Future Animators!
Posted by Krissy Ponden
Sixth graders have been working hard on their stop motion animation unit in visual arts. They have spent weeks studying the medium, drawing storyboards, and creating characters and sets. Finally this week they were able to begin recording! Be sure to look for their amazing videos in this year’s art show!
The Memory Project expands to 7th grade!
Posted by Krissy Ponden
The Memory Project has become a rite of passage for 8th grade visual art students. They learn how to draw a portrait as a gift for a child experiencing hardships somewhere in the world. This year, 7th graders have been invited to create “inspiration art” for children living under the threat of Boko Haram in Nigeria. The students were given a photo of a child along with their name, age, favorite color, three words they used to describe themselves, and their hope for a future career. Their artwork will be mailed to the children as a gift to let them know that we are thinking of them and wishing them well!
If Picasso Made Witches
Posted by Alice DesGranges
In connection with our study of Picasso’s cubist work, the fourth-grade class created witches that incorporate some of the characteristics of his work. We discussed in class how Picasso often used two viewpoints of faces in a single work: a front and a silhouette. We discussed several examples of these faces such as “Girl Before a Mirror” and “Woman with a book”. The students then added warts, eyelashes, spiders, scars, and other hideous details.
“Chopped” meets 5th Grade Science!
Posted by colleennoyes
What do rubber bands, popsicle sticks, cotton balls, tape and a bottle cap have to do with cooking? Well, nothing actually!! But if there was an engineering competition that was modeled after the popular cooking show Chopped then the Unquowa 5th graders would surely succeed! Students worked in groups, tasked with coming up with a design to make a functional catapult. Medieval meets Modern! It was pretty amazing to see the variety of designs these young scientists came up with. It was a fun day in Science!!!!!!!
Someday we’ll find it…the rainbow connection
Posted by Krissy Ponden
Sixth graders have been learning about color and its relationship to emotion. They explored the ways that colors are seen in different cultures and learned why white is not the universal color for brides or black the color for mourning around the world. We also considered how feel when we see different colors and how it is different for each person. This is all in preparation for our emotional color portrait project, which we will be drawing and watercoloring soon!
Radial Balance in Art, Culture, Nature, and History
Posted by Krissy Ponden
8th graders are in the middle of their first major project of the year, which focuses on the concept of radial balance. While “mandala coloring books” have become ubiquitous in recent years for their calming properties, the students learned about the myriad of ways that similar designs have shown up throughout history in different cultures around the world. We created radial designs on the computer and are now beginning to work on our printed designs. This is always a project that brings color and an opportunity for mindful reflection to our campus, and we are looking forward to sharing the results soon!
