Art 7: Elements of Art Project

After finishing up our graffiti unit, the next unit of focus in my Art 7 classes was the elements of art.  I created a note packet with snipets of worksheets and information that I "borrowed" from Pinterest.  Each page in the note packet concentrated on a single element and had some sort of drawing exercise, as well as vocabulary and definitions.

These pages took us about two class periods to complete.  Then, we were on to the first project.  The requirements were that students had to write the word(s) Elements (of Art) in the middle of their page using an interesting lettering style (pulling in from the graffiti unit).  Next, they had to split the page into seven sections, drawing lines through their letters.  This was tough for some students!  Lastly, they had to illustrate each section to represent one of the elements.  They were not allowed to write which element they illustrated...if I couldn't tell by looking at their drawing, then they had to go back and review that element.

In general, I thought this project turned out OK.  This group of 7th graders is struggling across the board in all area of academics, and it's starting to show in their art as well.  They were not very creative when it came to their designs.  Almost everyone did a brick wall for texture...not very thought out!  There was a lot of copying going on, and very few followed the directions or paid attention to the rubric very well.  In some cases, I asked for 5+ examples of an element in their picture, and they only gave 1 or 2.  I actually think that I might replace the infographic project for my Studio Art students next year with this project.

The final project in the elements of art unit is a hard-edge tempera painting.  Students are in the process of finishing these up after our winter break (and delays for -degree temperatures!).

Studio Art: Value Practice

This project was purely taken from the following pin on Pinterest.  Mrs. Hahn over at Mini Matisse did this with her 8th graders and I stole the idea for my Studio students!  Since part of my SLO at the end of the year is an observational drawing project, I figured this was a perfect mid-year review of value and observational drawing, as well as an easy thing to start with the students and then leave for them to finish with my substitute.

While students were finishing up their coil pot projects, they had some free time, so they started this.  They had to create a word with at least five letters.  It had to be 3-D on a piece of computer paper using paper strips and tape.  They then had to draw it on a piece of drawing paper, doing their best to use value to make 

it look like it "pops" off the paper.

This particular student is very gifted at the arts.  She always does fabulous work and I often find it difficult to challenge her.  On the plus side, she has said that a few things I have thrown at her have been difficult mainly because of the style I have asked the project to be completed in...such as the cubist superheroes.  

This student spelled his word wrong and didn't realize it until after it was all glued down...he just reordered the letters in his drawing instead of starting over.

The "Selfie" one was kind of creative when it came to the word and the added little icon she made.

I graded these on the observational drawing rubric that I use to grade their pre- and post-assessment drawings.  The rubric can be found here.

Elective: Ben Heine Inspired Pencil vs. Camera

Hi everyone!  I'm baack! ;)  This week was my first week back to school after my maternity leave...and it was rough!  It was hard leaving my little one at daycare the first day...but I have to admit that my busy day at school every day kept my mind off of that.  It was hard also because my little one has been diagnosed with reflux and it affects her the worst at night.  This week I was lucky to get 3-4 hours of sleep every night.  And of course, she was happy during the day at day care and crabby at home for mommy and daddy!  We're now trying a second medicine and so far it seems to be kicking it and making her feel better...last night she actually slept for two four-hour stretches!  On top of everything else, I was very sick Friday from lack of sleep and such.  I had a fever and a cranky baby!  Thank goodness for my hubby and friends who babysat her yesterday so I could get some much needed sleep!

When I got back to school on Monday, for the most part I was pleased with what was done on my leave.  For the most part, projects were completed at the bare minimum of what I would expect and nothing much about my classrooms were changed.  So, here's my first "post-pregnancy" blog post!

This particular project is what my elective group was working on when I left.  I had seen various examples of Ben Heine's "Pencil vs. Camera" series on Pinterest and loved the idea of using him as a starting point for a project.  So, my elective class was given the assignment to take a variety of photographs as homework.  In class, they used Picassa to edit them and then finally, they had to add a drawing to the photo that changed it.  I also taught/retaught students how to mat their artwork.  Here are some of the finished products!

Studio Art: Wrapped Food Drawing

For the final assignment of the drawing portion of the 2-D Media unit, students had to bring in a wrapped snack item to draw.  Similar to the shadow man project, I asked them to be creative with how they drew their object.  They could blow it up and draw a portion of it on the paper, draw it multiple times, etc.  Also, for this project, they were allowed to choose which 2-D medium they wanted to use for this.  Some elected to use regular pencil and ebony pencil, some chose colored pencils, some did a combination of all three.  The only medium no one decided to use was the oil pastels.  (You can see my note packet for this 2-D unit on the SmARTteacher.)

A few students still need a bit more time on Monday to finish these up, but after 3 1/2 days of working on this in class, here are some of the finished projects!

This particular student is full of natural talent.  Needless to say, her drawing was almost spot on, but I was a little disappointed!  On Thursday, she had asked me if she could rip a hole in the middle to make it look like a ripped wrapper, and then add crumbs inside the torn hole.  I simply told her I wouldn't every stop her from being creative like that and it sounded like it would be an awesome idea but then she never did it! :(

Now that we have finished up the first portion of the 2-D media unit, we're going to start on the next section which will be painting.  I was originally going to have the students paint their wrapped food item, but a lot of them ate their objects once they were done with their drawings! lol

So, Monday, the last few people will finish up their drawings and we'll talk about art styles.  In their notes, I created a section of 9 art styles and put examples of each style in the back.  We briefly started talking about art styles when we cut out the paintings and matched them with the correct style.  I was EXTREMELY happy to find that many of these 9th graders remembered some of the paintings that they had in the back of their packets.  (I had these students as 6th graders, my first year of teaching, and I had them do a group research project on an artist.)  We'll finish the notes on the art styles by giving each style a definition and discuss what style their wrapped food drawings fall into (hopefully they'll say pop art or realism, or both!).  We'll also frame these drawings too.

Tuesday I'll be giving them a brief quiz where they'll have to demonstrate they understand how to shade an object with a light source, they'll have to name the four shading techniques, and list some 2-D drawing media.

As we move onto the painting portion, I'm going to concentrate on acrylic paint, which is my favorite.  I've seen this particular pin on Pinterest and have LOVED the project idea, so I'll be incorporating it into this unit.  I plan on having the students draw out a simple still life of a book, bottle and fruit.  We'll shine the lights on them again, turn off the lights, and I'll teach the students how to paint with value directly on the canvas.  After that introductory project to the acrylic, we'll tackle Picasso's superheros.  I'm excited to do this project because I bought some acrylic modeling medium to use on the canvas boards to add texture, marbling and even, *gasp* glitter!  Depending on if they get bored or want to continue with painting, we'll also do some watercolor painting.

Studio Art: Shadow Men (2-D Media Unit)

This drawing assignment was a total improvise, but it's definitely one I plan on keeping for this unit in the future!  It seems amazing to me that the students (both older and younger) enjoy drawing from these mannequins so much!  It must be because they are movable!

After I looked over the student's #2 sketch assignment (which was to create a 3-object still life, shine a light on it, and draw it with value), I realized that they really didn't know how to properly observe light and shadow, and they didn't know how to properly utilize value in their drawings.  On a whim, I brought down six of my mannequins from the elementary room and we spent a period sketching one of them in our sketchbooks.  They really enjoyed it and asked if we could work on these more the next day, which gave me the idea for this sketch project.

Believe it or not, Friday was the end of the 5 week marking period already!  Art projects are worth 40% of their grade, and they have technically only completed one project, the elements of art infographic.  This was a great thing to do not only to teach them more about value, but also to increase that portion of their grade for the 5 week report card.

I brought in a second light and set up 3 mannequins at one table, and 3 at the other.  Their directions were that they need to have five mannequins drawn on their paper in some way, shape or form.  I wanted to see big, up-close versions, small, full body versions and the in-between.  We reviewed the elements and principles a bit and I reminded them to think about their composition as they positioned their figures. Students had three class periods to complete these drawings.

You can find the note packet I am using for this 2-D media unit, as well as the rubric for this project and the next drawing project on the SmARTteacher website.

Studio Art: Unit 2 Begins...2-D Media

My first unit lasted about as long as I had hoped it would, and on Friday we began our second unit.  Our second unit is all about 2-D media...drawing, painting and printmaking.  I am also combining art criticism with this unit.  The textbook I am using has art criticism as its own unit, but there is no way I'm going to spend an entire week or two just on art criticism...that's something we can work on over the school year to perfect, a little at a time.  The students have also been antsy to get started on a "real" art project.

The cover of my unit 2 note packet...stay tuned to the SmARTteacher website...my unit is posted there now!

On Friday, I introduced/reviewed value and the four common shading techniques with the students: hatching, cross-hatching, stippling and blending.  They had to practice in their notes and then for their second sketchbook assignment, I asked them to set up a 3-object still life at home, shine a light on it, and draw it using value.

This is the generic sketchbook assignment rubric I have created for the weekly sketch assignments.  Each student has now seen this and will have their Friday sketch assignments graded according to this rubric every Monday.  So far, I think I'm happy with it...but we'll see if I feel like I need to make any changes to it.

On Monday, we started off the unit by discussing the different drawing media that can be used (oil pastels, pencil, chalk, etc.) and we spoke briefly about art styles.  Again, this is something we will work on throughout the school year, but the projects we do for this unit are all going to fall under the realm of pop art, so I want students to have a basic knowledge of what pop art is compared to the other styles of art.

In the back of my packet, I put colored copies of these paintings.  We cut them out, and then one at a time, we talked about which style they thought these fell under.  Quite a few students new some of the more popular artworks here and knew the styles (although when I had them in 6th grade, they had to do a group research project on an artist...I found it quite wonderful that a lot of them retained the information!).

 Now, as I graded those sketch assignments on Monday, I realized that the students (a) didn't have a good idea of what I meant by set up a still life and (b) didn't know how to properly utilize value with observation skills.  Thus the reason why it's important to give sketch assignments as homework (a good way to assess prior knowledge!).  I threw out my original plans for the next few days and pulled out the mannequins I bought for the elementary room with past SmARTteacher winnings.  I set them up in the middle of the tables, let the students arrange them, turned the lights off and put a spot light on the figures.  I gave a brief demonstration of how they should quickly do a contour drawing of the figures and then demonstrated the proper way to observe value.

The students REALLY enjoyed doing this and asked if we could work on it again tomorrow...heck yes!

I found that they did okay observing the shadows and high lights, but they had a tendency to just give a dark and light value.  I went around to each student and asked if I could show them on their drawing how I wanted them to exaggerate what they saw and make more of a range of values, from black to white and everything in between.  Once they saw how much their drawings started to pop, they were really excited!

Tomorrow, I am going to give each student a large piece of drawing paper and an ebony pencil.  I envision having them do multiple drawings of the figures on one sheet of paper...a super huge close up of a figure that goes from top of the page to bottom...smaller figures that go off the page, etc.  Just a montage of mannequins!

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Once we move on from practicing the value (probably by Thursday or Friday this week), students will have to bring in a wrapped food item, such as a candy bar, and do a large, up-close black and white drawing of it.
As we move onto the painting aspect, students will learn about how paint is made and we will then use our candy bars and acrylic paint to do a pop art painting...I'm thinking more in the style of Claes Oldenburg.  I want them to incorporate some acrylic mediums that I bought to give their paintings texture.  This project will be a way for students to utilize the elements and principles to create an interesting composition.

For the final 2-D project, printmaking, students will do some reduction printing ala Andy Warhol.   I did this with my printmaking class when I did my student teaching, and I have my example hanging on a bulletin board in the high school art room that students were admiring and mentioned they wanted to do (I hung up some of my artwork from the past, both high school and college, so that students could see what I am capable of).  So, I'll have students bring in a popular object to turn into a multi-colored print.

This unit will also introduce art criticism to the students.  That was originally what I was going to start with, but I was tired of doing the note thing, and so were the students.  I prefer getting the boring stuff out of the way in the beginning, but I need to remember that the students don't think that way!