I have been a little slow this year in updating our class blog, due to injuries and surgery that caused me to miss some school at the beginning of the year. But we are catching up quickly in our choice-based art room. We currently have a drawing station, a paper station, a weaving station, a three-dimensional construction station using found materials , and a painting station open in grades three, four, and five. 1st and 2nd grades are able to go to the drawing station, paper station, modeling clay, and painting. 2nd grade also uses the construction station. Kindergarten has choices of drawing, pre-cut paper shapes for collage, modeling clay, stamping, and blocks They have just been introduced to cutting out their own shapes for a non-objective collage.

On Fridays, all students may go to the conceptual building station, where they use creative ideas for three-dimensional constructions that are temporary. The building station has a variety of 3-D sets: k'nex, kid k'nex, legos, shapees, tinkertoys, 4 large tubs of blocks, bristle blocks, space links, jigsaw puzzles, tangram puzzles, plastic and rubber shapes for making 2-D designs, and magnetix. They may also use the graphic programs on the computers on Fridays.

Third, fourth, and fifth grade students weave with yarn. Third grade students learn finger weaving and cup-weaving. Fourth grade and fifth grade students learn straw-weaving and rectangular weaving on pasteboard looms. These are, of course, a choice to work on.

I have recently introduced bookmaking. First grade students can make their own books using yarn for binding. Second grade students are making altered books by selecting cut-up nameless art work to add details to and change to their own art, then bind with yarn. Third through fifth grade students are using old books from our library to make their own altered books. First they are painting the covers, and then will add their own artwork to the inside pages.


I plan on introducing some new stations in the next semester, which may take the place of established ones. We are also beginning to get ready for our all-school spring art show, which takes place on March 27th.