Labyrinths

Another successful Art Week at May Street Elementary has come and gone.  This year the week-long lesson was about labyrinths and mazes.  I first taught the students the difference between a labyrinth and a maze. (A labyrinth has one path leading to the center with no tricks, dead-ends or false paths.  A maze is meant to be a puzzle to figure out.)

The students spent the week creating labyrinths with the idea of using them to help focus, slow down, solve problems and center themselves.

The students made books filled with many examples of labyrinths to use as finger labyrinths.

I taught them how to create their own labyrinth by starting with drawing a seed.  Students used recycled book pages, and watercolor crayons on their labyrinths.  They outlined their labyrinths with white glue to create a raised line and barrier for their finger when they use their finger labyrinths.  Their creations were added to the cover of their books.

Students also decorated bean bags with a finger labyrinth.  Each student worked with me to sew the bean bags with my sewing machine.  I bring my sewing machine into as many lessons as possible and am always amazed at how many students have not had the experience to seeing a sewing machine in action.

We used the bean bags to create a walking labyrinth.  The student worked together to figure out how to create the labyrinth on the classroom floor and then took turns walking through it with a focused intention.

The younger group of kids created a simple spiral labyrinth, but also enjoyed walking through it.

On our final day together, the students collaborated on a walking labyrinth made on the backside of a reclaimed billboard.  I gave the students metallic markers to use on the black vinyl billboard.  These labyrinths were given to the school for classes to use whenever they desired.

Art Week 2013

Another successful Art Week at May Street Elementary! Art Week is just what it sounds like.  A whole week when the entire school is devoted to ART!  Six artists are hired and many parents volunteer to teach crafts all week to the entire student population.  This year I decided to have the students make recycled art journals from discarded hardbound books.

I spent a couple of weeks searching through my local libraries discarded books and also talked to local used books stores for donations.  I was able to collect around 100 books and only spent $2.50!  Thank you Artifacts in Hood River, Oregon and The Book Peddler in White Salmon, Washington for your donations.

 I painted the cover of each book with chalkboard paint and had the kids decorate the covers with colored pencils and metallic Sharpies.






I had never kept an art journal before preparing for this week, but after doing extensive research, I decided that it was a great idea!  Giving myself a couple of minutes each day to create is exactly what I need and modeling that to my kids is an added bonus.

I lead the students though a variety of projects to get their creative juices flowing each day and then allowed them time and access to materials to create whatever they wanted in their journals.

Art Week

We are right in the middle of  Art Week at one of the local elementary schools and I have been lucky enough to be involved in this wonderful project.  Art Week was the brain child of a fellow Master Recycler, teacher and artist, Peggy.  She wanted to devote an entire week at school to celebrating the arts.  After finding funding for her project, she was able to hire 6 artists to come to the school and do a week long residency so that the entire school would collectively be able to have a focus on art.  Artists from a variety of disciplines were asked to participate in order to expose the children to a number of art forms.  Painting, sculpting, movement, music, recycled arts, cutting, pasting... CREATING!!  

 

The students go to two art sessions a day.  The have the opportunity to work with one artist for the entire week where they will focus on one project or medium.  During the second session, they rotate through different artist and project each day, one that can be completed in 75 minutes. This way the students have the chance to work on a long-range project and 5 smaller projects. This model was so successful that other area schools have adopted it and are also having Art Week. 

 

This year I am teaching almost 300 students how to make recycled paper wallets.  I have 75 minutes with a group of 20 students to complete the project and teach them a little about recycling as well.  We are using a variety of found paper to make the wallets such as wrapping paper, wall paper, maps, cards, paint chips, book covers, scrap booking paper, security envelopes.  The wallets are covered with discarded overhead  transparencies that I rescued from local teachers.  There's nothing like creating from materials that I know are headed for the landfill and extending their life.