Well.... I did it.

I finally did it.  I realize that I should have some of my videos to view not only for students who are making up work, but for colleagues who are interested in them as well.  I've posted them to my YouTube where it can be easily accessed.

Two years ago I decided to flip my classroom and it was a game changer!  Like many art teachers, I follow Cassie Stephens. When she posted a few videos about "flipping" her classroom and showing instructional videos, I initially thought that would be too difficult. But I tried it out by recording my two girls demonstrating how to go through a day in art class for the first week of school and it was the SMOOTHEST first week ever!  I was less drained because I didn't feel like I was constantly repeating myself, I could walk around the classroom and watch the students at the same time "I" was giving directions.  It was also nice to be able to replay the instructions on kindergarten and pre-k centers for their first few weeks.

I was hooked after that!  I made up a schedule to keep myself ahead of my unit time tables and to hold myself accountable.  After the first year, I had a full year's worth of lessons recorded for grades 1-5 and half a years worth for Kindergarten.  This year, I focused on rounding out the videos in each grade level with more units, recorded more kindergarten, and began pre-k videos.  I have also started recording a few sub lessons so my students can still get a good art lesson while I'm gone.

Heading into my third "flipped" year, I hope to focus more on sub lessons and redo some of my older videos that are more long-winded in addition to building my 'library' of units.

I've streamlined a lot of instructional time, cutting it down quite a bit.  The students seem to retain more and I can keep myself consistent between classes - not forgetting to mention things and not feeling like I've repeated myself more than I actually have. I also don't have to stop for behavior problems or talking students and can quietly address it with them while the rest of the class still gets their lesson.

And let me just say, put in a little background music and you got yourself a video!  Those kids will stare transfixed.  It's magical.  Even my normally distracted students, who tend to talk while I talk or misbehave, are silent during videos.

Try it.  I guarantee, you'll never look back.

Birch Trees

An old post from last year that never got posted:

Fifth grade has FINALLY completed their foreshortened birch trees! They did a great job with them!

2nd Grade made stand up towns to create communities!  They each designed a small section (or street) out of cut paper and once they were done, they worked in teams to create neighborhoods, arranging the streets in different ways. One group decided on a big circle facing outwards so all the kids could play together in the big backyard it created,  Another made long streets and cul-de-sacs!  At the very end of the last day, we all put out neighborhoods together in one bi classroom community. I looked at the pictures and recreated some of the formations in the display window after the unit was over.

3rd Grade stained glass

Happy 2018!

We've been very busy in the art room this year!  I'll be putting recent works in a few new posts!

We did a stained glass unit with 3rd grade where we learned about the process of creating stained glass and designed our own window using rotating symmetry.  We used transparency sheets and sharpies.  After drawing the design on paper, I taped the plastic sheets on top and they traced their lines carefully with black sharpies (acting as the lead of the window).  I had them flip their sheet over to the back to color the shapes in, still using the white paper so they could more easily see their colors.  Flipping the sheets prevented the black from running into the colors so the works turned out nice and clean!

They were so focused and excited about these windows - and that's been a challenge this year!

Early finishers took a look at rose windows' radial symmetry and created a symmetrically colored rose window as I noticed a few students that didn't quite translate the rotating symmetry to the color part of the lesson.  I think the next time I do this project, I may have them do the colored rose window first before adding color to their own windows...