Art Free Days
Students earn Art Free Days within the school year as both an incentive and an opportunity to challenge themselves as artists. It also allows the Art room to act as a Makerspace environment. Each class at CET has their own "Color Wheel" to fill by following three main classroom expectations:
1. Listen to Directions
2. Show Good Behavior
3. Help During Clean-Up
At the beginning of the year these expectations are clearly defined in class discussion, and students provide their own examples highlighting each one. When a class as a whole is able to follow those expectations they earn one piece of the color wheel. In addition, as a class they announce which color will be filled in, reinforcing the order of the colors on the wheel.
If the class was not able to follow those expectations, then they do not earn a piece of the color wheel that day. As a class, we discuss what needs to be worked on and they try again next Art class. Pieces of the color wheel are never taken away.
During an Art Free Day, brief directions are given to reinforce good Art Room habits, such as gathering and cleaning up painting supplies. Each table becomes an activity station and students choose where they would like to work. Activity bins are labeled and accessible to all students so that they can independently take and put away what they need.
Activities include, and are rotated:
Model Magic or Clay Exploration Table
Tempera Paintings & mixing colors with individual palettes
Yarn: Finger Knitting, Pom-Poms
Stamping & Dot Dot Markers
Building Sets: k'Nex, GoldieBlox, Hanz Blocks, etc.
Art Games
Collage Materials: Fabric, Paper Scraps, Colored Tape
Scratch Art
Mixed Media Collage on Cardboard Squares:
Feathers, Small Wooden Shapes, Shells, etc.
Paper Sculpture
Wire Sculpture
Free Drawing, Step-by-step drawing, Coloring Pages
Small Toys for Observational Drawing
1. Listen to Directions
2. Show Good Behavior
3. Help During Clean-Up
At the beginning of the year these expectations are clearly defined in class discussion, and students provide their own examples highlighting each one. When a class as a whole is able to follow those expectations they earn one piece of the color wheel. In addition, as a class they announce which color will be filled in, reinforcing the order of the colors on the wheel.
If the class was not able to follow those expectations, then they do not earn a piece of the color wheel that day. As a class, we discuss what needs to be worked on and they try again next Art class. Pieces of the color wheel are never taken away.
During an Art Free Day, brief directions are given to reinforce good Art Room habits, such as gathering and cleaning up painting supplies. Each table becomes an activity station and students choose where they would like to work. Activity bins are labeled and accessible to all students so that they can independently take and put away what they need.
Activities include, and are rotated:
Model Magic or Clay Exploration Table
Tempera Paintings & mixing colors with individual palettes
Yarn: Finger Knitting, Pom-Poms
Stamping & Dot Dot Markers
Building Sets: k'Nex, GoldieBlox, Hanz Blocks, etc.
Art Games
Collage Materials: Fabric, Paper Scraps, Colored Tape
Scratch Art
Mixed Media Collage on Cardboard Squares:
Feathers, Small Wooden Shapes, Shells, etc.
Paper Sculpture
Wire Sculpture
Free Drawing, Step-by-step drawing, Coloring Pages
Small Toys for Observational Drawing