Art Teacher Planner For A New Year

Winter break is always a great time to charge our mental batteries. Normally the New Year signals our return to work and many of us wish for time to slow down. This year it seems we are all quite eager to close the door to last year and welcome in the new year as quickly as possible. 

Perhaps the return to school this January looks a bit different. Maybe you are returning to your kitchen table zoom sessions, a cart or a new semester of classes and students. Many of us set goals to be more organized in our work and home life. I've updated my Art Teacher Planner dated calendar pages so if you need a fresh start, you have one waiting for you. It still includes the 103 print-as-you-go options (most of which are undated) and the fun extras like dotted journal pages and coloring sheets. But if you would like a pre-printed, dated option that starts Jan 1st, that's in there now as well. 

Happy New Year!

Winter Book Round Up

One of the things I miss most about leaving the elementary level (besides their cute faces) would be children's books. I really love a well illustrated story. So this week, I'm sharing my favorite winter themed books.

Polar Bear Night. (Or Polar Bear Morning) by Stephen Savage

You can't go wrong with either book. Last year I paired it with a fun printmaking lesson. You can read see the original post here.

Who Will See their Shadow This Year by Jerry Pallotta

This is great for groundhog's day connection, teaching shadows in art AND it covers a ton of weather illustrations. I like to pair this with my snowman shadow lesson because in Pennsylvania, it' snows through March. That lesson has been reinvented a few times, most recently with a Starry Night twist.  The first time I used the book, we did some skinny sculptures. Original post here.

Snowflake Bentley by Jacqueline Briggs Martin

 is an amazing book to connect your slightly older artists with the science and math of snowflake design. 3rd-5th have enjoyed this lesson with projects like my notan snowflake and the snowy winter scene with marker prints.

No Two Alike by Keith Baker

This is a fun book for students to observe differences. Let them make two birds with different details. Or two snowflakes cut from the same sized paper. Endless possibilities for your smallest aritsts.

Supertruck by Stephen Savage

I know, this is turning into a Stephen Savage fan page! But seriously. This book is great for boys, teaching basic shapes, perspective, shadows, and cityscape. So many ideas. Last year we did paper collages inspired by the book.

The Mitten by Jan Brett

This is a fun lesson to teach students about textures and patterns. If you're able to project the book in the room there are some fun hidden images on the pages. We've done scratch art and clay mittens inspired by this book.

Ten on the Sled by Kim Norman

This book pairs well with this lesson that I left for a sub. It worked really well K-5 by tweaking the instructions slightly for the different age groups. You can find that lesson here.

Snowmen at Night by Caralyn Buehner

This is fun and inspiring for a variety of projects. I've done printmaking and landscapes with a variety of grades. One of our favorite things to warm up, is a game of "snowman charades." More info on that here.

Inspiring Your Students With Virtual Visits

If possible, 2020 is simultaneously the fastest and slowest year of my life. I can't believe we are already halfway through the 2nd quarter. Due to a snowstorm and covid precautions, our district went fully remote for the next month. Concerned to lose the momentum we've been gaining in my cartooning class, I scheduled a local comic book company to join our zoom this week and speak to the kids.

Students submitted questions in advance using padlet and the session was more Q&A tailored to their questions, which was awesome. Having Joe and Ralph from Echo City Capers  engage with them really lit a fire for many of my students. Some even turned on their cameras and shared work with the artists, which was huge for my camera-shy crew.

I'm hoping to see my classes transfer this excitement into their current assignment to create a comic book page layout. We're using the original character from their model sheet to save time. By breaking this larger assignment into smaller pieces I'm hoping they will stay successful even during this fully remote period. This student's rough layout looks promising:

I'd be lying if I didn't admit that our artist's visit sparked a little something in me as well. This week I've enjoyed spending some time in the evenings adding even more illustrated examples to my narrated video and presentation for the students. 

Does anyone else teach a cartooning class? What are some of your students' favorite assignments? I'm adding every assignment after it's been classroom tested to my growing cartooning class bundle. It even includes the final exam.

Have you done any "virtual visits" or field trips with your art class this year? How did it go? 

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All images in this post are (C) Echo City Capers and (c) The Speckled Sink. If you'd like to host Ralph and Joe, they are a super fun team to work with. There is a contact form on their website linked above.

A lifetime of landscapes

Several years ago I needed a lesson to cover a week's absence after a planned surgery. I wasn't sure if I'd get an art sub, and started getting that awful feeling in the pit of my stomach. What if they let the kids trash the room or waste supplies? It wasn't fair to assign a week of bogus activities or make the sub feel like a babysitter. The compromise was to have students create a monochromatic postcard with watercolor pencils. All the joy of painting with limited supplies and clean up hassle. 

As I looked through my previous lessons to select which I would keep, tweak or toss for this year, I kept coming back to this lesson. There was something really fun for the kids about working small, so I thought...what if we went smaller than a postcard?

A polaroid is smaller than a postcard and it gave them a fun connection to instagram. We rarely work with squares, so that was an added compositional challenge.  

After an intro to color theory and some painting practice, I was concerned they wouldn't be able to show off the many techniques they were learning, and decided a series of 3 would help. They can fit four on a page, so it gives them an extra space for an "oops." And perhaps, because it's almost Christmas the theme of polaroids past, present and future sprung to mind.

Both lessons are available in my TpT shop if you'd rather skip the preparation. 

Collaboration in the time of covid

Recently I've been seeing lots of questions from teachers looking for ways to incorporate some classic collaborations like exquisite corpse. It is, after all that weird time of year where many of us have a short week ahead, maybe some half days or conferences and you're trying to even things out. Grades are probably due and you need a fun break.

While I do have an answer for your exquisite corpse quandary (hint, templates and contact points) why not use this time to expand our art teacher resource bank of collaborative art activities. I recall a fun idea from Ian Sands including post it note mosaics/murals many years ago. Assign each student a color, let them add to a giant wall sized mural. Use the smaller 1" size and break it into 3-4 smaller murals. Great article on murals here. Ian's lesson is available for free here.

(c) Image Ian Sands 2012

Some clever teachers are reinventing this lesson by having students work in shared documents like google sheets to take turns filling in blocks of color to create their images. Some are assigning students into breakout rooms and giving timed contests.

What about a collaborative collage? In this lesson, students are reinforcing their working definitions of juxtaposition, positive and negative space, as well as texture and pattern. Students can share an original drawing or photo of their choice to a folder or space in your virtual classroom. Other students choose a picture that inspires them and they cut out a piece. It is their job to fill the void with a new pattern on texture by holding the photo in front of a variety of objects. 

It is great fun for students to see their reimagined photo. Like a Flat Stanley for the art room! For this lesson have students look at the work of Shamekh Bluwi,  the inspiration for this lesson.

What fun ways are you allowing students to collaborate?

Animation for all ages

There is something about an animation lesson that just hooks kids every time. Thanks to GIFS, tik-tok and boomerangs our students are already well versed on moving pictures. While it was never expressly part of my curriculum, I always tried to sneak a little bit of animation in when I could.

K-2 students absolutely can master some of the basic animation devices like roll ups and thaumatropes. For the littles, I prefer a circle or square on a stick or straw to string, but I usually show them both and let them choose. Two years ago I did an animation station at my elementary STEAM night and the kids (and parents) had so much fun making both of these items. I've also used them as part of my art center and free choice day.

3-5 students love jumping into more complex ideas and if you have access to technology, this might be a great time to work in a little stop motion. A few years back I wrote a grant to get enough white boards and modeling clay for a grade level of 3rd graders. They worked in teams to create animated shorts. They did their titles with dry erase, and their videos were claymations using the stop motion studio app. A few adventurous kids, brought the videos into iMovie and added sound. Original behind the scenes post here.

Middle schoolers will love any of the above PLUS they might have the patience to do an old school zoetrope, phenakistoscope or flip book. My fifth graders were able to do some basic animations in procreate last year. This year, I dedicated a healthy portion of my budget to purchase a procreate license for each of my cartooning students. Using the animation assist feature, they are starting to animate characters they designed. 

We started by examining anthropomorphism and they are working to bring to life an inanimate object. Their first mini assignment was a single action sequence. A wave, a hop, a blink. It's really important for them to separate a single action from a broader term (like "dancing") as many kids will be ready to go with a whole plotline. This student's "nervous" candy is really sweating it out on halloween.

From there, we did a basic squash and stretch activity in procreate with basic shapes. This is how they learned to identify their keys (extremes). We used animation assist to speed up the drawing process.

They are now sketching out a more advanced movement sequence. It's so much fun to watch their ideas come to life. How about frame 5 on this adorable origami boat. I love how he's peeking to check that the coast is clear.

With strong connections to science, writing and math I can guarantee your principal will never complain about you teaching animation in art! If you'd like some help with lesson plans for these ideas you can click the links above for the original posts or you can view my lesson plans:

Historical Animation devices

Animation with Procreate

Stop Motion Lessons

Winter Art Lesson Round Up

What a crazy year it's been. As we head into November it's time to plan those fun, seasonal lessons. While our teaching spaces may look a lot different this year, our students still deserve engaging, educational lessons that can be done in class, off a cart or in their home. The following ten lessons check those boxes and more!

SNOWFLAKE ACTIVITY

What makes snowflakes unique? How do snow crystals get their design? Students will learn the science and math behind a snowflake. Then students will use Expressive Monkey's fun drawing pages to design their own snowflake.

SNEEZY THE SNOWMAN

Combine literature and art in this seasonal snowman project by Look.Between.The.Lines. Sneezy the Snowman is used as a jumping-off point for this drawing and clay project. In addition to learning drawing and clay techniques, students learn about personalizing their artwork by adding unique details to their snowmen. These make perfect gifts for the holiday season.

BASQUIAT BEAR

In this lesson from Ms. Artastic, students use paint and oil pastels to create a winter artwork featuring a polar bear inspired by the style of artist Jean-Michel Basquiat. This is a great way to learn about a contemporary artist, explore mixed media art, and create winter themed art at the same time. This resource is complete with a visual and text step-by-step, a rubric for marking, a lesson plan, a finished example, and a step-by-step drawing handout.

PERSPECTIVE PACKAGES

Capture your students' attention with this fresh take on perspective. This project is easily scaled up or down by requiring patterns on the wrapping paper and texture on the wall or floor. Lesson includes step by step directions for creating boxes in two point perspective and is suitable for 4th-7th grades. The example shown here is from a fourth grade student.

SNOWY LANDSCAPE

Teach elementary or middle school artists about creating depth in landscapes with this mixed media project. Perfect for a winter lesson, students create snowy landscapes that focus on drawing trees and creating depth through placement, size, and overlapping. This visual art lesson is a 2-3 day project and is designed for 2nd-7th grade. Guided drawing handouts and printable posters included.

A SNOWY VIEW

Teaching students at home? Chances are they can do this seasonal printmaking lesson with just one marker and a styrofoam plate. The "add a snowflake" method makes each print unique and the combined effect is dazzling. A symmetry skill builder is included and ready to load to your digital classroom.

WINTER MUG

This art lesson from Glitter Meets Glue is perfect for elementary teachers wanting to learn how to paint on a budget with markers (yes, markers!). Step-by-step picture directions are given for how to transfer the template to drawing paper and fill it in with designs. Choose between patterns on a fun roll a dice game.

PAPER POINTSETTIA

Looking for a new winter-themed art lesson for your classroom? Art With Mrs. Nguyen has a lesson for creating paper poinsettia sculptures. Great fine motor practice for your students, in class or at home.

PENGUIN MOSAIC COLLABORATION 

Teach kids about collaboration and symmetry while creating a beautiful mosaic. A Space to Create has designed this simple lesson. Just print a template, have students color and compile to make a colorful wintertime mosaic. Perfect quick art activity for any classroom.

LINE ORNAMENT

Have you been tasked to create a quick seasonal "gift" with your art class? This is a great way to accommodate that request, while checking the elements of line, shape, positive and negative space off your to-do list. Teaching students remotely? If they have access to plastic take out containers and a sharpie, they can do this lesson from home.  Includes handouts to print or post on the element of line and two symmetrical drawing activities for early finishers.

It's never too early to plan. Having the next two months mapped out in advance will make it easier to focus on your own family and self-care this holiday season. If you are the go-to person for making holiday gifts with your students in your art class, having ideas that align to your curriculum before the requests start coming your way will provide a relief from that added stress. Some of us are not seeing our students on the regular basis we are used to, and it might take a little longer to get items completed. Hopefully this list inspires you and your students this winter.

Rust Printed Flags

It's been amazing to return to the high school level this year and revisit some of my favorite lessons. This year's first batch of rust printed banners does not disappoint. I believe this is the first student to ever change the banner shape. 

This lesson was designed for a high school contemporary art course. Students meet alternating days for 1 semester in a block format. There is no prerequisite. Here's more info on our class. 

Original post on rust printing here.

Cartooning Class

This year I am teaching a cartooning class for the first time. Due to the way school ended, I didn't get a really good chance to discuss the course with the retiring teacher,  so I've been making it up as I go. 

So far they have completed a caricature of a famous person and a model sheet of an original character. They are completely blowing me away with their talent. There is currently no prerequisite for the course so it's a mixed bag of ages and abilities.

Looking forward to the 2nd half of the course with these kids. With the current state of education I used a good chunk of my budget to purchase a procreate license for each student so we are moving on to animation next!

The Monster Mash Up

Some lessons are timeless. Six years ago I posted an exquisite corpse lesson plan that I have done with students in grades 3-12 and I am still hoping I can sneak it in this year now that I'm back at the high school. Right now my cartooning classes are developing original characters and it might be fun to have them submit and edit these digitally.

Since posting that lesson, I have added these fun muddle and match books from usborne to my growing resources for the project, which include a halloween card from 10 years ago.

The topic of "seasonal" art is sometimes hotly debated, especially at the high school level. I think an art teacher in an exploratory course like Art 1, could definitely make connections to surrealism and this could develop beyond a fluff piece for decoration. While I wouldn't have students collaborate their paper drawings this year, a technology connection could make this more interactive and add a layer of engagement and excitement.

Do you use seasonal inspiration for middle and high school art classes?

Memento Mori Art Lesson

Fall is here and it's a bit odd not to be in the middle of the Yayoi Kusama mania and pumpkin patches that dominate the elementary art world. I was trying to think of what meaningful, natural connections could be made at the high school level this time of year. One of my students' favorite lessons was the vanita projects that I used to assign at the end of the year. By switching from vanita and leaning in the direction of memento mori, I'm thinking students may be drawn into the lesson a bit more.

Since students are partially working from home, it might be fun to have them consider the symbolic elements around them. At this time of year, they may have access to skull decorations that could be integrated into their pictures.

How do you handle "seasonal" art and inspiration in your high school art room?

Contour Line

 My Art 1's wrapped up their first project a few weeks back and I'm beyond thrilled with the results. 

Some of these students I have had the pleasure of teaching at the elementary level and now again as high school art majors. 

So cool to see their growth. 

We spent some time exploring the element line and then I had them draw from observation using real flowers. 

We added just a pop of color, allowing the quality of their line steal the show.

It was also nice to test drive the painting process with social distancing before diving into a big paint project.