Kindergarten's Shooting Stars !!!

                                Kindergarten started painting their shooting Stars today! Yay!

We started the class on the rug in front of the Smartboard to watch this video from Youtube. It's Roy G Biv by They Might Be Giants.  The kids love this one! At the end I pause the video and we talk about what the letters in Roy G Biv stand for.

From there the kids moved to their tables for directions on how to use the watercolors and our new "artist" brushes.  This was the first time they were using the watercolors in the art room this year. They already knew how to go get their smocks from their Color Wheel Sunflowers...

When I gave them back their Shooting Stars they could get up to get their smock and begin to paint...

When the kids finished they put their paintings on the drying rack, put their smock away and if they had time got a free time activity.  Since our art time has been reduced to 30 minutes this year there is very little time for free time activity ( much to the disappointment of many of the kids who are used to having 5-7 minutes to free create... ) (As second grade finished up designing the backgrounds of their leaf prints and filling out their A.R.T. Splat ( Art Reflection Time - self reflection sheet) today I let them have the rest of their art time to free create today... they were over the moon! Some were done but a few needed about 10 minutes to tie up loose ends. I debated starting the rest of the class on our new project but thought it would be too crazy, chaotic and rushed... I'm happy the 2nd graders got the time to create freely and so were they :)  As they worked I went around and sat with each table a bit and talked with them about what they were making, what they are going to be for Halloween, etc... They even did a great job cleaning up when they were done :) 

Monday's classes have to paint their's yet but that won't be for a couple of weeks as next Monday is Columbus Day and the kid's have no school but I will be at school for a day of professional development.

Well... since my lesson plans don't write themselves and I think I've procrastinated enough for one evening,  I will leave you with this thought...

Shooting Stars...

                                          This week I cut up some old painting placemats...

                            I cut several of the strips into rectangles that I then cut into stars...

My Kindergarten students are learning about line this week...

        Each child chose a start shape from the pile at their table and glued them onto their paper...

      We spent some time as a group looking at, talking about and practicing some different types of               lines...

I love how each one is so different and each picture is loaded with information about the creative and mental growth of the kids...

Next week the kids will be adding the colors of the rainbow ( color wheel ) using watercolors! I can't wait to see how they turn out! So excited!!!

Mrs."C"  :)

*** Oh yeah.... I finally figured out to add the link to my Instagram page (lol) it only took me forever to figure it out! Technology genius I am not...  the link is at the top of my page on the right...  :)  ***

Back To The Art Room!

Well, summer is officially over, although it did not feel that way in New Jersey this week as we had such oppressive heat and humidity, the likes of which we had not seen all summer! :(  

So hot you are sweating through your clothing! :(

Thursday the kids came back to school... some smiling, some crying, some looking exhausted because they were not used to getting up and moving early in the morning (like me ).

My 1st and 2nd graders were excited when I told them we were painting on the first day! We quickly got our seats , quickly reviewed the art room rules, reviewed our painting procedures and set to creating!  My 1st grades reviewed the color wheel and got to use watercolors, 2nd grade reviewed the color wheel, how to read it to help them mix colors and they used tempera to mix and paint all the colors of the color wheel.

I was happy to see that our "too clean" table placemats were quickly being used  to wipe off brushes! They look so much better with paint on them!

I ordered brandy new paint brushes for this year! It really was time, the others were very well loved but way past their prime!

I ordered, Royal Langnickel Big Kid's Choice.   The kids loved them! They really like the grip on the handle! They were all commenting how cool it was that they grips on the handles!  We went over how to take good care of our new brushes.  I let them know that I still had the old brushes in case there was anyone who was mistreating our new brushes on purpose, I would give them an old brush to use.  All the kids were very careful to use our new brushes correctly! ( I knew they would)

What a happy feeling to see projects drying on the drying racks on the first day! 

There is a major change to my K-2 classes this year... we have always had 40 minutes for art ( I know some of you are saying to yourself " Wow that's all?")  Well, this year I have been reduced to 30 minutes  K-2 ... yeah, 30 minutes...  it was kind of a shock for the kids when I gave them their 5 minute time-check before clean-up! We discussed the time change at the beginning but  they didn't really get it until they saw how short the time felt!  We will work with it, we will get used to it, but we will never like that the time is so short...  my 3d-5th grades have had 30 minute classes for a very long time.  Anyone else out there working with such a short time? I'd love to know...  

This is after two happy classes got to paint.  We will get used to having to clean up faster...  

I also have personally moved into the 21st century and got an IPhone 5 the other day ( chorus of angels singing in the background)  Yes, I have retired my old, well loved and well used texting phone...( it was a really pretty shade of turquoise blue...) but it was time, and my upgrade was in...

I am getting used to it... it actually is cool that I can take photos with it and load them onto Picasa and onto my blog!  I have even started an Instagram for this blog!  I can't get the link to load onto the blog page( it keeps telling me the link Instagram gave me is wrong :(  I'll work on it...  ) but if you want to follow me on Instagram just go over and search for me under users, my user name for Rainbow Skies and Dragonflies is: 

Mrs.C_art      I only have a couple of pictures but I plan on adding them daily!  

Also, for those of you who know and love Hope from Mrs. Knight's Smartest Artist's she now has a Teacher's Pay Teacher's  store!  Go to this link and it will take you to her store!  I have already purchased all the items she has and they are all going to be great inspirations for some pieces I am creating for this school year! 

Another change ( that I am happy about) is that for our SGO's this school year we do not have to give pre and post tests,  we are instead using several mirrored assessments from our projects to obtain the data we need for tiering our students this Fall and following their growth through out the school year. I will have to do final assessments but it will be through our projects! Yeah! We can do a pre and post assessment if we want but they are discouraging us from doing them and would rather we do several different types of assessment that mirror each other and average them together to get our data. 

Well I'm off to write my lesson plans for the week and do some Eco-Printing today! Oh yeah, and piles and piles of laundry!  :)

Have a great week! 

Mrs."C"  :)

SPRING BREAK!!!

At 3:30 p.m. this afternoon, a mass exodus of teachers flowed out the doors of my school... there was no staying until 4:00 or 4:30 to catch up loose ends, grade or work on plans. No, this was the much anticipated and long awaited for moment that marked the official start of Spring Break! I finished organizing the drying 3d grade prints, put lids on the paint cups, cleaned the last of the paint brushes I had thrown in the sink, rinsed out the water containers and neatly stacked them on the shelf above my sink. I grabbed my things, locked my door, went down the hall to say, "good-bye and have a great break!" to several people and got in my car and left without looking back!
               Enjoy these pic's of flower paintings with concentric line design centers that my 1st graders are working on! ( these are still in progress, but they are turning out so awesome I wanted to share! ) If your also off this coming week, ENJOY! If not have a good week where ever you are!      Mrs."C"  :)

Assessments to the Left, Projects to the Right....

What a wacky week!!!  I've been trying to finish up mid-assessments with my SGO groups and my K-2 have been working on their giant class Hearts of Kindness for our school's Kindness and justice week for Martin Luther King's birthday.  I was inspired by this pin and this pin. More on what we did with these when we are done with it next week.  

On Deep Space Sparkle Patty recently offered a free download of a 2014 calendar she made up.  It's a great calendar for school or home to keep track of your daily happenings! I printed it up , stapled it together and attached it to a background. It's hanging behind my desk on my window at school. Sorry for the darkish picture... it was snowing again yesterday and it was dark outside. 

It was FREEZING out this week! Monday evening through Wednesday saw below zero temperatures and 15- 20 below zero F wind chills here in Northern NJ!  My school and many more had delayed openings on both days.  I was getting used to school starting at 10:00 a.m. everyday! 

I have my 2nd round observation coming up on Tuesday next week. This one is an announced observation so I had some pre-observation questions I had to answer and upload to my account on Teachscape for my administrator to view before Thursday a.m. so we could have a pre-conference meeting on Thursday.

Here are the questions I had to answer: ( ready for this? )

1.)  To which part of your curriculum does this lesson relate?

2.)  How does this learning "fit" in the sequence of learning for this lesson?

3.)  Briefly describe the students in this class, including those with special needs.

4.)  What are your learning outcomes for this lesson? What do you want the students to understand?

5.)  How will you engage the students in the learning? What will you do? What will the students do? Will the students work in groups, or individually, or as a group? Provide any worksheets the students will be using.

6.)  How will you differentiate instruction for different individuals and groups of students in the class?

7.)  How and when will you know whether the students have learned what you intend?

8.)  Is there anything that you would like me to specifically observe during this lesson?

Yeah, all that...  I felt like I was back in college working on an assignment for a class! I was at my PLC Monday afternoon when I was reading all the questions, my other administrator happened to be present and I was like... OMG!!! They smiled in what I took as agreement and told me to keep it brief. So I did, but in a way that I feel was very professionally written, siting curriculum standards and specific IEP modifications where needed. Seeing that everything I upload to this site can be viewed by any administrator in the district including the superintendent, I am making sure I am keeping any "snarkyness" to myself...  there's a time and a place for everything...

This so looks like a beautiful abstract sunset to me! It's one of the 4th graders mixing plate from the landscapes they have been working on.  I have had them mixing all the colors for their paintings and they are creating the most incredible color values!!! How I wish we had so much longer than 30 minutes for class because they were so involved I hated stopping them to clean up!

The lesson was inspired by the beautiful paintings that Laura, from Painted Paper had her students create earlier this year.  If you have never been to her site go visit! Her students create gorgeous pieces!  More on what my 4th grades did with this lesson when they are complete!

I do love Crayola tempera but due to the fact that I can no longer afford it in my budget I have tried the Sax Versa Temp this year and I am very, very satisfied with it's texture and mixing properties!  

The paints are looking a little nasty at the moment!  :)  They show that great creativity and involvement in the objective that was going on! :)

The students loved trying different combinations of colors to get different values of brown! As I was circulating the room I could hear them all saying things like," Wow! Look at the color I just got! " and sharing with each other what colors they combined to create their loved colors! Boring assessments became a thing of the past and creativity was alive in the art room once more! ( I know that the purpose of these assessments are to be able to track my students learning ( and how well I am teaching them ) but seriously from a creative standpoint, they really are boring...  :(  The kids keep asking WHY? This is ART! We are supposed to be creating, not taking tests! 4th and 5th grade can be very insightful at times...) 

My 5th grades are finishing up their mid-assessments and a surrealism project this week. Next week they also begin their journey into everything color! They are going to be working with monochromatic values. This project is always a favorite! I have done it with 2nd to 5th grade and it's always a hit! The finished pieces are always stunning! 5th grade saw the beginning example on the board this week and is anxious to start! :)  

Happy to see the drying racks again filled with drying paintings! All is good in the art room once again! 

It's actually rainy ( very rainy ) and 50 degrees F here in NJ today! A stark difference to the past week! I'm off to go put on a pot of sauce for supper tonight and work on some creative projects that have been sitting in limbo all week...  tomorrow I have to get my lesson plan and all my documents for the lesson together to up load onto Teachscape before Monday for my observation Tuesday.  Hope you all have a creative weekend! 

Mrs. "C"  :)

Birds, Birdhouses & First Grade

I love all the colors and textures in this picture!

One of my first grades thought they were helping me during clean up by dumping all the pom-poms and feathers together in the box I had been storing the bags in!  "Oh well!"  I remarked that it looked like a soft, feathery ball pit!  They all wanted to run their hands through it!  I used the opportunity to review tactile and implied texture!  They all got a chance to put their hands in and feel for the textures and see if they could sense the different size pom-poms.  (you can't really tell by the photo but the box huge!) 

The first grades recently finished painting and creating birds and bird houses.  They loved this lesson!  I think creating their birds was their favorite part!  I did this lesson two years ago with my second grades.  I was inspired by the cute bird house paintings from Deep Space Sparkle.  I decided to revisit the lesson  with my first grades this year.  We reviewed drawing with shapes to design and draw their bird houses. Demonstrating different ways they could combine shapes to create different style bird houses.  I also drew up a step by step drawing sheet they could keep in front of them to look at while they were drawing if needed.

This lesson took us three 40 minute classes to complete.

The first class the students drew and painted their bird houses.

The second class the kids created their birds.

Everyone made two birds.  I gave each student two pieces of oak tag cut about 5in x 5in.  I demonstrated how to glue together the pom-poms and feathers to make their birds bodies.  The ends of the feathers (quills) had to be cut off in order to get the feathers to stay glued on.  After many a flying quill, I had them hold the feathers over the garbage cans in the room when they trimmed them!  They literally shot across the table and onto the floor every time they cut one!  I was starting to worry we were going to have a flying quill and eyeball disaster!  I showed the kids how to hold the feather down into the garbage can when they cut them so it shot/fell into the can and not into their neighbors eyes! 

The third class I had the kids draw the beaks and legs, add some eyes with sequins, cut their birds out and glue them into their bird house paintings!  Any student that needed to finish their birdhouses, start their houses or make their birds did so that class.  Somehow we all got caught up and finished! 

The bird houses are proudly displayed outside their classrooms marking that Spring has finally come! One of the first grade teachers used their pictures as a prompt for a writing piece!  (yeah!)  They all wrote a little story or poem about their birds and birdhouse!  I will have to remember to take photos next week and update with the photos!  The teacher was hanging them up Friday after school! 

On a final note, I was gifted this enormous bag of rubber stamps and stickers this week!

One of my colleagues daughter is a professional organizer and these are from a house she just helped clean up and organize!  I can't wait to go through the bags!

Hope everyone out their has a wonderful weekend and a beautiful Mother's Day on Sunday!

Looks like rain today, but thats okay because we really need it here!

Mrs. C  :)