That dreaded first week...

...was not so bad after all!

So it's the end of our first week back.  I'm typing this from an awkward position because they gave us stupid computer carts that are too high for a chair, but too low to stand.  Yay!  The week has been fine.  I think five years in, you really start to fall into the routine.  I can only imaging how easy and smooth 10 or 20 years will be, but maybe I'm wrong on that.  Who knows?!  If you know, tell me in the comments!  I haven't had any really huge behavior problems with the classes.  My only real complaints are that my technology has been a pain to get working, and that the K5 classes are at 28-30 students.  That's A LOT of five-year-olds!

My lessons this week are basically just introducing the art room to the kids, reminding them of the safety rules, etc.  I made some awesome new posters for my classroom, I will show them to you!

I found this one on Pinterest here:  ARTIST poster

I love me some Pete!  So when I saw this poster on Pinterest I had to make one too!

This is the one I think I like the most!  It will REALLY help my K5ers learn the best way to color.  Found here: My 3 Star Paper  Can you tell that I really like Pinterest?

Let me tell you... the Veriquest Die Cut Machine is my BEST FRIEND!  I don't have very neat handwriting, so I hate making posters where I have to write on them, but Veriquest makes that SO EASY!!!  If you don't have one of these in your school, you need to scream and cry until they get you one!  LOOK AT IT!!!  I promise they're not paying me to say that, I just really love that machine.  You have to watch what paper setting you put it on though.  If it's set on heavy construction paper and you're using light construction paper it will start to catch and tear and that makes a huge mess and can damage the machine.

The actual lessons I'm doing to get their creativity flowing: K5-1st grade doing Self-Portraits, 2nd-5th grade doing The Exquisite Corpse game.  I have found that most of them really really like this game.  They are delighted and laughing at the weird creatures they get.  BUT!  I have found that two of my 2nd graders are almost in tears at the idea of letting someone else draw on their paper.  I talked to them about how it's teamwork and they have to trust their teammates.  I told one of them, because he was just adamantly NO, that if he did it my way on one side of the paper, that I would let him draw his own on the other side of the paper.  Should I have done that?  I don't know, but it worked with him, so that's good.  In the future, I might not do this with 2nd grade, and leave it as a 3rd-5th activity.  Here's the Exquisite Corpse Lesson

In the past I've done portraits, creative apples, sketchbooks, and other things as beginning of the year lessons.  What's your favorite beginning lesson?

Ta-Da!

Hello world!

I've started this blog for many different reasons.

I think we all need to share more.  And not just pictures of what we did.  We need to share written lesson plans, share our ideas, share what worked, what didn't work, and how we fixed it.  And I don't plan to charge you for these things.  They are free!  I think we need to share more with each other to make art classrooms BETTER and LESS STRESSFUL!

I also need a place to vent... and who understands teacher problems better than fellow teachers?  I'll also be sharing my ways of de-stressing and calming myself.  I'm a highly anxious person, and I've had to carefully develop my go-with-the-flow attitude for my classroom.  Let me tell you... I grew more gray hairs my first two years than I can count.  Hooray hair dye!

I've also noticed that I've kind of let my art go.  I recently brought in some work from a few years ago, and I realized I can't draw like that anymore.  If you don't use it, you lose it.  And drawing simple things for elementary students everyday REALLY isn't helping.  So to keep myself in the groove, so to speak, I will *attempt* to complete some kind of artwork each month.  And hey! If I get good at it, I'll try for more!  I've set up an art space in my office devoted solely to ME!

We had our local Back to School rally today.  It was fun, uplifting, you know the drill.  It really made me think though.  Last year, one of my best friends won Teacher of the Year at her school.  I started to think about how the related arts are sometimes overlooked.  At least they are here.  I do a lot of little things for this school.  I don't really like being in the spotlight, so I don't usually volunteer to head a project, but I am willing to be on a committee.  I've decided I'm going to teach and volunteer every year like I want to win Teacher of the Year.  I noticed that those who do win, teach like that regardless.  It's easy to fall into a slump and just cover your standards.  I need to be more accountable for the things that I do, and I want those things to be excellent! (But I still secretly believe that these things are rigged and that the school doesn't actually vote on who gets nominated) *cough* SO! Moving on!

So anyway, that's that.  I'll be blogging my lessons, you are welcome to take and use them!  I find a lot of stuff on Pinterest, so I'll be sure to give credit!  Please feel free to comment or email me.  This blog gave me a gmail account, but I'll have to remember to check it! I think it is artteachersgiveahoot [at] gmail.com

Good luck!  Have a wonderful school year!  I hope to see you again soon!