My Art Teaching Adventures continue in 2016...Classroom Organisation

Somehow, it is already week 5 in term 1. I successfully got a role as a full time primary visual arts teacher (a career goal I had really hoped for!) and was excited to set up what was going to be my classroom for the second year in a row in at SAHPS.  To start this blog off honestly, it has been a hectic start to 2016. After going through some photos tonight, I realised how much has already happened and that I needed to show what magic has been happening in SAHPS's Art room.

First off, I have some wonderful teacher friends who came in on the break to help me put a fresh coat of paint on three of my art room walls.  After a day of hard work and paint fumes, the classroom looked brighter and much more inviting to walk into.

Then came the building of shelves, organising our monitor system, decorating the walls, and making the classroom an environment that the students and I would like to come into everyday. 

I set up the art room vocabulary from last year up on the main wall, so I can refer to it as it is needed, and as a reminder to the students.  I have set up the "supply banquet" which worked really well last year, allowing the students to independently get the media they need for their projects (they also can easily put away the everyday supplies including pencils, rulers etc.).

This system of monitors has already made a huge difference to the organisation and independence of the students (and honestly it is a big help to me as well, less of my time this year has gone into cleaning up after the students!). They get an assigned role for the day and have a time limit to work in. I put up a timer up at the end of class where the art helpers do their assigned task before coming and sitting down for final feedback questions. 

The students at the beginning of the year are assigned to tables (the picture above shows the table setting this year, with one more table behind the white one), but allowed to work anywhere in the classroom as long as they are:

-Working on the assigned task and working towards the checklist or rubric

-Complete their Art Room helper role without reminders 

-Are safe in their choice of seat

Two big changes to my room that I wanted to make this year, were the ease of their drawing book tubs, and a clearly marked tub for White paper. I don't think I could go another term having to point out where the white paper was!  A third last minute idea was to have picture up of how the cushions were to be put away, allowing the students to know how to tidily put them away quickly. (Even the foundations have been successfully putting them away in the right places!) 

This is how I organised my room so far this year, with more photos to come as things keep evolving. 

Celebrating the Arts at the "Doorway to Imagination" Art Show

The art room has been a hub of excitement these last 5 weeks. The school (staff, students and parents) have all been getting ready for the big night. This was my first Art Show within a primary school context ,and I wanted it to be a fantastic night to showcase the students work, and for students to leave with a sense of pride. The theme of the Art Show was "Doorway to Imagination." Each grade level chose a theme in which to create works within their classroom to go along with the works created in Visual Arts.  The hardest part of the blog post was choosing pictures, as our photographer did an amazing job and got over 400 photos!

 The staff as excited as I am!

I first created a timeline in which to get every task done before the big night. I had one for all staff, and one just for me! It was 5 weeks of hard work putting in lots of extra hours. (and not much time to blog!) Luckily, I work with an amazing staff, who were ready to jump on my vision (and I admit, it was a big vision) and go even further with it then I could have imagined. They all volunteered extra time to help put up work, (with bribes of lollies and love) and create their doorways/hallways much to the delight of our students.

Finally after a few nights of getting ready, (and a day of creating suspense by closing the school and not letting the parents seeing the work!) we were ready for the unveiling of the show. Thanks to the handy pre-organising using a google doc, all the staff knew where to go!

 The night had begun! 

Handing out the brochure with the map of displays and list of activities

(including when the song performances were on)

The air was filled with a vibrate energy of excitement and a sense of community that is really hard to put into words.

The parents were proudly taking photos of their students work, and students proudly pulling their parents to do so! The year 5/6 "selfies" were a major hit ( please watch this space for a blog post just on those)

 Students and parents walking through the foundations "Jungle" themed hallway. 

Wandering across the breezeway through the lanterns that were made in Science. ( Every class was involved!)

A group photo organised by a regular Mum at our Community Hub! Loved how excited our families were.

Paintings by a mother, hung in our Community Hub.

Some lovely year 1/2 girls who were all thrilled to wear pretty dresses to the art show, just like Ms. Huber. 
An extension project for a high level 3/4 student. He created a unicorn out of wire, and got together an artist team to help fill it. I was really proud of him!


This was another extension project. I has a huge happy/proud teacher moment when he showed off this art piece to his Mum on the night. His Mum couldn't believe he created it!

 These pictures show one of our Apple Tvs playing a video of the 1/2s iPad artwork, in their "Under the Sea" themed hallway.( there was another apple TV in the 5/6 area playing a video of the Andy Goldsworthy projects seen in another post)

 A big celebration always needs food....hence why we put on a BBQ! Amongst the "Neural Knit" installation.

 Our 5/6 Team Leader and our Science teacher serving out the food.

Our Community Hub Organiser and a volunteer father doing an amazing job cooking everything up.

Our translator is sitting with some parents eating the BBQ. With her help I was able to communicate to an entire cohort of our school that other wise would have missed out. 

 Our Principal hanging out with some students in the Neural knit display and BBQ area.

There were many activities happening at the art show....including getting to make some art in the art room!

 One of my favourite pieces made on the night was " Keep calm and go to the Art Show". Cheers to our Play and Say teacher for being in the Art Room with the students and families.

 A proud foundation student beside his mosaic piece. 

The 3/4 recycled mosaic boxes planted and placed outside filled with plants.

The 3/4 area was the enchanted forest with clay mushrooms and big murals. The classes used symmetry lessons in their maths to create leaves hung off finger knitted vines. This made me so happy that classes were integrating visual arts into their lessons. 

The 3/4 students clay mushrooms, and the tree extension project. 

Ned Kelly Display.

At the beginning of my time being the art teacher at this school, I applied for a program called the Song Room. Lena from the song room has been a wonderful asset to our school. The 5/6 students are performing at the Melbourne Town Hall on this coming Monday with them, and we decided that our visual art show would also be a great time to showcase what we had been working on. We also had our 3/4s and 1/2s perform a few songs that we had worked on the last 2 terms.

Two of our 1/2 teachers have been really inspired by having song room within the school, and created a song with their class that they also performed on the night. 

 It was a huge turnout!

 I was still trying to manage the safety of parents and students when I was surprised by gorgeous flowers by my principal. :-)

The outcome of this art show, was felt the next day when I had a grandmother who couldn't speak any english was insisting that she help me take down the artwork. Her daughter came to me later and said that I let her feel useful, and she was so happy to be part of the school, and that she was so happy she came to the art show. The students also came running up to me the next day exclaiming how much fun they had, and how much they enjoyed it. It made all the effort and hard work seem so worth it. I am really happy with the success of it, and how supportive all the staff and parents were along the way.