My Visual Art Teaching Highlights

Creating: Our Own Topic-Themed Images

(Term 2, 2016)

Next, here's our topic-linked visual arts lesson on 13-05-2016.

1.) Breaking the images into shapes we could replicate ourselves...

2.) The E1 class group sketching their own versions...

3.) A couple of our finished sketches - well done!!!

Sharing: Using Oil Pastels for a Collaborative Collage
(Term 4, 2015)

This term, our Inquiry Learning topic is Kiwiana. In response, we are doing a Level 3-4 Visual Art unit as planned by Ms Osborne. We had modelled examples, where we all worked out together how to draw the lines by first breaking them up into shapes we could see, before adding the finer details:

We used the designs we had drawn to then create our own versions of the designs using oils pastels. Again, Ms Osborne modelled how to use these:

Our 'success criteria' were: using lightest to darkest colours and making sure we moved the paper to avoid smudging it or mixing the colours, to get the best result we could. We had a lot of fun creating our own images to share with others. Here are some of the images we have created in response to this 'so far':

Sharing: 3D Collages and Handmade Beads

(Term 3, 2015)

We had a shared art and crafts afternoon on Friday - the Year 5 & 6s worked with the Year 1 & 2 class to show them what they had been doing, and helped them to make their own fabric collages that afternoon.  It was a fantastic opportunity to share some of our Visual Arts learning with the younger students at our kura, and we all had an awesome time!

 

Creating: 3D Sculpture Using Papier Mache 
(Term 3, 2015)

Earlier this week, we watched a video on "How to Make a Papier Mache Mask", which was shared with us by our teacher. It was selected in response to a couple of the Inquiry Questions our class came up with for our "Fabrics, Fibres and Fashion" topic this term. 

(You can watch the video here if you would like to see it, too). 

Ms Osborne suggested we could use a "reduce, re-use, recycle" approach to creating an item for our fashion show later this month - by using materials we have around us in our community, such as old newspapers, plastic milk containers and home made flour and water glue... 

...to make ourselves an African "Igbo Ijele" styled mask that we could then personalise to reflect the vibrant and exciting culture around us! Once we had made up our papier mache bases for our masks, we used some of our design ideas that we had around the colours we could use, and then painted our mask forms to match these:

Our next step will be to ask ourselves: what reusable or recyclable materials do we have available around us? How could we use some of these to decorate our masks to reflect our own unique cultural 'fashion' ideas?

Composition and Perspective: Still Life Drawing to Watercolour Painting
(Term 3, 2015)

For our Cultural Groups electives sessions, the Year 5-8 students in Cultural Art have been learning about portrait composition (lines/shapes) and contrast (shading) with Miss Osborne.  

Ms O's lesson planning - a summary of what we covered in our discussions...

And here's the lessons themselves, using some of Ms O's own art and photography.

Creating: 3D Sculpture Using Papier Mache
(Term 2, 2015)

For our Cultural Groups electives sessions, the Year 5-8 students in Cultural Art have been learning about portrait composition (lines/shapes) and contrast (shading) with Miss Osborne. 

Drawing Lesson - Ms Osborne's modelling of portrait composition.

Here are our Year 5-8 akonga creating their own portrait studies in response to today's lesson:

Learning: About Different Ways to Express 'Who We Are'
(Term 1, 2015)

Here are some examples of the Visual Art activities we have done with Ms Osborne in our learning hub earlier in the year...

Early in Term 1, our Year 5-6 class created portraits in a 'Pop Art' style by taking photos and then using the data projector to trace an outline (with a lot of help from the teacher). 

Next, we used a mixture of crayons and pastels to create bright, bold images that reflected both WHO WE ARE and the comicbook-like style of 'Pop Art'. 

A close up shot of our wall display of Pop Art styled portraits!

These were then put on display as a collaborative collage, to give it that Andy Warhol-esque finish, and *wow* the visitors to our learning hub!

We also did some individual Pasifika 'flower' designs, modelled by Ms Osborne and completed using water colour paint and pencils, to later be uses as borders for our wall displays and to add some culluturally appropriate imagery to our learning hub space... 

Don't they look welcoming? We think so, too! :-)