Ahh October Air

I love October.

Aside from it being the month of my birth, and the month of my favorite holiday...Halloween, it smells so nice!!! And seeing all the beautiful colors of the trees is so centering!!

So much has been going on!! I'm super busy lately. All of my students are starting new projects....that's all 4 different prep classes, 6th, 7th, 8th and 8th GT. But I am super excited about all of them!!!

I am also super excited about how AWESOME my classroom is, and how AWESOME my students are!!! For my birthday I received 5 different plants!!! I love plants, and now my classroom is full of them!!!  We have a total of 14 plants!  Wow I didn't realize there were so many of them!!!

I have been taking so many pictures lately, I just haven't had time to upload them!!

So I just received my 100 ATC's from Reading, MA!! Its like Christmas!!

Adopt-a-classroom!

How cool is this?!! Its a website you can create for your classroom in order to generate donations for something you want for your classroom. 

I really want a digital station in my classroom in order for my students to be able to create digital art through photoshop or other programs. I feel like they are missing that aspect from art class. Its so much of who they are as people, in their free time they are on computers constantly...to keep pretending they are not the center of our society is just hindering our students.

Aside from this cool website, I've been great. Work is awesome. I simply love my students.

We are creating our ATC's starting today...we're swaping on SWAP-BOT.com. They are VERY excited!  As am I! I cant wait to see their work and start taking pictures to show you! I have to upload the pictures of my classroom still. Its looking awesome!

Hope everyone has a great day!!

First Monday of the year...

So today is the first Monday of school this year. Last week we had off because of Labor Day and the week before it was because of hurricane Irene. Today doesn't feel like a Monday!

I love my students this year, and the way things are going its going to be an AWESOME year!!

So I guess a little about myself...I teach middle school, 6th 7th and 8th grades, this is my 4th year in Baltimore, Maryland. I love my school...my faculty...and that students I teach. My biggest challenge is deciding on what projects to do!

I graduated in 2008 and found out I got the job the Friday before teachers came back from professional development! It was a hectic beginning of the year but I did it...and this is now my 4th year! I cant believe it!!! I've been at the same school all four years.

I love what I do! I couldn't and wouldnt teach anything other than art!!

Just wanted to stop by and post since its been a while, and I've been super busy getting back to the work schedule. I'll post more later!!! :)

An extra week of summer....

So I was blessed with an unexpected extra week of summer, THANKS IRENE!! :)

A whole week to relax with my loves, make some things for school, and find awesome ideas for this school year! My school was one of 4 middle schools in our county that did not get power restored in time for school to open this week!

And now I have a nice weekend before my first day of work. We're going to go hiking on the Appalachian trail. We've been a couple times before and we love it. There are shelters on the trail as you hike so you dont have to carry a tent, just a sleeping bag. Thats what we're doing for Labor day weekend. I'm SUPER excited!! :) I think it might rain, but I dont mind. I like it because its a different feeling and atmosphere when you're in the woods in the rain.

I'll post more, but for now, I'm going to go to Bonefish and eat some bang bang shrimp and then I have a double header softball game :)

First 4 days of school...canceled

So my school is one of three in the county that still does not have power. Our first day was supposed to be Monday, but we've been off and are off again tomorrow.  I don't think it makes sense to have us go back for just Friday right before a holiday with Monday off. haha. I have been SOOO excited to get back to work...and we have a whole week off!! I don't know what to do with myself! I want to go in but I don't feel like working in the dark.

So I've been making a lot of visuals. This year our visual arts office is focusing on the 4 C's....Creating, Communication, Critical Thinking, and Collaboration.  So I created this poster to display them and I made these awesome cards for each of my three tables.  Like mini posters with the definitions of each thing on the back.  I think I'm going to have my students pay attention to how they incorporate these 4 C's into their every day life.  I'm planning on having a set collaboration time for each project in order for everyone to get some extra ideas or inspiration.

Once they're finished I'm going to take pictures and post them.

I watched this awesome clip about education that just blew me away.



I think I'm going to make a poster that says "If you're not prepared to be wrong, you will never come up with anything original." I think this is an awesome quote for middle school students!!

What are your thoughts??

This your brain on art....

I think I'm going to make one or two more today, since there's no school again. I don't think we'll have school tomorrow either.

So I found this Awesome Book! that I think I'm going to read to all of my classes when we finally start school.

I've been doing a lot of online research about trying to get my classroom more student centered and technological. I want to be able to give my students the chance to create and express themselves while learning new ways to create art that are relevant to the lifestyle they are growing up in...i.e. technology.

I want to create lessons that help them better use the technology in their lives.

I was reading Game Informer Magazine and there was an article called "Art Attack" about a group of artists called iam8bit have taken over Los Angeles gallery world with video-game inspired art. I thought WOW what a better way to get my students engaged.  Showing them how something they play everyday is actually art and can be used to inspire art.  I could have them create a narrative based on what happens in a video game if the game was real life. Like...what does the inside of the huddle look like on Madden, or what's Mario doing inside the warp tunnel? What happens after the Mario Kart races are over?  For high school you could have them create paintings that represent the way they see the game.  Allowing their imaginations to fill in the gaps.  Students can create this work in any materials they have available to them.

Divergent thinking: a thought process or method used to generate creative ideas by exploring many possible solutions.

I want to teach my students the importance of Divergent thinking as opposed to Convergent thinking which generally means the ability to give the "correct" answer to standard questions that do not require significant creativity, for instance in most tasks in school and on standardized multiple-choice tests for intelligence.

Any ideas from any of you out there? Agree/disagree? thoughts??

Countdown...1 day..oh wait make that 2!

So this past week was my first week back to work! A lot of meetings, but also a lot of work done! I finished setting up my room, with a few signs still needing to be posted. I will post pictures soon! I am super excited!!

I just found out that our first day of school isn't until Tuesday because of Irene the not so large hurricane. It didn't feel that bad where I lived. We didn't lose power or anything, so we were lucky.

This whole weekend I was working on my posters and my plans for the first week. Now I am pretty much finished, just a few little details. Once they're done I'm going to take pictures and post them. I wish I would've taken pics before I left school on Friday. I have old pictures from my classroom the past 3 years. I'll post those too.

Now that I have another day to myself...I think I might go camping tonight.

Countdown...8 days....

So I've decided to go into work next week for a day to set up bulletin boards and such. I'm soooo excited. I can't wait! My friend Kristen who is also an art teacher but for Elementary School, is going to come with me and help...and I"m going to go to her school with her one day and help her set up. I love back to school time.

So my bulletin board idea is to make a world out of cardboard from boxes like pepsi, snack boxes, and cereal boxes and then write the worlds "LIFE is ART" and put examples of things in our world that are art...like Movie covers, CD covers, clothing, ads, commercials, music videos, plays, architecture, toys, history records, books, interior design, graphics...etc. Its a HUGE bulletin board so I have lots of room to make it all nice and big!

I'm going to create a station called Express Yourself! where the students can create any kind of art that expresses one of the following, or all... Today I... Yesterday I .... Tomorrow I... They will have access to all materials, no limits. They'll have to make at least one per quarter. This promotes focus and drive to finish projects early or on time, in order to make a free art project about themselves anyway they want.

I've also decided to try going at this year with no teacher desk. Constant movement around the room helping every student succeed to their highest potential. Making my classroom not a classroom, but transforming it into a studio...with 32 artists working together on a task and expressing themselves. We'll see how it goes.

Countdown...11 days...

There are 11 days until I go back to work!!

I'm super excited...not too many people can say that about going back to work...but I love my job.

I created this blog to share my ideas, thoughts, and creations with the world.
I would also like this to be a place where other art teachers come and share their thoughts and ideas.

As the summer winds down yet again, in 11 days I will be starting my 4th year as a middle school art teacher in Maryland...I've been at the same school since I got hired right out of college.

I've been thinking about all that needs to be done before the students come back...and I really want to do some things different in my classroom with layout, supplies and displays. I'm trying to find some awesome back to school bulletin board ideas but I've had little luck. I guess I just have to stop being in summer mode and start coming up with the ideas myself. I think I might do something with words... like CREATE, EXPRESS YOURSELF, GET YOUR ART ON...or even "Fall into Art" which is kinda lame because its used so much...but maybe I can turn it into something awesome. Its hard cause most of the ideas online are for elementary schools, but I want my boards to be more sophisticated...if that makes sense. Maybe I'll pick quotes or something. Any ideas?!

Aside from bulletin board ideas, I was thinking about having supply stations. Right now all of my art supplies are in the cabinets...nice and neatly put away where students can't touch. But I feel like as artists they should be able to have access to the supplies to use in their work if they want to. I want to make my classroom "artist" centered. I want my students to come in feeling like artist, not students.

I feel like thats the issue with middle school students and art. They don't see art as expression, but as a class. Art is not a class...its a way of life...its expression and creation. I want them to learn new things, but in order to use those things in being able to better express themselves...not just because they're supposed to know it by a certain grade.

So how do I arrange my room? How do I set up my stations? This is my first time trying it...it gives me anxiety. Making sure I'm sticking to the curriculum, keeping my students behavior in check, and making them feel like they can create awesome work even if they aren't the "best" at drawing, painting, or sculpture. I want them to realize that art isn't about making it look just like something, but its about EXPRESSION. It can be about replicating...and technique, but they're only in middle school....how much technique can they have? I don't want to lose them on technique.

I think for my first day of school I am going to have students create Post-Cards that share things other people would not necessarily know about them. I've based this off of Post-Secret by Frank Warren. I think kids will love this...they can express themselves ANY way they want, and we all get to know each other a little better.