Writing stories and creating creatures for stop motion

During every fourth grade visual arts class we have been observing videos, identifying how different artists use different visuals and sounds to communicate emotions. 

  

  

The fourth grade students used inspiration from their writing classes to create stories for these music videos; in their visual arts and music classes they have used charts to organize how they will use elements of art and musical form for the different feelings expressed throughout their stories.

In visual arts, the students have been working on creating the characters they will begin filming next week.  

Drawing from observation

A valuable skill in visual arts is accurate drawing.  

Students benefit from learning about drawing from observation early on.  

In third grade, we have been practicing this kind of drawing using pencils and ink, observing geometrical forms and shadows. 

It is a challenge for young children to differentiate between things they see and things they know are there, so it is important to look carefully and count corners, for example.  We know a cube has 8 corners, but we can only see 7.  

We keep the classroom nice and dark with only one directional light on our models, to control the amount of shadows. 

Children practicing hatching shading with ink.

KINDERGARTEN: PLAYING PERCUSSION INSTRUMENTS


These past few weeks, Kindergarten students have been filling the music classroom with the sounds of very diverse percussion instruments. These pitched and un-pitched musical instruments expanded the expressive possibilities of our musical experiences, and, of course, are the children's favourite medium for music making. We used them to learn about pitch, timber, colour, using them to create a sound landscape for a story. We used them also as another way of experiencing fundamental music elements such as beat and rhythm. At the same time, they allow us to reinforce the cooperative and management skills necessary for making music together: listening to others, respecting turns, taking care of your instrument, responding to visual and musical cues to be able to begin and finish together, or to intervene on time.

Unpitched instruments: Students learned the names and proper usage of the instruments: hand drum, guiro, claves, blocks, tambourin, triangle, cabassa, or rainstick. They inquired how different materials create a particular type of timber: metal, wood, and membranes. They also explored the different ways of creating sound: striking, rubbing, or shaking.

Students sit in a circle. They switch instruments by moving to the next mat clockwise. This allows them to play all of the instruments.

Practicing basic skills to play in an ensemble: responding to the cues and finishing together!

 .

Students created their own versions of a story.

Students accompany their singing.

Pitched instruments: Xylophones, metallophones, glockenspiels, the so called Orff instruments. Students learned barred-instrument technique: how to release the sound, to hold mallets as if riding a bicycle, with no fingers on top, elbows out slightly, mallets pointed inward, and sitting posture.

The children's ability to play musical instruments is related to their physical development. In music class, we use the creative context of a story, a rhyme, or a song to explore sound. Kinder students work on their muscular coordination and the most refined eye coordination necessary to play barred instruments, first with two hands simultaneously, and then with alternating hands guided by a creative purpose.

History of Classical Music

Sixth graders have been focused on developing knowledge and understanding of Music history. The students are studying different composers and the characteristics of the musical periods in which they made their compositions.

Musical Forms

Fourth Grade students have been working on the concepts of musical forms.  Musical forms are basic units often used by composers when creating a musical piece. Students have been listening to compositions and identifying the basic forms studied in class, in order to put them into practice when composing their own musical pieces.

Ear Training

Third grade students have been working on auditory training.

Through different kinds of activities, students have been developing the ability to listen to different rhythmic cells and to identify them.

Auditory development begins with detection of the presence and absence of sounds; then progresses through identification, discrimination and recognition, and comprehension can happen by processing the auditory information.

Sixth graders finishing their masks

These past few weeks of 2017 have been the last formal classes regarding the Costa Rican mascarada tradition.  Most students are almost finished with their masks so they will receive some more studio time in order to finish painting and adorning their masks with hair, jewels, and other accessories... The rest of the class time will be used to begin our new project.  

Using masking tape to do dry work before papier machéing over it.

Different styles and mediums can be used...

When using acrylic paint, mistakes can be erased by washing paint off...

Some very interesting surfaces have surfaced...

And some masks say a lot about their makers.