iPads and 7 year olds: A Parent's Perspective:

So I got this message from a Donald parent:


"Curse you Leslie McReynolds, thanks to your recommendation my children have spent the last two hours proving that they are smarter than me! My seven year olds are coding their own games...characters, music, interaction, every element of gameplay. And while they are doing it they are problem solving, collaboration, and amazing creativity. The only problem is that they are already more adept than I am so I can't answer their questions. What a wonderful problem to have!"

^.^

Looky what I did. *giggle*

Ok, so check this out---

LISD 1:X

Seriously, when I post, I pretend no one is reading. My own mother doesn't even follow this blog. My blog says I have, like, I don't know, 22 followers (thanks Bloglovin' and Feedly! I know I have more! Huh.). Imagine my surprise when I was asked to be a guest blogger on our district's 1:X website?! Me? Have you read my stuff? I talk about Star Trek waaay too much.

This means I get to be a huge (loud) voice for Donald Elementary and Art(s) Education! I am going to be shining a huge (loud) spotlight on us, so buff up. THIS. IS. HAPPENING. PEOPLE.

A year ago I was fumbling around with blogging. Jessica at Art of Ed and Tricia Fuglestad have inspired me so much. (Jessica actually helped me set up my blog--she is a rock star.)Thanks to these awesome art educators, we art teachers here in LISD can raise our roof. Promote and model what we are already doing!

I intend to stay true to my goal of demonstrating practical ways to incorporate tech with traditional art making. Messy hands and clean iPads. It can work.

Keep checking it out. And send me your cool stuff!

Minecraft in the Art Room. Creepers gotta creep!

In case you didn't know, I am a gamer. I have been since video games were invented. I play a lot of games, from Scrabble to World of Warcraft. I believe there are strong benefits to gaming, and I am seeking awesome games to bring into the Art Room. (For more information about the benefits of gaming and how gaming can change the world, check out Jane McGonigal)

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With the kids bringing their iPads to Art, I made some necessary additions to my Free Choice Centers (what the kids choose to do when they finish their project). Adding to origami, stamping, weaving, free draw, and assorted games/puzzles, we now can use the iPad as a Center!

No, they didn't rush through their work to get here :)

Some guidelines:

• Art Apps only
• 3 Questions (these are posted and repeated):
• Are you being creative?
• Are you thinking like and artist?
• Is it appropriate?

I explained the 3 Questions to the kids.Here is how the conversation went:

Me: Is Candy Crush allowed?
Kids: Noooo.
Me: Plants vs Zombies?
Kids: NO!
Me: Minecraft?
Kids: No. Wait. Yes? YES!?

So why would I let the kids play Minecraft? Why wouldn't I!

First of all, it is a highly creative and (don't tell) educational game. Talk about STEAM. (ah, that is STEM with a healthy dose of ART). Second, many kids play, it is highly engaging and super fun.  Try this: ask a couple of classes how many kids play and note how many hands shoot up.

Ok, here are my Minecraft guidelines:

• Creative mode only. There are no creepers in creative mode!
• Students must be thinking and acting as an artist at all times.
• Students understand they will not be playing every time they come to art, or even when they have Centers. They will draw, weave, etc. We are seeking balance!
• If these privileges are abused in any way, this goes bye-bye.

Our kids LOVE Minecraft. Why not meet them halfway?

Fuzzy questions: 

• what about other games like Minecraft? 
• What about other creative games?

 This is where the 3 Questions have to be answered. If a kid is "making" goods for the sheer purpose of "selling" them, I don't see the creativity and artistry in that at all.

Teachers and Parents, if you really want to explore gaming, have your kids show you Minecraft. I promise you will at least you will have fun with your kids!

Way Cool Apps for iPads and how we are using them. I think.

I spent a LOT of time last year playing with the iPad and researching Art Apps to prepare for this year. I feel pretty good about where we are heading. 

Here are my driving questions: 

-How can we get our stuff OFF the iPad? This is a HUGE ISSUE for those of you sharing!

-How can we use this tech meaningfully without replacing traditional art materials? There HAS to be balance!

 So with this in mind, I thought I would share a portion of the informational sheet I sent home to our parents (my apologies for any overlap!):

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Me: There is an App for building clay pots*

Your kids: Cool!

Me: Ok, we are going to do a clay project. Everyone take out your iPads.

Your kids: *crickets*

Me: Ok, now what if I said, here is a lump of clay, go make something?

Your kids: *cheers!*

Me: So, how could we use this clay making app to help us?

Your kids: we could use the app to help us with our design before we made it out of clay!

Me: Bingo!

We will use the apps to help us make our art better and stronger. Technology is a tool, not a replacement. We will continue to create with messy hands.

It is the nature of art to be messy, subjective and hard to define. That being said, here are my underlying 3 Questions** for using technology in my room:

Are you being creative?

Are you thinking as an artist?

Is this appropriate?

What is appropriate for one family may not be appropriate for another. Parents, the time for honest conversations is now.

These sticky, fuzzy issues are issues artists and art teachers have been dealing with for centuries. The only thing that has changed is the type of technology.

(Did you know that when Gutenberg invented movable type and the printing press in the 1440’s, it “led many superstitious people of the time to equate printing with Satan because it seemed to be magical.”? The Unsung Heroes, a History of Print, Dr. Jerry Waite, 2001.  And now we can’t imagine a world without printers! Not an Art reference, per se, but pretty interesting! )

I am committed to integrating tech with traditional art making in a meaningful way. I spent last year attending conventions learning how to effectively use iPads in the art rooms, talked to art teachers across the country for their experience, perspective and “must have apps” and did a ton of app research over the summer...

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*(Yep. check out Let's Create Pottery)

** (I made this into a poster for my kids. So I can point at it a hundred times a day)

• 
  

Here is my "fluid"  list of apps my kids need to download:

(I have no idea why these images are all over the place!? And I have a migraine so I amnotinthemoodtofixthem. Sorry ^.^)

Google Drive (my district is using Google Apps for Education in an effort to get more efficient and hopefully go paperless)

Snapseed (free): The Bomb Diggity for me. A photo editing app for images, allows saving directly to Goggle Drive. (So you can make a work of art on another app, save it to the Camera Roll, and then save it to Drive using Snapseed.)

Inspire Pro (free or paid): for painting 

Sketchbook Express (free or paid): for drawing

Pic Collage (free): Classroom teachers LOVE this app, it is great for many, many things. Want some faculty-wide Brownie Points? Intro it as a way to make lock/home screen collages.

Doodle Dandy (free) Fun app about radial symmetry.

Drawing Pad (paid): optional paid app, but the best I have found for younger kids. Easy to understand and navigate.

Procreate (paid): optional, and the best on the market right now. I recommend this for my older students who plan to take Art in Middle School and High School.

ArtRage (paid): optional, similar to Procreate

1st Week Post! (or: How I Beat Laryngitis This Year!)

(official way cool art teacher disclaimer: I absolutely love my job. But the first week...seriously, it's a beating.) Oh, and this post is kinda wordy. I'm sorry.


OK peeps, whew. All I can say is YAY! The first week is over. I don't know about you guys, but I am normally a weepy, hoarse-throated, headache-y blob of worthlessness by Friday. I have been teaching for 20 plus years. I ALWAYS forget what the first week entails. Kinda like childbirth *wink wink*. Ha ha.

This is usually how it goes: The first day (Monday) is always AWESOME! Sunshine and unicorns and the kids are wonderful joys and I am super excited!!! I AM THE BEST TEACHER EVER!

See that blob in the paint? That's me. Or it might be a happy tree.

 By Thursday we teachers greet each other in the halls with glazed expressions, repeating the same phrase: we always forget what the first week is really like, don't we? Oh ha ha ha!  Thursday afternoon I literally hugged a wall. I walked up, spread my arms and just...hugged it.  The kids are cooked: tired and crying. Forget open ended, empathic questions. Ha! Older kids can barely keep their heads off the table. This is probably the only week of the entire year they do not talk. Kindergartners have this shell shocked expression, asking, do we really have to come back TOMORROW? Do we really have to do this again? 

What most people don't understand about being a "Specials" or "Fine Arts" teacher is that we have to give the exact same presentation to every single class we see. So for us, we repeat the first day of school for 4, 5, 6 or 7 days. I give the same song and dance, rinsed and repeated to 24 classes. It is the most important thing we teachers do to prepare for a successful school year. We plan for success, we manage expectations. If you don't do this, or some semblance of this, you are planning to fail.

These are the tried and true, can't-be-missed things I do every time I see a class the first week of school:

1. seating charts-
2. getting to know all the new kiddoes- 
3. rules and procedures-
4. where the trash can, sink and paper towels live-
5. how this thingy works-
6. please never touch the paper cutter-
7. what exactly is considered a bathroom emergency-
8.  iPads and how we are going to use them-
9. introducing: App Tutorials!
10. and if we have time: portfolios

Is it any wonder I can't talk or even make simple decisions by Friday? I am a wreck. My family usually spends Labor Day weekend treating me like I am recovering from surgery. I normally spend the weekend nursing terrible hoarseness,  migraines and exhaustion.

BUT NOT THIS TIME. I changed it up folks! I let the kids do most of the work. It was awesome! And I only had to deal with the migraine! And, well, some exhaustion, but my throat feels great!

Check this out!

 I asked each class: 

How do you want Art to be this year?

What projects do you want to do?

How should artists treat each other and the room?

1st graders deciding how they want Art to be this year!

So I threw this up on my document camera and wrote their answers, verbatim I might add. I absolutely LOVE their thoughtful responses.

I asked them if they could do these things. A student said, "If we write them, sure!"
So that was a cool moment. I allow a lot of freedom in my room, more than a lot of teachers, but having the kids help plan our yearly projects and the atmosphere of the room is new and really special.

Check out 5th grade:

I apologize, my handwriting is atrocious. Hopefully you can see all the awesomeness here.

Can you see where they said to act like a Smurf?! Happy and hardworking! Can you believe it. A 5th grade boy.

And 3rd grade:

Spy Talk! How awesome is that?!

What did I learn? These kids want to create with yarn, clay and they desperately want to learn observational drawing skills. With the iPads and other tech, they want to learn photography.

They want a judgement free, relaxing and quiet Art Room. But is it really quiet? Not always. Nope. We are too creative and chatty for that. So "Spy Talk" and soft music-Pandora Calm Meditation-to the rescue!

I will be posting these kid-created Rules and Procedures in my room as Tree Maps. Hopefully, since the kids have ownership, I won't have to remind them as much??? Hmmm. I will keep you posted.

So if you stuck with me this far...Yay! Thank you! And here is your prize: You really are awesome. You are EXACTLY where you need to be. You ARE changing lives.

To those starting Back to School this week, go get 'em. Hug a wall if you need to. Drink lots of water, sleep a ton and let the kids do some talking.

iPad Deployment-it's Elementary my dear

Donald ES was the first elementary school in Lewisville ISD to deploy iPads to all student 1-5th. *so excited!*

Last week, teachers and parent volunteers manned stations to help students set up their iPads with starting apps, assist parents with Apple IDs, and so on. Families pre-scheduled online for 15 minute rotations.  It was a busy day, from 9 am to 7 pm, but WOW. Great success. Check out these grins:

you found me.

What are you most excited about?

Leave me a comment!

oh snap!

Thank you Mrs. C at rainbow skies and dragonflies for nominating me! I love that I can communicate and share ideas with a fellow Jersey girl from my Texas art room. The Shore doesn't seem so far away!

I fell (reluctantly, I might add) into blogging while trying to find cool ways to incorporate technology into Art. 2 years ago, I was recovering from surgery and had some time on my hands...and discovered Tricia Fuglestad at Dryden Art and Theresa Gillespie at splats, scraps and glue blobs. Holy moley. I. Had. No. Idea. Seriously, you guys.

So, I played around with blogging and found that it really suited my personality. I love spreading the humor of my classroom and sheer craziness as an "Artist Who Teaches". I was able to learn A LOT more at the NAEA convention (thanks Mr. E and Art of Ed!! You guys are the bomb diggity. I mean it.)

Blogging has enabled me to not only promote the awesomeness of my student's art, it has allowed their secondary art teachers to see what they can do, our administration to see how we in the arts can incorporate technology without always having a device in our hands, and pushed me into a leadership/advocacy role. This year, I presented 6 inservices to our district art/arts teachers, from Beginning Blogging to Digital Portfolios to Ways to Incorporate Tech into the Arts. How many inservices did I present last year? Zero? The year before? Zero. Ten years ago? Zero.

Blogging is fun, easy and I love connecting with all the cool and wonderful artist educators out there.

My goal for this year: creep less and comment more ^.^

Here are some  other blogs that I love:

Mess to Masterpiece- a fellow LISD Art teacher!
Organized Chaos-I am sure she has a ton of followers but I love her posts so I don't care!
........and the remaining spots will be filled when the LISD attendees of the Blogging Basics inservice finish their blogs *ahem* *cough* *poke* 

This made my 13 yr old son literally laugh out loud.

Check out who moved into the Art Room this summer- an Art Fairy! Check out her way cool door! She is going to need some stairs. Or a ramp? I am so excited--iPads and a fairy! Could this year start off any better?

Blogging Inservice. It was a MONDAY.

Blissful LISD Art Teachers Blogging

So I taught my very first inservice (with McAuliffe Art teacher, Rebecca Lake). On a Monday morning. And if it could go wrong...ho boy.

1. Our newly wireless school had no wireless. Server was down. Naturally.
2. OF COURSE I had used Google Presentation. Luckily, I saved it to a flash.
1. Remember kids, always have a plan B!
3. The printers are wireless. I couldn't print. I couldn't print!
4. Finally, with 20 minutes to go, I was able to print the 24 page Presentation and make copies...
5. Toner was down, and I forgot to hit the collate button. *smack head*
6. By this time I was so flustered I couldn't make my laptop and projector talk, so I am totally old schooling it with a document camera.

Remember, I am teaching an inservice. ABOUT BLOGGING ONLINE. Using paper copies on a document camera.

Until Rebecca plugged in the correct cable. Doh!

Luckily the wiffy came on around 9ish. I was able to stop crying and start over and hopefully everyone learned Very Important Lessons. I know I did.

Most important:  heads up blogging-world, we just sent a new bunch of art teachers to you! You're welcome!