Freebie Weekly Planner

With my free time today I decided to make myself a planner. Last year I bought an Erin Condren planner but decided that it wasn't fully functional for myself as an art teacher - there were just too many extras. The two sections I used most often were the monthly calendars and weekly planning pages. The first part of my journey was to find a simple monthly calendar design that I liked.

 I found this gem by The Tomkat Studio.

Now that I had my starting point I decided to make a weekly planner that matched this design.

And here is what I came up with! I am a fan of the simplicity, especially if I will be printing this out MANY times. Click the preview images above to download these two pages if you would like to use my design for your own planner. Let me know what you think!

Kindergarten Kandinsky Circles

I discussed Kandinsky's Concentric Circles painting with my seven kindergarten classes. They were given a piece of 12x18 paper that I pre-folded into thirds. Students were guided and aided in folding their papers 'hotdog' style to create 6 sections. They used black pastel to trace along the fold lines and then moved onto many colors to create their circles, one in each square. When they finished filling in each square with enough pastel, students used tempera cakes to fill in the 'triangle' shaped corners.

As an extension I had students create individual circles on 6x6 paper and cut them out. I used these to create the buds on tree next to the bulletin board I was planning. Here is the final result:

In 2014...

Starting this month I obtained another bulletin board! This one is located right across the hall from my classroom, which is nice since all the other ones are across the school.

I wanted to make this bulletin board something fun to look at, without student artwork. And since it's a new year I wanted to incorporate that in some way. 

I've always loved the left vs. right brain conflict and the Mercedes Benz ads from awhile ago (Google it!) so I went with it. After some googling/pinning of my own for inspiration I came up with this!

Left brain logic.

Right brain creativity.

The clock and brain are the only things hand drawn by me. In the coming years hopefully I'll be able to add more to this idea!

Winter Bulletin Board

I had posted my fall bulletin board a few months ago, and in December I changed it to a winter theme. 'It's Snow Secret: GES has amazing artists!'

The board has projects from Kindergarten, Second, and Third grades.

Kindergarteners did the finger painted Christmas lights, second grade did the snowmen having an introduction to value and shading, and third grade did the landscapes using tints and shades.

I'm going to try harder to remember to take pictures during the actual art making process instead of just the finished displays. It will make for a much more educational blog, don't ya think?

If you'd like to know more about an individual project leave a comment below and I'd be happy to help!

Peter Diem Cow Fever

Of course I did this lesson a while ago but never posted pictures because I'm not very good at this blogging thing. I've got a lot on my plate, it is my first year and all!

I got my idea for this project from Mrs. Impey and loved the idea of it. What a fun way to introduce pattern to the Kinders!

I tried step by step drawing with my first class, but after that was an EPIC fail I decided to draw out my own cow and copy it on my 9x12 paper. The students then only had to draw their spots (in black crayon) and add some pattern (in any other color).

I hung them on a close-line outside my classroom and always heard people commenting/complimenting them as they walked by :)

I will scan in my original and upload it for anyone who would like to use it for their own lesson.