Winding down

I can't believe that we only have seven more classes together! Students are spending the last days of the semester working on a collaborative puppet show inspired by Indonesian Wayang Kulit. Over the next four days, groups will be writing scripts and creating shadow puppets out of poster board. The last three days of the semester will be devoted to sharing the puppet shows with their classmates. This is always such a fun and creative end to the semester, so I look forward to seeing what students will come up with!

ALSO, the Virtual Art Show has finally been updated! You can see highlights from the last several projects. I'm so proud of the creativity my students have shown this semester. You rock!

Final Two Weeks!

We have EIGHT (including today) days left! This second semester has completely flown by. It feels like just yesterday I was meeting all my new students!

We've been incredibly busy in the art room this past month. Students finished their watercolor paintings (which are absolutely GORGEOUS) and moved on to learning about Indonesian shadow puppets. Students worked in small teams to create their own scripts and are currently assembling their puppets. I'm thinking students might need three more days to complete this project, so maybe Thursday and Friday will be presentation days!

Shadow puppets in the making.

Shadow puppets in the making.

Shadow puppets in the making.

Instead of shadow puppets, Purple Class learned about the art of STOMP! which is a group of performers that use their bodies and found objects to put on a theatrical music performance. In small groups, students created a performance that conveyed a theme without vocals, so they had to use their acting skills, props, and costumes to help the audience understand their concept. Students had a great time putting together their show and performing them last week. We've since moved on to a Passion Project. Students are given the choice of selecting any art form (visual art, theater, dance, music, or literature) to create a capstone project that demonstrates their passion in art. As the other three classes complete their shadow puppets, they will move on to a final Passion Project, too. We will be making art up until the last day of school!

Below are some photographs of what's been going on in the art room lately. Watercolor paintings will be added to the Virtual Art Show soon, and I will post again once students have completed their puppets.

Artwork on display in the hallway.

Artwork on display in my classroom.

A group performing their STOMP! show.

A group performing their STOMP! show.

A group performing their STOMP! show.

I don't write about my I&I class often, but they are working on a really neat project currently. They have been building cardboard arcade games, and they've been getting super creative with it! Tomorrow will be their last day working on this and then they'll have a day to play each other's games. Below are some in-progress pictures.

Wayang Kulit

During the first week of the new semester, my current I&I students presented their Indonesian Wayang Kulit they created during CA. I am so sad that I was absent the last two days of Term II, resulting in students not being able to present their hard work, but I know they all enjoyed the creation process. I'm including a few images from some of the performances below. Tonight I'm going to put together some short videos to share on Twitter, so stay tuned!