Art Class: Patterns Around Us [Part II]

The P3 children are transferring their pattern studies into a mixed media artwork. Their observations of patterns are from the school environment can be read here. They did watercolour resist work by drawing patterns with oil pastels first and applying a layer of black watercolour. I find that there is a fine line between choosing to give explicit instructions in art lessons and allowing children to discover for themselves. I will further elaborate on this point in my subsequent post. In these lessons, explicit instructions are necessary to ensure safety in the art room even though some of the instructions might seem trivial. We should never make assumptions in our teaching. Occasionally, I will still get a child who would fill up his water container to the brim and other children would help to remind him of the right amount of water that goes into it. Gaining the confidence to carry the filled containers from the basins to their workstations can easily be overlooked. Other instructions such as using sufficient pressure on the oil pastels and getting the paintbrushes to hold enough colour pigment before painting especially when we are using the watercolour cake are just some habits of mind the children have to adopt and practise regularly.  

Art Class: Self Portraits

The children read a story It's Ok To Be Different by Todd Parr. It's a book packed with wit and delivered with sensitivity. We discussed artists' self-portrait from Georgette Chen, Vincent Van Gogh, Pablo Piccaso and Frida Kahlo. These paintings offer varying styles, composition and personal stories. I usually choose other artwork from another class when doing class critique for the first time so that the children will not be self-conscious. Then I would explain that if their work was chosen for class critique in the future, they should listen to everyone but not necessarily follow their friends' suggestions. I numbered the artworks on the whiteboard to allow pupils to participate in the class critiques.  

Art Club: Game Makers Survey

When I was a student, my Math tutor, Dr Yeap Ban Har, told us that teachers often tell him that they don't have enough time. He advised us to look at the whole curriculum and be a more effective teacher. For example, in the lower primary Math curriculum, the topic of Time doesn't have to start only when it is time to do so according to the curriculum timeline, we can start at the beginning of the school year by applying in daily situations. I shared this tip with my students' parents on a blog here many years ago.

My English tutor, Dr Babara Spilchuk, was equally inspiring. She taught us similar concept to integrate the arts by making books, writing stories and sharing with each other. The material cost was modest yet kept us, young adults, deeply engaged and hungry for more. One thing that irks her is worksheets. She rejected worksheets, didn't believe in it and so we didn't receive any during her class. We spend a lot of time creating, reading and held discussions in her class. 

I grew up consuming worksheets so Dr Spilchuk's class felt more like a visual art class than an English class. After all, my mental schema of an English class was books and worksheets and booklets compiled with photocopied papers. 

I guess my tutor was role modelling for us not get too comfortable with a teaching style. She was also showing us that knowledge doesn't exist in isolation. After all, an integrated school curriculum has the potential to alleviate the problems of curriculum overload and fragmentation. As teachers, we can focus on the relationships between subjects to promote learning that applies to several disciplines concurrently and it may allow us to streamline curriculum.

Both my tutors' teaching has somehow urged me to conduct my mini research on integrated learning. The art club pupils have started this project since Term 4 last year. To get a sense of their readiness and their current state of mind about their projects, I conducted a survey. Below is a snapshot of one of the open-ended questions:

Next, a collaboration google document with the template below allows all the children to respond to my questions and their friends' comments together. They are also able to read other people's responses that would polish their train of thoughts and written comments. Below is a snapshot of one of the groups' inputs:

Finally, I would like the P3 art club children to experience interacting with this group of game makers so they were given instructions to approach any game maker groups and ask any questions they like. They were given a PQP (Praise, Question, Polish) feedback form to evaluate their chosen game maker group and to provide written feedback after their interaction. 

Artventures: Art Teachers as Teacher-artists

Hi! I was asked about my work in school and the filming was done in a few hours. Please enjoy the video! Thank you to all the students, production team and Ming for the hard work!

STAR Arts Educator Series: Art Teachers as Teacher-artists from MOE STAR on Vimeo.

Art Class: Early Finisher Activities

It is common for children to complete their art tasks at a different pace. Therefore, to accommodate the transition period to the next lesson unit, I have planned for early finisher activities. It's important that the activities are low mess and can be put away quickly because I wouldn't want it to supercede the actual art lesson conceptually and it should be stimulating. A bookshelf with art-related readings is available for the children freely whenever they have completed their art task. I'm also toying with the idea of a lightbox with solid shapes, yarn bombing, observational drawing and playing with magnets.

Making my Early Finisher Palette poster

Making paint tubes with toilet paper roll

These fake paint tubes are wrapped with casting plaster and painted with real paint :D

Found this beauty in my neighbourhood for yarn bombing