Our school is excited about being selected as one of the Champion Creatively Alive Children grant winners this year. Click on the picture to see what we are doing. You can find interesting art ideas for every grade level and learn ways to connect students learning through art! It is a n exciting opportunity for our students and a fun process for our teachers!
Well the year has slipped by so quickly that I have just found time to post to the blog. Many exciting things have happened this year including my new classroom and grading for students in art. I have also introduced a new "Creativity Center" for the students as an incentive for good behavior while in art. On top of all of that, our school was selected as a winner in the "Champion Creatively Alive Children" program hosted by Crayola. The grant awarded our school $2,500 in monetary donations as well as $1,000 in Crayola art supplies. We have been awarded this grant for our idea to create a Multi-cultural experience for our students while tying together many of our schools initiatives and programs at the same time. We are currently working on adding a new website to the art website that will host all of the information regarding this grant. It is exciting news once again for Cuba Elementary, considering only 20 schools from around the nation were selected for this award!!
Happy Holidays to everyone and look forward to seeing all of you in 2014! Mr. Cox Finally a chance to catch some sun without dealing with more snow. Its been a long winter and students are excited about the weather change. We have been working on Prehistoric art and completed a mural in class. Students were asked to draw something that was important to them, just like the caveman did, when he was drawing animals on cave walls. I hope many of you got a chance to view the documentary below...if not please watch it. Its a fascinating theory. It tries to prove how art may have sparked human development and why humans are so fixated on art. In this day of age we are surrounded by art and with technological advances we have revolutionized the way we use and see art. This is a great way to jump from Prehistoric art, into the latest 21st century technology...the I-Pad. This will be my first time teaching about art and technology, so I am very exctited about it. Students need the exposure to technology and how it has changed art forever. I will keep you posted so please check back from time to time.
Have a great Spring! This week we have started talking about Prehistoric art and cave paintings. We do not know all there is to know about prehistoric artists but many theories have been tested over the years. The fact remains that we may never truely know what caused the "creative ex[plosion" in humans to propel us to start creating art work in caves all over the world 30,000 years ago. The videos below give a fantastic theory as to why art began and the impact it may have had on all of human history! Who said art can't change the world??? Students began and finished working on a pointillism project. You may have heard your students talking about "George Seurat who paints with dots" over the last couple of weeks. We took this idea and began coloring a tree using markers and dots only. This is a great way to add texture to a drawing. It also taught students about mixing colors, layers, value, and shading. The video above is something we watched in class and discussed. This was a great project students really seem
This week has been a busy week for art students. We are still working on our Van Gogh Vases using chalk pastels. This can be a very messy media to work with but the kids are doing a fantastic job on this assignment. I am looking forward to seeing their finished works. I will be uploading these to the gallery section as soon as I get the pictures taken. The younger students are still learning about landscapes and are finishing a "Winter Wonderland" project. We are using oil pastels to create a winter landscape with cool colors. These have turned out great so far and teachers are hanging them up, outside of their classrooms. Voting for the tree ends tomorrow...if you have not done so, please go vote at the link provided in the "in the works" section or in the "spotlight" section on the district home page.
Its been a great year so far and students are learning a lot. They seem to be excited about art, having art once a week and learning in general. So far we have covered a few artists like Van Gogh, Paul Klee, and Jackson Pollock. We have created a habitat out of milk cartons which included all age groups. We have learned about space, depth, shading and other elements and principles of art. At this age students need to explore and learn on their own as much as they need to be taught. Art can be fun and exciting and students need to be encouraged as much as possible. In this web page, I hope you can find materials related to art education, student development and projects to use at home. I hope that my web page will only get better as time goes on and any input you may have will be greatly appreciated!
Thanks, Mr. Cox |