Assessing Growth in Drawing

How can I draw what I see?

• Look for Contour Families: line, curve, angle, circle and dot. 
• Air draw
• 'Imagine draw' when you need to overlap
• Look closely... even when you think you're done! 

At the beginning of the year, each student at GWA from Grades KG2-Grade 5 was asked to do their best drawing in 10 minutes. They had to draw a of a pot of art supplies. They reflected on their work and set goals for how they would improve in drawing this year.

Here are some of the drawings and reflections from Grade 3: 

And very focused Grade 4s: 

How can forces help us create art?

Grade 2 students explored how force can help us draw. They created very light lines and dark lines by varying the amount of force they used when drawing.

Their observational drawings included thick dark lines made with a lot of force and thin light lines made with a little force. 

When done, we turned on our imaginations and transformed the machines into characters with google eyes! What fun! 

Going Bananas

More Chemical Reactions in Grade 4!

Here GWA artists created art on bananas by poking holes with a pin, (much like a tatoo artist does!) After a moment the mark began to oxidize! 

Goal Setting

Finding out what students know in art is a very important way to ensure progress and set appropriate goals. One of the ways that students are self assessing and goal setting this year in art class is through a drawing assessment. Each student in the grades 2-5 classes completed a 10 minute observational drawing of the same subject (a cup of art supplies). They critiqued their work and set goals for observational drawing this year. We will do the same activity later in the year to identify areas of improvement and set new goals.

Grade 3-5 Homework

As Grade 3,4 and 5 students finish up this week, they have been told that their homework is to draw, draw and draw, over the next 10 weeks and summer break! Here, 3KR is doing a practice contour drawing. They are getting much better at using thin and thick lines!

Remember:
-Look for dots, circles, straight lines, curved lines and angles!
-Draw slowly. Your pencil should move over the paper as your eye moves over the object.

And have fun!

To become good at drawing you must practice!

Upside Down Picasso

The Grade 5 students were challenged to draw Picasso's 'Portrait of Igor Stravinsky'. The twist? They had to copy it upside down! The trick was to turn off the left brain, a task that took a lot of focus. Labeling parts of the drawing (finger, eye, nose... ) was discouraged as this activated the left brain. Students were encouraged to look at each part of the drawing as a series of lines, curves, angles and circles, keeping their right brain focused.

Many students were a little nervous when they began, but they were risk takers and gave it a try. Here are a few almost finished drawings. Impressed? They were very pleased when they turned them around!

Drawing Animals: Geometric Shapes to Organic Shapes

Grade 3 students are busy at work in their home room classes, completing an ecosystems project. To support this end of unit project, students are developing their drawing skills in Visual Art class. Knowing how to observe animals carefully to find shapes will help them to design their comics, murals and dioramas. Take a look at some of their practice drawings. Students all agreed that this lesson was challenging, but everyone felt proud of their accomplishments by the end of class. Great job Grade 3!

Tree-ish

  KG2 students enjoyed Peter H. Reynolds book, Ish, in class today. It's a story that celebrates creativity and helps us understand that not everyone sees things in the same way.

Later in our class students examined a bonsai tree very closely. They touched the leaves, the soil, the bark and twigs. They also looked carefully to identify curved lines, straight lines, angles and circles. When they went away to draw, the KG2 students kept their eyes on the tree and looked very carefully. Below are a few examples of their work. 

They decided to title it this project Tree-ish :) -A great title, I think. 

Although some students think that their drawings look very realistic. What do you think?

These drawings took about 15 minutes.

Students loved using charcoal to draw in their art books.

Students touch the tree to identify different kinds of lines.

These guys tried white chalk on black paper.

Grade 4SM students completed their portraits today. This group was especially interested in refining their drawings. The class created emphasis with contrast and with colour, focusing on aspects of their personality and dreams that they wished to highlight.

 

An Introduction to Portraits

Grade 4 is working on a unit, Respect Ourselves, Respect the World. In Art class they will be creating portraits to portray how they see themselves. We are beginning the unit by putting on our detective hats and investigating how many different artists express themselves through self-portraits. We have found that through colour, facial expressions, symbols and clothing, we can find out many things about the person.

Students are also practising their drawing. Everyone will improve because we practise! This week, we completed blind-contour drawing and some observational drawings of our facial features to warm up for our self-portraits. Take a look:

Say Cheese (or kimchi!)

Blanka's stare :)

What a great smile!



This student is using her sense of touch to draw. Students are surprised at what they learn about the object through touch!



Her eyes are on the object. Not her paper! Her pencil is moving line a snail :)

WELCOME 2012-2013

Welcome back to all of our artists -and a big GWA welcome to all of the new artists who have joined this year! After our first week of classes, I have seen almost all of you. We’ve discussed the essential agreements and gotten to know each other by creating and sharing our art.

Summer Artists

One of the things that I have been so thrilled to hear is how many of you have been drawing over the summer! So many students are telling me that they were inspired to draw more and felt empowered by what they had learned last year. Here are some pictures from last year’s drawing lessons to inspire you all. I encourage you to keep drawing in your spare time! Remember, with practise, everyone can look more closely and learn to draw better!    :)