Week 3

I was secretly hoping for a two hour delay today (since they canceled school yesterday) so I could get some extra shut eye, but I was not so lucky! Getting up at 5:30 am is starting to wear on me a little, but I only have 12 more trips to go and I made it this long!

Any-who! Today I was super active and on my feet helping students with their projects. Jewelry 1 is in the middle of their first project. I have no experience in metal work but I have grown very confident in my ability to teach it in a short amount of time. I just make sure I am watching Ms. O's demos and taking notes so if I ever have to teach it while I'm student teaching for her or for a position in the future, I'll be ready! So the first two periods flew by because I was helping students left and right. For Intro to 3D, Ms. O started class and helped students get started on their wire self-portraits during 3rd period and then left to do some work for the upcoming art show, leaving me to start 4th period and help everyone. It went well! The class was SUPER quiet which was a little awkward, but hopefully they'll warm up to me. I made a mistake where one student was struggling and I grabbed his project and started tinkering with it and messed up the work he had done. He did not mind at all, but I felt really bad. I will remember to 1. Ask before I start messing with a student project, and 2. remember that I don't want to become my biggest pet peeve: art teachers is them DOING the project for the students. Additionally, in the period I taught there are two students with special needs taking the class on a Pass/Fail basis and have peer aids with them. I noticed that the aids were doing the project for the students, D. and C., and I asked the peers to make sure they don't just do the project for them. The aids communicated that they felt that working with wire was too difficult for them because it involves strong motor skills and hand-eye coordination, both of which D. and C. struggle with. So after that period, I told Ms. O some of my concerns about the medium of the project and its accessibility for her students with special needs. She totally agreed so we brainstormed and came up with two alternatives. The first alternative was to let them work with pipe cleaners instead of wire. It'll be much easier to bend and twist and form into the shapes D. and C. want and is a better texture for students sensitive to texture. The second alternative is to have them create a contour, self-portrait out of yarn and then harden it with starch so it stands up like the wire portraits students are making in class. I think both alternatives will work great!

During AP and Prep I helped cut matboard to frame artwork for the Scholastic Art Show this weekend. There were SO many pieces that needed to be framed. I suggested that she make students in AP and upper level art classes learn to frame their own artwork to lesson her workload and she said she'll teach AP so they can frame their work to be sent in their portfolio.

That's about all I have to report! Shorter than usual but I can't think of any other significant things. Excited to go back tomorrow!

I did not take any pictures of student work today but I HAVE to post a picture with every journal at this point so here is a sculpture I made of my German Shepherd in ceramics class.