 30 artists addressing human rights in relation to the theme of protection
Since reading Mind in the Making , I've been fascinated with Carol Dweck's research into fixed vs growth mindsets and how we as art...
