AND THE COUNTDOWN BEGINS.....

 Hopefully, the flyers created by selected 4th and 5th grade students made it home, and you've had the opportunity to talk with your child about visiting the art opening. On May 31st the work of your children will be on display! Now is your chance to see America's great future artists! At least one artwork from every student in the school will be exhibited. The Art Show opening will be held from 5-7 PM, and on display in the hallways near the art room. If you cannot make it the shows opening, it will be hanging until June 8th. Please stop by to see their amazing work!

Terrific Trash

 

I challenged the 1st and 4th graders to use their imagination to turn their trash into treasure by taking something ordinary and transforming it into something extraordinary! I spent a week "dumpster diving" around the school collecting (and cleaning) recyclables to use for our terrific trash sculptures. I also encouraged the 4th grades to bring in their own recyclables, old boxes, broken electronics, and broken toys to use for their projects. Prior to building their sculptures, students sketched ideas of what they could build with the materials they had access to. "If you know you eat a box of Fruit Loops a week, then your sketch should have a cereal box in it...If you drink a chocolate milk every morning for breakfast, then you should do a sketch using 5 chocolate milk containers."

Both grade levels created memorable sculptures that I am proud to
share with the world! Take a look...

 

 

 

 

 

 

Below is an inspirational news clip about terrific trash I found on Youtube and shared with my kids.

Fresh Impressions: Cute Video

This video was emailed to me a few months back, and I thought I should share it. Having a background in graphic design, this video made my day!

Can you recognize all of the logos?

Digital Pop Art Portraits

 

For this assignment, the 4th graders were introduced to a program called Image Blender. We used Image Blender to create digital Pop Art portraits of famous historical portraits.  Image Blender is similar to Photoshop, but accessible to elementary age children. After examining Andy Warhol's Marilyn Monroe print and Campbell's Soup Cans prints, I demonstrated the creation of a digital Pop Art portraits.

 

It was awesome witnessing this young generation of students so excited to be learning about digital art and utilizing technology to create their own art. Students who were more familiar with technology were eager to help those students who weren't as tech savvy. The project was a huge success and my students seemed to thoroughly enjoy holding art class outside of our art room. Check out their work below!

 

   

Students who finished their pieces early were challenged to create a second digital art piece utilizing other filters found in Image Blender.

White Flint Art Show

 

If you didn't get an opportunity to see the White Flint Art Show in person, here are some photos from the show. The students work looked amazing! I am so proud of them all. Two of my second graders received stickers, and their pieces will be in future MCPS art exhibits.

Congratulations to all of the students who's work was selected, and thank you for allowing me to display your fabulous art!

 
 

 

   

 

(Note: Parents of students who participated, keep an eye out for their "Certificate of Appreciation."

Animations: Thaumatropes & Zoetropes

 

As a child, I would be up with the sun watching cartoons every Saturday morning. Scooby-Doo, The Flinstones, Ducktales, Looney Tunes, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and the ThunderCats were among my favorites. I loved Walt Disney movies too. Today's generation of kids are growing up watching cartoons like I did, but may not recognize the artistry behind their beloved animated cartoons.

Animation is the rapid display of a sequence of images of 2-D or 3-D artwork or model positions to create an illusion of movement. Animators typically draw 12 frames/pictures for each second of animation. For 60 seconds of animation, the animator(s) draw 720 pictures! That is a lot of drawing.

Students in 3rd and 4th grade were introduced to the animation unit by creating thaumatropes, which were popular toys in Victorian times. Thaumatropes are 2 images that effectively create the illusion of movement.  After successfully creating thaumatropes, students created Zoetropes, which were invented in 180 AD. For their Zoetrope, students drew 11 frames for their animations. Below are examples of the students' zoetropes that I scanned and animated on my computer. There are also links for tutorials on creating both types of
animations

DIY:  Students can make a spinner for their animations at home with a small plastic take-out container lid, tape, and black construction paper.  Enjoy!

Draw Something!

 

Last week, my cousin introduced me to an app on the iPhone called "Draw Something." I have not stopped playing since. Yes, I might be addicted. Draw Something is a smartphone version of Pictionary where you select an easy, medium, or hard word to draw. When you have completed your drawing you submit it, and your opponent tries to guess what it is as they watch you draw it. The best part is that the app is FREE! You can also buy the app for 99 cents (on sale) to remove those annoying pop ups. This small investment gets you a larger word bank.

I love technology and the "Draw Something" app is a fun opportunity to draw and be creative outside of the classroom. In the game you have to read and spell, so there is some literacy practice as well. Here are some of my drawings. Don't judge me to harshly. After I invested in more colors and started playing on my iPad, I am now able to get more depth in my drawings, but I must say it's hard trying to add depth and details on an iPhone.

 

   

iPhone Drawing vs. iPad Drawing

Below are some of the best "Draw Something" pictures I found while surfing the internet:

 

Cardboard & Paper Mache' Pop Art Sculptures:

The City of Rockville and the Rockville Art League are hosting the annual Rockville Student Art Show this month at the Glenview Mansion Art Gallery.  Three of my students entered artwork in the show, and one received a 3rd place ribbon for the Pop Art sculpture she created in class.  All of the students received a certificate for participating.  My hope is that seeing the success of their peers will encourage more students to participate in contest/exhibitions as an opportunity to showcase their work. I will be on the lookout for upcoming contest/exhibitions in the near future. If you know of any in the area, please feel free to share them with me. The student artists showcased will be in display in the Glenview Gallery until March 27th. I encourage you to take a peak! Below are pictures of some of the 5th grades pop art sculptures, including the sculpture entitled "The Hungry Artist," that won a ribbon.

 

The Hungry Artist

 

  

  

 

Teaching Tip: Ross Craft Paper Mache art paste is inexpensive and easy to mix. I called it "slim," because the consistency isn't like the traditional paper mache mixture made of flour and water. The kids seemed to like that.

Fun Run

 

The PTA recently asked me to create a running cougar for our schools field day "Fun Run." The "Fun Run" will help raise money for our school. If we reach our school's target goal, our principal and assistant principal will dye their hair BLUE! Below are images from our "Fun Run" kickoff assembly. I hope the life size cougar cutout and cougar temporary tattoos will help generate some buzz and excitement so we can reach our goal.

 [Left:] Mrs. Till, Assistant Principal, and Mrs. Gregory, Principal with the Fun Run Cougar Mascot. [Right:] Mrs. Gregory, Principal, at the Fun Run Kickoff Assembly. 

It's Not to Late to "DOODLE 4 GOOGLE"

Over the weekend I read an article in the Washington Post about Jennifer Hom, a core member of of the Google Doodle team. After doing a few web searches, I came across a "Doodle 4 Google" competition open to K-12th grade students. Submissions are due on March 23. While it's very short notice, your child still has time to put together a masterpiece! I will share information about the competition with my classes tomorrow to see if anyone is interested in participating. Below are some important links, and an embedded video of a description of the contest.




Important Links:
Doodle 4 Google Home
Info for Participants  

The Winner From Last Year:

Digital Magazines

If you missed the notice in our "Cougar Newsletter" about our art quarterly magazine, check them out below. The digital magazines for quarter 1 and quarter 2 have been embedded on the blog (you will need Flash to view the magazines...click the lower right hand corner of the magazine to turn the page).  Enjoy!

Q1:

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Digital Publishing with YUDU

Q2:

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Publishing Software from YUDU

Hello World!

Welcome students, parents, colleagues, family, friends and world to our classroom blog!  I had been toying with the idea of blogging for months now and I finally decided to give it a go. As a first year teacher, there are a million and one things to do, but I believe blogging about our work is the perfect "window" into our classroom.  Now that I have gotten my "sea legs" in  the classroom, I hope to update the blog with vignettes of what takes place in our classroom.

Designing the blog was relatively easy...I'm an artist :), but words have never been my thing. Coming up with a name that didn't sound silly after saying it aloud was a difficult task to say
the least. After careful consideration, I decided on "From Maryvale to MoMA".  MoMA is an acronym for The Museum of Modern Art. The title of the blog isn't meant to mislead anyone into making a direct association between Maryvale Elementary School and MoMA, but is an expression of my belief that education creates opportunity and with hard work and dedication I KNOW that each of my students will have a bright future.  Maybe one day their artwork will be exhibited in MoMA next to Jean-Michel Basquiat, Takashi Murakami, Andy Warhol, or Frida Kahlo.

I hope you will stay tuned to what’s to come in my world of teaching and my kids' world of learning about art!  Great things are on the horizon….