Purdy Elementary School

I grew up in Fort Atkinson, WI and went to Purdy Elementary School kindergarten through 5th grade. All six years, I had an amazing and inspiring elementary art teacher named Mrs. Gomez. She always had visiting artists, operas and murals. You name it, she’s done it. Even though the district has increased her work load to almost double that of when she started teaching, she still manages to create permanent public art to make Purdy the special place I remember it growing up.

Clay stomp mural from Joel Pfeiffer a few years ago

Clay stomp mural from 1992..

..and my tile from the clay stomp in second grade!

Beautiful mosaic

A couple of tile walls

Amazing mural in the lunch room

I visited with Mrs. Gomez over winter break. As we are now colleagues and no longer teacher/student, our discussions turned to a more political and professional direction. I’m worried that amazing teachers like Mrs. Gomez and the programs they have created are going to fade out unless we fight for them. Every child deserves the art experience I had growing up. I will advocate and fight for my students to make sure they have inspiring art experiences as well.

Georgia O’Keeffe in 3-D

Fourth graders focus on Wisconsin artists. Last semester they drew from observation and created beautiful watercolors inspired by Georgia O’Keeffe. Then they took those 2-D watercolors and created 3-D clay sculptures inspired by the watercolors.

 

Claes Oldenburg

5th graders have been learning about Pop Art this semester. We first started with Andy Warhol and have now moved on to Claes Oldenburg.

After sketching items and foods we use in every day life, we practiced our clay techniques and made sculptures out of our every day objects.

We began by watching a short video of Oldenburg’s giant BLT sandwich and discussing how the scale and media changed the purpose of the object. We learned from Warhol that Pop Art is about changing everyday objects into something new.

After sketching items and foods we use in every day life, we practiced our clay techniques and made sculptures out of our every day objects.

 

Resolutions for the New Year

I believe that you aren’t a good teacher unless you are willing to CONSTANTLY change and grow! No matter how long you’ve been teaching or how many good reviews you’ve gotten, there is ALWAYS room to grow. My resolutions are based on things that I have learned in 2011. On that note, here are my goals for 2012 as a teacher!

1. Finish my Class Action Research about using PBS to curb bullying at Randall in terms of class and race differences.

2. Delegate! I will delegate hanging artwork, student council responsibilities and general things that need to be done. I will recognize that I don’t need to do it all in order for it to get done!

3. I will reach out to the parents, teachers, my union MTI, school board, administration and superintendent to learn about and change our racial achievement gap in Madison.

4. I will become more active in local politics to advocate for ALL our Madison students and public education including working on school board elections.

5. I will create lesson plans that are under three weeks for students to finish so students are able to have more of a variety of experiences in art.

 

Hold me to ‘em and Happy New Year to all!

Eric Carle’s Dream Snow

First graders learned about collage and overlapping with Eric Carle’s book Dream Snow.

On the first day, we watched a short video and saw Eric Carle himself created his art papers. Then we made our own with our own colors and patterns. On the second day we used our art paper to create a collage to tell a story about what we like to do on snow days.

And then we overlapped our collages with a transparency and painted our own white blankets over the collages.

Watch for Josue’s amazing work (pictured above) in February at South West Wisconsin’s Youth Art Month show at Hilldale Mall!

 

 

Recycled Art Metals

This is not my project. I was walking through the Doyle Administration the other day and saw these wonderful metal sculptures and I had to share them with you.

Amy Mietzel is the art teacher at Cherokee Middle School. She took recycled metals and her students created these beautiful creatures.

Not white, not black, not blue..

1st grade learned about contrast in this story about a penguin looking for something more.

The penguins discover that everything is black, white or blue. As the story went on, the penguins found something ORANGE and learned blue and orange are complimentary colors and create contrast.

Each student drew their own penguin story with black, blue and white oil pastels. The very last thing they added was their something orange.

Randall Neighborhood Walk

Terrace Town is fast approaching. We have three Randall classes that are participating this year! My role is a little different this time around. Last time I did Terrace Town with three fifth grade classes with no collaboration from classroom teachers. This year, the three classroom teachers are in charge of everything but construction and even that’s a collaborative effort! It’s so much more fun when we all work together.. : )

My role in Terrace Town kicked off last week with a walking tour of our neighborhood with our students, teachers and wonderful parent volunteers.

Here’s a photo diary of our journey-

Bike trails. See the Capitol hiding back there?Mixed use buildings with small, local businesses.

Mini-library.

Another mixed use building, Trader Joe’s.

Finding answers on our worksheets..

Talking about the Indian Mounds in the green space.

Accessibility issues.

Co-housing.

Walking back.. : )

 

Neighborhood House Auction

The Neighborhood House held an auction this last weekend as a fundraiser.

Our beautiful third grade Circle Paintings were a hit! They raised almost $200 for our Neighborhood House. You should be so proud of yourselves, Randall 3rd graders!!

They were also a beautiful backdrop for the amazing music I had the pleasure of listening too. What a great afternoon and wonderful display of genuine community!!

Dale Chihuly

This blog post is a little over due and it is inspired by Miss Oetken’s Artists.

As third graders, we obviously can’t actually blow glass but this website from the Children’s Museum of Indianapolis was perfect for showing us how real glass blowers do it! We also watched this video where Dale Chihuly gave a lesson on glass blowing to a news reporter.

After learning a little about the glass blowing process, students had a chance to really study Chihuly’s forms and colors. After the Circle Paintings, students knew what collaborative art was and learned that glass blowing can really only be done collaboratively. It’s very difficult to do without help.

Dale Chihuly also has work installed at the Kohl Center here in Madison. Does this look familiar?

Students sketched out some ideas for their own Chihuly sculptures before they began their own projects. Their sketches are inspired by the forms and colors in Chihuly’s work.

Then students used Sharpies to draw their colors and patterns on SOLO clear plastic cups. I used the SOLO brand because after they are melted in the oven, they are easy to poke a hole into for display. They are also easy and safe for the kids to cut into Chihuly forms as well. Other brands have cracked instead of cutting neatly.

If students finished early, they created their own paper Chihuly sculptures.

After the students did their part, I took each of them and melted them in the oven. (250 degrees for a minute or two, just until they begin to curl).

All together hanging in the library. Aren’t they beautiful? There have been SO many comments on this amazing sculpture. Even parents are asking ‘is that REAL glass?” : )