2013 Partners in Art

I am always amazed at the end of the year when I have to make selections for the annual middle school art show, the St. Joseph ISD, and Partners in Art.  My students are so talented and truthfully the art program at Sturgis Public Schools is top notch.  All of the art teachers, at every level, are so dedicated to their profession and craft.  The other night I had the pleasure of attending the Partners in Art celebration held at the Sturges Young Civic Auditorium.  I hadn't been to the party for three years because we had parent teacher conferences on the same night, so being able to attend the exhibit was just wonderful.

Partners in Art is a program put on by the Sturgis Arts Council.  Area art teachers select artwork from their students.  These are matted and framed and then area businesses can rent them for a year.  The rental cost is basically to pay for the framing.  Students get their artwork back with the frame a year later.  It is a wonderful program and a huge honor for any student that is fortunate enough to get selected.

I have put together a little video of the event so I hope you enjoy it.

Creating Art for My Art Classroom

I am always trying to get my students motivated to create art.  I think the best way to do this is by creating art myself.  Over the summer I created some artworks to hopefully inspire them in some way.  I have always used these to decorate my classroom to try and dispel the cold, ugly look of the painted walls.  So here are some artworks that can be found in my room that are used to inpsire my students.

I am always trying to motivate students to be their best.  I feel they have the power to become whatever they choose, hopefully someone that is productive and positive.

This poster was created a couple of years ago at vistaprint.  I highly recommend the website for their prices and usability.

With this little drawing, I am just trying to get students to think about their compostions.  How are they using the space?

 This came out after a college student that I used to have in art at the middle school posted on her Facebook page, "Earth without art is just "Eh."  I had never read that before but I thought it was cute and so true.  When I looked online to find art that had that statement I didn't find much so I created my own on a canvas  because I knew my students would enjoy it.

The color on this upload is a bit off but this was just for fun.

 This was created to inspire students to focus on their behavior while in art class.

 This was to help students think about developing their skills in art class.

 I find that many middle school girls love fairies so I wanted to inspire them to create.

 Even the "chill out zone" can be a place to find inspiration in my classroom.

 I created this painting to showcase our mission statement.  After it was created I had my students paint one for every classroom at my school.  They are all different and inspirational.

 Clustered here is an eclectic grouping made from a friend, a student, and myself.  All of course can hopefully inspire some of my students.

 This summer I decided to create an art class bill of rights because in our maddening, testing, world I think artists need to unite and know that being creative is a wonderful thing.

 Enough said,  I want my students' imaginations to go wild and lead them wherever they can find a place to be creative.

 Art can be simple but say a lot and I want my students to always look for the bright spots in their art.

 This was made by a student of mine.  It was an idea of course pilfered from the Internet and Pinterest.

 Imagination is where it is at.  If you cannot use your imagination, you are probably doomed to be very boring.

 I always find inspiration from other artists including Laurel Burch.  I love the shimmer of metallic paints as well. I just wanted my students to understand blending and layering with this one.

 This was purchased at a family reunion to help raise money for the next family reunion.  I bought it to inspire my students.  It is large and very fun.

This is what greets my students when they come into my artroom.  I believe it takes a village to raise a child and I am an important part of the village of Sturgis.

 Learning is what it is all about.  I teach and hope my students learn something from me.  I am always learning from my students.

Hopefully, seeing some of the artworks in my room will inspire someone else to create art.

Say, "Hello" to My Little Friends

It's time to get serious about classroom management.  This past summer I spent a lot of time trying to create a new plan for my classroom.  I wanted to create a special environment that any student would want to be in.  I started by creating art for my classroom, searching Pinterest for ideas, and brainstorming by myself.  I worked really hard to come up with a plan for the school year.  I wanted my room to stand out as a place where excellent things happen.  I wanted a new plan for my classroom that would motivate my students to behave and want to create art.

I ended up with two new friends.  They are Class Dojo and the "No Yell" bell.  Seriously, if you don't have these, get them.

I absolutely love Class Dojo.  I am using it two ways.  I use it to monitor student individual behavior but I also have each class set up as table behavior.  I have two classes on Class DoJo for each of my classes.  I did this because I wanted to create a reward system that was fun for my students and would force the ones that don't like to clean up to clean up.  When my students come into my classroom they know that they must be seated when the bell rings in order to get a point.  I have very few tardies anymore.  There is less wasted time getting students to settle down because they know I am giving them points if they are quiet.  Class Dojo is so easy to set up but what is really nice is I can constantly change the positive and negative behaviors.  I have added things like "turning in quality artwork" to "volunteering".  Students know that I am looking at them and thinking about their behavior and it keeps them on their toes.  Luckily, my sixth grade students already knew about Class Dojo because a couple of their exploratory teachers had been using it last year.  My seventh and eighth grade students were unfamiliar with it but loved the cute little avatars.

At first, some of my 8th grade students thought it was silly and they were going to get many negative points.  I told them that this was going to be their behavior grade.  In reality, after they saw some of the rewards the students were getting they started to take it more seriously.  I have a class of 31 8th grade students with only 6 girls in it.  Many of the boys are students that aren't really into school and have many behavior issues in most of their classes.  I discovered that Class Dojo is really working for them.  One day Class Dojo was down and the difference in attitude and behavior was amazing.  I was so happy when the Internet was back to normal.  I display Class Dojo on my projector so students know which tables are getting points and even which students are getting points.

My reward system is interesting.  I told students they could negotiate what their reward would be with me.  I have a giant bucket of Dum Dum suckers, Little Debbie type cookies bought at the Dollar store, trinkets from Smile Makers, and any combination of those.  Students can also bring their music for a week or go make a movie together and replace one of their projects.  Students can replace a project with a different type of art project.  I am open to negotiate with them and make them feel like they really got something great!
Some 6th and 7th grade students decided it would be fun to learn about pixelation.  They got to create a stop motion animation of people.  I also let them work with Sam Animation and One True Media.  So, while they were having fun, they were still learning!  Here are two videos made this week from students who chose this as their reward:
This first one was made by sixth grade students.

 This one was made by seventh grade students.

When a table of students win an award for getting points on Class DoJo, I allow them to have these trophies on their table for a week if they want to kind of "show off" that they are special.

If a student wants to have their music for a week, I have them put the trophy in front of them so I am reminded that they earned the privilege.  Class Dojo is so much fun for my students and even me.  It makes my classroom run smoothly and my "No Yell" bell alerts students to listen or clean up.

The NO Yell bell is digital.  It has 7 sounds on it.  I use two of the sounds.  Number 4 sounds like some alien ship.  I use it to alert students to the fact that I need to say something.  It is highly effective.  Often times students don't pay attention to their teachers which causes teachers to escalate their voice.  I am no stranger to that one.  The No Yell bell stops that behavior.  The students settle right down because they know I need to talk with them.  I use number 6 as our clean up bell.  It is like a clicking sound and then a buzzer like you are running out of time.  When that bell goes off my students get right to work on their clean up jobs.  I have color coded the tables and I have a chart on my white board that I rotate the colors on so that each week students have different jobs.

I have even more things to share about how I set up my room this year but I will save that for the coming weeks.  I hope this helps anyone out there reading my blog.  Your two best friends could be Class Dojo and the No Yell bell.  I know they are mine!