Category: Art Programme

Arts Alive – “Out of this World” – what excites us …

For this biennial event, from the Burnaby Art Gallery, we started by reading a storybook called, “Dream You’ll Be”, by Joseph T. Garcia.  We had a few discussions on things that we like and those that excite us – maybe exciting enough to pursue as a career.

Students then did a ‘draft’ drawing of their ‘exciting thing’ before making their ‘good’ copy.  The grade two girls prepared the canvas (the required size by the BAG of 18”x24”) with paint.  They were given black, blue, purple, and white.  This was their result …




After all the students completed their final planet Saturns (what excites them), the grade two boys glued them onto the canvas.

Now it looks like this …

I will deliver it to the Burnaby Art Gallery next week.  They prepare all the art pieces, from the classes at schools who choose to participate, for proper display. We will all be invited to the Grand Opening Night.  I will let you know when it is.  It is usually in April.

I will share the students’ “artist statements” via an email.  They were very thoughtful in what they chose and how they said it.

Antarctic Delivery 🐧

We have had a very exciting week! On Monday we received a package sent from the South Pole! It was an extremely cold package and had air holes punched into it …

In the package was a penguin!!

She came along with this letter from an ‘Admiral Drake’.

There was also a journal and a carry bag.


The penguin, named Pringle, began her home visits on Monday evening with Calla.  On Tuesday morning we heard all about Pringle’s visit when Calla shared her journal writing with us. The visits have continued this week with Samyar (Tuesday) and Rose (Wednesday). Tonight Pringle is spending the night with Patrick. Each morning, after a visit, the student reads their journal entry and shares the pictures they have drawn.  We will be continuing through the class list so that everyone has a chance to have Pringle visit them at home. Please help your child enjoy these visits by assisting, where necessary, with their writing and pictures.

In our classroom we have also got a lot of other penguins who have come for a visit.

We also have a lot of journals, from previous classes of Mrs. Temple’s, who have been lucky enough to have had visits from Pringle.

With this package also came the novel “Mr. Popper’s Penguins”.  We read a chapter each day.  So far Mr. Popper, a house painter from a small town who has a fascination with everything from the Antarctic, has received a live Adélie penguin from an Admiral Drake. He has named this penguin Captain Cook.

We will be spending the next several weeks learning about several different species of penguins – there are 18 different species – and doing many different activities, both scientific and, of course (😉) art based.

Stay tuned.

Poppies … Division 7 Remembers 🌺

We made a variety of poppies for Remembrance Day.  Students coloured, with markers or pencil crayons, both a ‘traditional’ poppy and one that was designed by an Indigenous artist.  These were put on our wreath for display during the assembly.  I will add a photo when I get it back from Mr. Stoffberg.  We also made poppies in the style of Georgia O’Keefe.  These were created through a directed drawing lesson done with pencil.  Students then traced over their lines with china markers, also sometimes called grease pencils.  Students coloured in the centre with green oil pastels.  The poppy petals were painted with red tempera paint.  Once the paint had dried, students went over the lines again with the china markers, cut the poppies out, and glued them onto the complementary colour of green construction paper.  These are on the bulletin board with a few of the extra small poppies.