Art Room Update, Week of 9/18/18 and Behavior Grade
Kindergarten through eighth grade spent the first two half weeks decorating their portfolios and revisited Art Room rules. This week, Kindergarten began a Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944) lesson, creating concentric circles of different sizes and widths within first one square, then graduated to six squares. Using oil pastels and watercolors, students discovered that oil and water don’t mix. First grade began their self portraits in crayon, while second grade students looked at the self portraits by Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890), and began theirs in oil pastel. Second graders became familiar with the self portraits by Paul Gauguin (1848-1903). Third grade finished their portfolios, and will start self-portraits next week. Fourth grade are working on a warm/cool color landscapes with trees using oil pastel and watercolor. Fifth grade looked a series of self portraits by Albrecht Durer (1471-1528), from age 11 to 27, noticing the incredible amount of detail in his work, as well as the highlights and shadows. We reviewed facial proportions, noticing where shadows tend to fall on the human face. They have been taught how to use a “torchon” or “stump” to blend the graphite shadows on their faces.
Sixth grade are creating symmetrical name insects out of their names in “bubble script” letters, noting that insects have 6 legs, 2 antennae, and 2 compound eyes. Seventh grade began a sneaker design unit, looking at designs by Tinker Hatfield (1952-) to start. They did some research in groups on sneaker design, technology, and trends and will continue this next week. Eighth grade will begin to design skateboards next week, based upon the work of Japanese artist Takashi Murakami (1962-).
BEHAVIOR GRADE: This year grades three through eight will receive a “behavior grade” in School Loop. Every student will begin each week with 100% as I fully believe and expect that they can follow art room rules, and conduct themselves appropriately. Students who aren’t following the rules or keeping noise levels at a reasonable rate will be warned once, and if necessary, given a final warning. If they haven’t corrected themselves a third time, 25% of their behavior grade will be deducted, equaling 75, or a “C.” 25% will be deducted thereafter if they continue to ignore the rules. The behavior grade counts as half of the overall art grade.
Parents will be able to see behavior grades posted weekly in School Loop.