Spring Art Show; part 2

More pictures from my schools first art show.........

Spring Art Show

In April I held the first art show at my show. These are some of the pictures I took that day. The students (and aides) enjoyed seeing their art displayed and honored.

I am so proud of what they have been able to accomplish through-out the past year in art.

A new Adaptive Easel!

A few weeks ago this easel arrived in my room. At my school we have a carpenter that makes adaptive equipment for all the students. His Name is Ron and he is amazing, the school is so lucky to have him.

As my students get older their wheelchairs have more difficulty fitting under the tables in the art room. I really wanted to get some type easel so my students could get right up to their work. Since traditional easels are not accessible I needed something a bit different. After meeting with Ron a couple of times he constructed this over spring break.

This easel has really made a difference in my classroom. Students of many shapes and sizes can use this easel to experience art. This works especially good for my students with a limited range of motion.

Color Field Painting

Color Field Painting

In this Project we looked at the work of two abstract artists: Morris Louis and Helen Frankenthaler. Both were a part of the color field painting movement of the 1960’s and 70’s. These artists used many different tools in place of brushes to paint with. They would use raw canvas and liquefied paint to create large abstract works.

In our small painting we used runny tempera paint on muslin. We used three strange tools to apply the paint: a sponge to apply the yellow, an eyedropper to apply the red and a spray bottle to apply the blue. As we worked the colors over lapped on our fabric and create new colors such as orange, green and purple.

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs

I have always loved the book Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and thought this would make a great interdisciplinary lesson to do at my school. I teamed up with one of the really great teachers at my school and started this month long project. She read the book in class and did other lessons that focused on the things that happened in the book and food in general.

I introduced the students to the Pop artist Claus Oldenburg and his giant food sculptures. The students started to get really excited when I told them we would be making our own art based on the book and Oldenburg. For the food sculptures we would make as a class I had pre-made all the armatures out of cardboard and newspaper. We then worked together to cover the bases with strips of newspaper and paper mache paste. This took many days and was very messy, but the students loved to smooth the paper on to the forms. (I swore I would never do paper mache again, but that only lasted three weeks before I was cat it again.) After the food dried we painted each piece to look like real food. We even used colored paper to represent lettuce and cheese on our burger.

In class the students also watched the Movie version of the book and read the sequel, Pickles to Pittsburgh.

I can't wait to display this at the school wide art show this Friday.

Creating Digital art online

I try to Incorporate the computer when I'm working with students one on one. I found this website a few weeks ago. My student are able to create a really interesting art work by using a switch to access the computer. It adds another option to my students who love the computer and hate getting messy.

Adaptive Scissors

Many of my student have a hard time using scissors (even ones manufactured for students with disabilities) and holding the the paper at the same time. My school's OT department came up with this wood base to mount the scissors on, so that the students just press the top of the loop while they (or the aide) move the paper along.

Adapting A stamp

Stamps are most often flat and small, and hard for student with special needs to use. Here I have adapted a sponge shape stamp so my student can better use it. The sponge is glued to a piece of cardboard, but next time I would use wood so it would last longer. Then I glued and old prescription pill bottle to the other side of the cardboard. This becomes a handle they can use, making stamping more accesible.

This is how "A" paints

"A" likes art on his terms. I tried to get him to use a brush but he would alway turn it around and tap the handle on the paper. So thinking quickly one day I cut up some sponge into small rectangle that fit into the wells of the liquid watercolor tray. Right away he picked them out of the tray. He dropped them onto his paper making marks. He also squeezed them releasing the paint while moving his hand over top of the paper. I have to stay out of his line of sight while he works or he will just want to play with the sponges. I'm glad I found a way for "A" to paint because he aways has the biggest smile on his face when he enters the art room.