I Like to Move It, Move It Final Drawing

One of the fairly recent animated movies was Madagascar and the lemurs were always dancing to the lively, "I like to Move it, Move it." I used that song to get kids to stand up and wiggle since there really was no room to move. We looked at examples of figure proportion and the artwork of Keith Haring to create stick figures in movement. This was an introduction to gesture drawing and capturing movement in drawing. (See Animoto below)

Intro to Paper Mache'

First graders got a chance to see the Chicago Cows, the Milwaukee Beasties, and the Holy Family Bears in their Prezi introduction to paper mache. We will be doing something akin to the beasties in the first and second grade classes.
Stuffing plastic grocery bags with crushed up newspaper was the first step to creating our beasties. Tactile activities are important and paper mache' is a cheap alternative to clay. (See Animoto below)

I Like to Move It, Move It!

Students pose for each other in order to practice gesture drawing. Students need to work on human proportion or they will stagnate at a stick figure/lack of movement stage in their drawings. This playful approach allows the natural growth of this skill. (See Animoto below)

First Graders Figure Drawing

I can't emphasize this enough, but children need concrete instruction in figure drawing or they will eventually struggle and give up drawing people. They need to understand the relationship of body parts and their proper proportion. They won't master this but it will give them a sense of what is correct when they see it. (See Animoto below)

Calligraphy: An Introduction to Beautiful Writing

There is a lot of debate about teaching cursive writing because of the use of computers. I do not want to see writing skills such as cursive and calligraphy be lost just because we use computers. Lettering is an important hand skill and I loved introducing it to students. Oddly, female students skewed towards Italic with its rounded strokes and the males skewed towards Old English with it's boxy strokes. (See slideshow below)

Calligraphy Stack

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Getting to Know You Prezi

Students in the Digital/Studio Art Electives will use Prezi to create a Get to Know Me presentation where they will share their favorite things, goals, etc. This is part of the community building we will be doing. Today was our first day and I shared my 30 Things About Me presentation with them so they could also get to know me as a person. I look forward to really getting to know my students and create an environment where they can learn and explore their own creativity along with technical skills. Ms. Strehlow Prezi  (See Prezi below)

New Gimp Assignment for Digital Art Class

How2 fixurpix2

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Fourth Grade One Point Perspective Designs

3rd and 4th graders got a taste of 1 point perspective and learned about 90 degree angles, using a 30/60/90 triangle as a checking tool, and to create parallel lines with a grid ruler on graph paper. Some of the 3rd graders found it challenging enough just to hold down a ruler and construct straight lines while a few sailed through the entire concept. This is the kind of thing that just takes some more practice till they "get it." Here are some of the 4th graders and their finished designs. (See Animoto below)

Fiber Arts: Needlework Basics

Some of the 5th and 6th graders chose to work on embroidery samplers and it has been fun to revisit some of the basic stitches with them such as the chain stitch and cross stitch. (See Animoto below)

Painting Techniques Day One and Two

Kindergarten through 4th grade students are learning how to handle different types of brushes and experiment with different painting techniques. We began with the care of watercolor brushes; learning how to clean them and prevent paint contamination. We will do several such explorations before actually trying to paint something. (See Animotos below)