Day: 10 October 2014

Every Artist is Unique

We began our art theory lessons last week with one of the main things that all artists should always be aware of – each artist is unique.  We can get ideas from others but we need to ‘do our own thing’ with that idea.

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I showed the students about 30 different prints from a wide variety of different artists (Cezanne, Monet, Pissarro, Van Gogh, Renoir, Picasso, and some students from British Columbia).  Each print was different from the other but all had one element the same – they all contained at least one tree.

Students were then directed to create their own pictures.  They could use any of the media on their desks (wax crayons, pencil crayons, skinny felt markers, fat markers).  They could have the paper in either position (landscape or portrait).  The only ‘rule’ was that the picture needed to contain at least one tree.

As you can see – every artist in Division 5 is UNIQUE!!!

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Terry Fox Run

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Even with our school year starting late this year, we still managed to get our learning in about Terry Fox.  In our class we discussed his life and what he accomplished in that short life.  We had a talk about cancer and how, because of the awareness that Terry brought to this serious disease, more and more people are surviving than did in the past.

As next Spring is the 35th anniversary of when Terry began his Marathon of Hope, we are focusing our major fundraising efforts for then.  We will also be doing our big run then, as well.  We had planned to do our regular run two weeks ago – and then a more involved one next Spring – but the weather was rather inclement that day.  We had a short assembly followed by our (indoor) corn roast instead.  With the students we talked about how Terry ran in all sorts of weather (fair or foul) but he was an adult and could make that choice for himself.  We didn’t think it was a good choice for our young students.

In our class we did write, on special sticker forms, for whom we were going to be running.  We will use these next Spring.  Today, as a part of one of our Fin’s Friends (Canucks’ character building programme) we discussed ‘perseverence’.  Naturally Terry was again discussed as I cannot think of anyone better suited as a role model for not giving up – no matter how difficult something is.  Students seemed to really understand what it means to persevere and will, hopefully, be able to incorporate that trait into their lives.