2019 "Self-portraits"

Here are some of our finished portraits as inspired by Nate Williams (see original post here).

So happy with how they have turned out!

Pop art portraits

A bit of a delay with sharing this lesson/unit idea:

Term One had a sketching and portraits focus so we started the term with some pop-art self-portraits (after looking at the different types of portraits that might be produced)...it was a lot of fun and the art is very creative. I got the inspiration from a Facebook post but am not sure whose!

I took black and white photos of the kids then printed them out on A3 - the kids turned them over to trace around their main features and facial shape, neck/shirt etc with pencil.

They then used black crayon to go over the outlines and to split large areas (eg face and hair) with dark lines before using coloured crayons (including white) to draw patterns inside each different space.

Next step was to use bright dyes in each section - don't they look awesome?!

Lesson or unit starter ideas

The sort of things that those of us who have been teaching as long as me already know, but it doesn't hurt to have a reminder occasionally...

http://blog.teacherspayteachers.com/5-simple-anticipatory-sets-that-make-a-big-difference/

Modern Learning Example: School 21 (UK)

School 21

An English multi-level school "Elevating Student Voice: Combining Wellbeing, Speaking Skills, and Project-Based Learning

Teaching Kids to Think

From the MindShift site (always so informative!)

When Kids Have Structure for Thinking, Better Learning Emerges

Video: Engage Not Enthral

Modern Learning

This is very much how our school is conducting our inquiry programme, which we have called DRIVE (Discover, Reflect and ask questions, Investigate, Vision and create, Evaluate):

Writing - ongoing pupil reflection

Trialling this with my Year Five and Six pupils, Level 3 writing goals...

DRIVE Term One 2016: In Great Shape!

DRIVE - the Inquiry process at Edendale Primary School:
Discover  Reflect & ask questions  Investigate  Vision and create  Evaluate

Term One 2016: HEALTH 

"IN GREAT SHAPE"

- What makes me a healthy person? 

PURPOSE/AUTHENTICITY:
* Personal Health and Physical Development is where students develop the knowledge, understanding, skills, and attitudes that they need in order to maintain and enhance their personal well-being and physical development.
* Healthy Communities and Environment is where students contribute to healthy communities and environments by taking responsible and critical action.

KEY UNDERSTANDINGS:
* Health and well-being (hauora) is physical, mental and emotional/spiritual.
* My health is my responsibility.
* I can support others as they keep themselves healthy and safe.
* We mature physically and mentally as we get older.
* We all have feelings and emotions that we express in different ways.

CORE KNOWLEDGE:
* We all have a range of feelings and emotions to describe our experiences in different situations.
* If I don’t take care of myself I will become ill.
* Healthy eating, hygiene, exercise, sleep, relationships, positive thinking, Sunsmart, water safety etc. SMARTS/learning styles, values and principles
* Our bodies and minds change at different rates.





RESOURCES FOR DISCOVERY AND INVESTIGATION STAGES OF 'DRIVE'

General
templates for tracking healthy habits
a variety of health/body templates

Food/Eating  - AN APPLE A DAY pupil group resource links blog-post
track your diet for a week - template   and five food groups tracking chart
Healthy eating for kids
expert: Mel McKenzie, Heart Foundation (Linda Harris)

Exercise - WARRANT OF FITNESS pupil group resource links blog-post
tracking your movement minutes chart
expert: Jane Muir

Hygiene - KEEP IT CLEAN pupil group resource links blog-post
healthy hands templates and unit
teeth - experiments to show why we should brush
toothbrushing tracking chart
kidshealth.org - why we need to brush our teeth
expert: Dental Health service educator

The Body - ENGINE PARTS pupil group resource links blog-post
variety of games/activities to print out
skeleton cut out
skeleton labelling sheets
heart health
expert: NZ Heart Foundation (Linda Harris)

The Brain - BRAIN POWER! pupil group resource links blog-post
multiple intelligences pupil survey printable
another printable smarts survey
expert: Maureen Deuchrass, Road Safety Southland

Painting - atmospheric perspective

Term One 2016 - Year 5-6  pupils

Henri Matisse - art appreciation

Henri Matisse 1948 (image source)

For art appreciation discussions this term we are looking at the cutout/collage works of Henri Matisse (1869-1954):

Biography information:
Tate Modern Gallery (For Kids) 
Ducksters.com   
KinderArt
Museum of Modern Art

Classroom lesson ideas: Crafty Classroom   









First, let's find out how this modern artist worked when producing his cutouts:

Videos from the Museum of Modern Art

http://www.biography.com/news/henri-matisse-the-cut-outs-moma (pictures in my IWB picture drive folder)

Next, we will discuss some of Matisse's cutout works - What do they make us think of or feel? What do we like about each one? What do we not like? What questions do we have about each one?

Photos below are from this MoMA website source

Composition Green Background 1947

Large Decoration with Masks 1953

Le Clown 1947

Nuit de Noel (Christmas Night) 1952

Pale Blue Window `1948-49

The Codomas 1943

The Fall of Icarus 1943

The Sheaf 1953

Two Dancers 1937-38

The Horse and Rider 1943-44

Swimming Pool 1952

For our activity, we will each choose one of Matisse's works shown above and use this as our inspiration for a cutout artwork of our own design... (watch this space for a link to the results!)

Successful senior camp!

What a great time we had at Camp Columba in Pukerau with our Year 5 and 6 pupils...



2015 TAKE TWO NEWS Senior Camp from Edendale Primary School on Vimeo.

Beginning of the year!

This year (and this week coming!) I plan to make use of these links that I have pinned on my Pinterest boards...mostly free downloads from Teachers Pay Teachers...

Link to image source

'All About Me' pupil info sheet - though I have had to twink and change the American spellings eg favorite into NZ's favourite etc - thanks Science Doodles at Teachers pay Teachers!

And some discussion points from this Hot Spot activity sheet thanks to Kristine from the Young Teacher Love blog.

We will be doing the "In Team Kahu we..." mural again, as I have a whole new team of pupils - let's set up our expectations right from the start!

'Parents' 3-2-1' question sheet - asking parents for info about their child - thanks LA Beach Teacher at TpT as well as asking them for their most appropriate contact information.

'Student Rights and Responsibilities' - gets everyone on the same page about the expectations in the classroom - thanks Angelia at TpT!

I always do What Kind of Teacher Do You Want? and so does Miss Freundlich, it works with any age-group and helps the pupils see that you are wanting to work with them as a team and will respect their opinions and needs.

And we look also at What a good pupil does, says, is and is not - here is Sarah's example.

We will build our own version of this Respect chart and also look at this How Big is My Problem chart.

I will be sharing a copy of Stephanie's poster of Glasser's What We Learn chart.

Star of the Week certificate -  I've ordered this, printed with Team Kahu in the title - thanks Creative Classrooms!

'Uh-oh!' - a note pupils can take home with any work that they need to finish because they didn't do it during their allocated class time - thanks Sally at TpT!

Attention grabbers - you call out, the pupils respond - thanks Traci at TpT! I will be adding "To infinity..." (pupils call out "and beyond!") - sound familiar??

Link to image source

When talking about our learning and skills progression, I will share this Assess Yourself Novice-Expert chart and I also love this Which Step Have You Reached Today chart posted on a Lifetime of Wisdom.

We will also be referring to this Positive Self-Talking chart as shared by Elliott Seif.

For group work and partner discussions I will have these on display, as shown here by Tanja:
Partners  and   Groups

This week's THINK ABOUT IT quote...

...comes from Tyson Adams...

Link to source of image

BLOOMing good!

A great poster to remind us of the multitude of ways to incorporated Bloom's Taxonomy in the classroom...

Thanks Mia, An Ethical Island blog

An absolute favourite prompt - Frosty Man and the BMX Kid

This video, promoting the beauty of New Zealand's scenery (and the have-fun nature of the general Kiwi population), is a favourite prompt of mine - it lends itself to all manner of writing ideas...

today we are using it as we plan our own movies for possible entry in the Great Southern Media Mash 5-day Movie Challenge; the pupils needed to see how a message can be shared via the medium of a made up story...

iPads in the classroom workshop 31-07-2014

Some practical activities using iPad apps in the classroom...an e-learning workshop for teachers...

Remembering the SAMR Model...we will be aiming to be actively creating (modifying and redefining) our own products to share information with the ipads (rather than just "playing games" with apps)...

Today's task/s: incorporating maths, writing, oral language, visual language...

1. Use the camera to take 5-6 photos of 2-d shapes in the playground or classroom.
2. Use the Skitch app to label the photos. Then you can use the photos from your PhotoStream or CameraRoll to...

• Create a Tellagami in which you verbally describe the attributes of one of the shapes you photographed.
• Your Tellagami can be saved to use as a video file (to upload to Vimeo* or You Tube), or shared to Facebook, Twitter etc (if you have activated those accounts) or sent as an email for further sharing via a laptop.

• Create a ShadowPuppet presentation about your shapes. - this can also be saved as a video to be shared in various ways**

• Create an Explain Everything or Show Me presentation about the shapes - also make into a video to share.

• Create a QR code for one of your presentations and share it to a blog or send it as an email to print - the ipad has a QR Creator app as well as a QR Reader app.

* from Vimeo or You Tube the video can be embedded into a blog for immediate sharing, or the URL link can be copied to use in a document or website eg a Facebook post

** The pupils and I usually set a criteria for the work that is to be shared - this often happens during the writing process that occurs before the app is used - we use the appropriate text type features to suit the purpose of our video and the audience that will be viewing it. This means that the pupils write a draft and peer check it against both the criteria of the text type eg an explanation as well as then having a criteria of what needs to be included when the writing is 'published' via the video app.

• I usually also set a time limit eg for an iMovie they are only allowed maybe 30 seconds of completed/edited video in which to share their message (iMovies that are too long will clog up the memory space of the ipad account)

Working on our Lino prints...

Today we moved onto transferring our 'gyotaku'-inspired fish designs to the lino and began our cutting...pupils rubbed pencil on the back of their design drawing so that they could then reverse trace the picture onto the lino...

Next step was to make sure they could see the lines clearly on the lino block...

...before beginning to cut out the design...lino block is softened by ten seconds in the microwave and pupils were given very strict instructions to have their steadying hand BEHIND THE BLADE! (Out of nineteen pupils there was only one boy who immediately cut his finger about ten seconds after starting and having his hand sitting to the side of the blade...sigh...)

...most of the pupils have not done this before and were really intrigued with the technique...their fish are going to print beautifully! (To see finished prints, go to this link: http://thekahukids.blogspot.co.nz/2014/08/third-instalment-of-our-fish-lino-prints.html

I promise you won't be disappointed!)

MEASUREMENT: length and area

Just a short week of activities to refresh the pupils' prior knowledge and give them opportunities to add to their skills with using length and area.

LEVEL THREE ACHIEVEMENT OBJECTIVES - specific learning outcomes:
* Use correct units for measurements – mm, cm, m, km.
* Convert from one unit to another.
* Solve problems using measurement.
* Estimate length or area sensibly.
* Know the units of area.
* Find the perimeter of a shape.
* Find the area of a shape including irregular shapes.



I will use adaptations of the units available in the Level Three lesson activities from NZ Maths:
Stepping Out - make estimates of lengths between 50cm-1.5m; measure lengths in cm and m; convert between cm and m
Paper Planes - measure accurately using mm, cm and m
Perplexing Perimeters - measure accurately using standard units; perform addition calculations to find perimeters of objects
Giant Mystery - measure accurately using mm and cm
How Do You Measure This? - a range of practical, problem-solving activities

ART - printmaking

Ben Reid

My Pinterest board for printmaking ideas (mainly lino prints)


With my level (Year Six pupils) I am planning to do lino printing...

NZ print-makers (range of print-making techniques):
Ben Reid            Michel Tuffery            Philippa Bentley   

Peter Lendvai                Minu            Vanessa Edwards

Susan Haywood Smith - beautiful NZ birds and motifs, 2-3 colours

                                                   Steev Peyroux - Dunedin peninsula

This British artist shares his experiences of using lino to create prints...


And this slideshow shows how another art teacher creates lino prints...

Marian Johansen-Ellis

I really like this idea on the left (found on Pinterest) as fishing is a big recreational activity in Southland - this artwork links well to the TED video below that explains about the history and method of Japanese Gyotaku (fish printing)...

and I think I might try doing it on paper - pupils can use their own fish design as the basis of their picture and then borrow pieces of other pupils' designs to fill in the gaps...

and maybe also try putting the design onto hessian or calico to make a wall hanging as seen in this Blick art lesson...



This video is a slideshow of a real fish being prepared and printed...


And I think we might also try some 'haunted houses' - printing them on four different coloured papers to create an Andy Warhol style of picture (as seen on this wonderful art blog) and/or print on old book pages...these would be great poem or story-motivators I'm sure!

Houses on book paper

Haunted house