Over the past week and a half, Art 1 students have been participating in a boot camp--an Artistic Behaviors Boot Camp. The artistic behaviors are common behaviors that artists do; processes they go through on their journey of creating art. In our classroom, the artistic behaviors include: Creating Original Art, Observing, Developing Art Making Skills, Taking Risks, Having a Global Awareness of Art Making, Communicating through artwork, Reflecting, Problem Solving, and Collaborating/Being Part of a Community.
Each day the students would be given an activity. Some activities would require them to do something; other activities would ask them to watch a video. Once they were finished with an activity, they were asked to reflect and make connections between the activity and the artistic behaviors.
Once 8 of the activities were complete, students were given back all 8 of their reflection sheets. They were given one last sheet as an activity on reflection. They were asked to think back over the activities and make any changes to which activities connected to which behaviors because sometimes they chose more than one behavior for an activity or they chose the same behavior for multiple activities.
Activities included one student drawing an image that was described to them by another student, a TED Talk video about artist Phil Hansen and how he "Embraced the Shake", a collaborative task where each student drew a small section of a larger work and the students had to work together to put the puzzle together, drawing using a marker at the end of a three foot stick, a video short introducing global artists, inspiration from Baby George, a lesson on copyright that ended with a discussion about Banksy's Dismaland and parody, a fun color challenge, and a second look at all the activities they reflected on over the past week and a half.
Students took part in this "boot camp" to be introduced to the artistic behaviors because they are at the heart of the students growing as artists. As they create art this year, they will learn to think like artists, go through processes that artists do, and gain a deeper understanding for the artistic process and how they can apply that to other areas of their education and their lives.
Each day the students would be given an activity. Some activities would require them to do something; other activities would ask them to watch a video. Once they were finished with an activity, they were asked to reflect and make connections between the activity and the artistic behaviors.
Once 8 of the activities were complete, students were given back all 8 of their reflection sheets. They were given one last sheet as an activity on reflection. They were asked to think back over the activities and make any changes to which activities connected to which behaviors because sometimes they chose more than one behavior for an activity or they chose the same behavior for multiple activities.
Activities included one student drawing an image that was described to them by another student, a TED Talk video about artist Phil Hansen and how he "Embraced the Shake", a collaborative task where each student drew a small section of a larger work and the students had to work together to put the puzzle together, drawing using a marker at the end of a three foot stick, a video short introducing global artists, inspiration from Baby George, a lesson on copyright that ended with a discussion about Banksy's Dismaland and parody, a fun color challenge, and a second look at all the activities they reflected on over the past week and a half.
Students took part in this "boot camp" to be introduced to the artistic behaviors because they are at the heart of the students growing as artists. As they create art this year, they will learn to think like artists, go through processes that artists do, and gain a deeper understanding for the artistic process and how they can apply that to other areas of their education and their lives.
