The Big Three

New trimester with a new group of fifth graders. Going over the classroom expectations today. At Cameron, we practice the Big Three: Be Responsible, Be Safe and (no matter if you win or lose) Be Respectful. The sun is shining, the air is warm for November, happy Monday everyone!! 

2015 Clay Whistle Designs

Fifth Grade Art Lesson


Want to know more about this lesson?  Check out this link: Clay Whistles
Here are some of the whistle designs for this year:

Practicing At Home

I had a fifth grade student bring in this drawing that they did on their own time for fun.  I love hearing about students creating art on their own time, but love it even more when they bring it in for me to see!

Art Journal

When I find pictures in my student's art journals that I am drawn too, I just can't help but share.

This one was completed by a first grader.  Love how the hair was drawn.

Ceramic Mosaic Mural Project 2015

For Middle School Art Club this year we are working on a ceramic mosaic mural of a large tree for our building.   So far we have spent our first 3 meetings creating clay leaves and glazing them.  It will be very exciting to see how this project progresses throughout the school year.

 Creating clay leaves.

Glazing Leaves.

During our next meeting we will be creating tree bark.

Halloween 2015

BuZziNg around the art room this Halloween at school.  

Working in the classroom.

Found these little bees at the Halloween Parade at our school.

Our Guidance teacher and I.  

Biggest Loser Run/Walk Race Series 5K

Ran this race with my co-worker Beth on October 18th, 2015 in Eau Claire, WI.  I must be improving in my pace, for I placed first in my age bracket!  23:34 Best 5K pace time I have ever had!

Weyerhaeuser Booster Days 5K

My friend Marie and I tackled this race on September 6, 2015.  Had my best race time for the year at 25:13.  Complete down pour during the entire race.  There were moments where it was hard to even look up in the pouring rain. Still had a blast!

Tempera Cake Organization

I love tempera cakes for painting with my younger students.  I find them to be a huge time saver for classroom instruction, setting up and in cleaning up.

I love giving students as many color choices as possible to paint with, but there are also times when I only want them to paint with certain colors.  I finally came up with this very simple way of organizing my painting palettes, which I can't believe I didn't think of sooner.  With this system, I can keep better track of which table is getting what for supplies.  As an extra bonus, this system makes it easy for students to help with distribution of set up and clean up of the materials.

I have each paint tray labeled with a number.  On days when children are allowed to use as many colors as they like for painting, I give each table a tray labeled 1, 2 and 3.  As you can see it has a wide range of painting cakes to choose from.  What is important to note, is that every tray 1 is exactly the same, every tray 2 is the same and every tray 3 is the same.  This way the children know that every table has the exact same selection of colors.

This is a photograph of what it looks like when the trays are returned to the storage closet.  I just stack them.  You can also see that I have trays of warm colors, cool colors and black.  Behind them are primary and secondary colors.

This system is working quite well for me.  Who knows, maybe it will work for you, too?

Happy Painting!

Birch Tree Landscapes 2015 Examples

The school year has been up and running now for a month and in the blur of unpacking a new classroom, making sense of my new 6 day schedule rotation, the first art projects are finally starting to get completed.

I began my fourth graders this year with this wonderful lesson on landscapes and the technique of tape resist.  This is a project that is fairly easy to do and gives students success right from the start. For details on this lesson and past examples check out my link: Birch Tree Landscapes.

Here are a few examples from this year: