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Listen with Your Eyes

I love summer not because we are “off” but because we get to jump start and fine tune our rhythm of routine. We get to be outdoors. And this summer that fact, connected to our policy of TQM equaled a thriving garden, well, that plus plenty of water and regular food for our little green friends (thanks for mentoring us Sara).

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When my boys came in a few weeks ago with a larger than life-sized squash that appeared over night in the garden, you know, the kind that was not quite ready to pick yesterday and has become a snack for Gargantua over night, the kind that is just too tough for a delicate meal, I ask, “How 'bout grate the mutant into another modified version of zucchini bread?”

A resounding, “No…!”

“Okay, we'll make art!”

So we pull out the sketch pads for an impromptu art session. Because squash (especially in this overgrown state) will last on our counter indefinitely, they are perfect objects to accent a still life composition. But this curvaceous object, I decided, was perfect for contour drawing. So we set out on a visual journey, observing the delicate contours of this enormous vegetable.

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Contour drawings show the outline of an object. Blind contour drawings are those created by looking only at the subject, not the paper, while drawing and to make matters more complicated, without lifting the pencil. One continuous line, this is the goal in a perfect world. This practice helps develop eye-hand coordination, helps to train the brain to listen to the eyes and to send the proper message to the pencil whose job it is to put marks on paper. Changes in form and space are tough to detect, this exercise allows the artist to get the eye, the brain, and the muscles to be on the same page.

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My dear friend, painter and art mentor extraordinaire, Sandra, has been teaching me the value of contour drawing for many years, “Listen with your eyes,” that's what she says. At least that's where she begins. Here is where that little opener leads:

Putting the effort, (even if it is a little uncomfortable!), into the the practice of contour drawing is important for a few reasons.

  • Primarily, it works to strengthen observation skills, (drawing what one actually sees, as opposed to what the brain “knows”).
  • Blind contour assists in becoming “shape sensitive”… instead of drawing a nose… follow the contour curving left, then sharp turn right…
  • Lastly, It's fun, (if you embrace it)!!!

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Whenever I struggle with a sketch… I'm not getting the correct gesture or tilt of the head or shape if the eye and shadow shape…

I switch my brain over to contour mode and rely on my eyes to tell my hand what to do. Right and left brain work together: Right brain follows the contours of shape, left brain analyzes where the shape relates to other shapes.

You can clearly see that she practices what she preaches. This is one of her contours.

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This is where her rhythm of routine leads:
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Since we live miles and miles apart, she mentors me via iPhone. My youngest son, Søren has been drawing all summer. When I sent Sandra his recent contour, he was tickled to read her encouragement:

“Soren's contour from last night is really good! Those undulations can be challenging, the tendency is to let the brain say, ‘…ya, ya, I know… up and down, up and down…blah blah blah…’. It looked like he was
really letting his eyes inform him! Keep it up!”

Sandra will be pleased to know that after 25+ years, I am beginning to recognize the value of this foundational skill. In fact, Søren and I have committed to a year of as close to daily contour drawing as possible. We will see where this goal lands us. My larger plan is to incorporate contour drawing into science workshops at my co-op this fall—15 minutes of observational drawing. I am sure Leonardo would nod approvingly, but his eyes would not stray from the subject at hand!

Click here for a really creative lesson from Lori over at the inspiring Camp Creek Blog, on how to begin blind contour drawing with younger children.

– Kim

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Sidewalk Masterpiece

ImagesVan Gogh chimes in, celebrating Da Vinci Summer II:
“Great things are done by a series of small things brought together.”

Can’t make it to the art museum this summer? Well, create your own museum at home!

This is a perfect impromptu activity for the patio or driveway. All you need is space, inexpensive sidewalk chalk, a box of chalk pastels in a lovely range of colors…and a bunch of friends.

What’s great about this project is that you get to own an original installation of art until you decide to have the artists close the exhibition with a few squirts of the hose!

Step 1
Prepare the surface using inexpensive sidewalk chalk. We used white because Van Gogh’s sunflowers are bright.

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Step 2
Draw what you see. This is a terrific opportunity to practice observation skills.

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Step 3
Color in the negative space (the background). Begin with colors slightly darker than the painting you are copying. This will add depth to the finished work.

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Step 4

Begin to fill in the details. As you do, be sure to experiment with colors. Don’t use a single color. Use a range of analogous colors (colors that are neighbors on a color wheel) to simulate the rich layering that a painter such as Van Gogh might use.

Step 5
Layer and layer until your composition is complete.

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Step 6
Make some lemonade and invite the neighborhood to your very own street painting festival.

Most of all… enjoy the process!

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Book of 100 Heads

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Last week Søren decided to copy a Van Gogh drawing. He pulled out a sketchbook, sharpened some pencils and spent an hour studying line and texture, shape and value.

The result is stunning.

This reminded me of the wonderful creative journey my friend Sandra set her son, Joshua, on a challenge to “Draw 100 Faces.”

And so, the challenge is on. Only for Søren, the challenge verbiage has been transformed, “Make a book. Not just any book. Make a book of 100 heads.”

Some of the heads will be studies of famous artist’s drawings. He started with Van Gogh. He moved on to Paul Klee. Tomorrow he might try Da Vinci.

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Some of the heads will be drawings from life. Today Søren drew himself.

But some of the heads will be straight from Søren’s imagination. These are the drawings I am especially looking forward to.

The goal is a drawing a day for 100 days.

And the reward?

Why, the book of course.

– Kim

Soren

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Another Kind of Poetry

CAHISTCalifornia history projects

Our Waterhouse cooperative school began in Kim’s 900 square-foot, flat roof house. We hosted a diversity of characters during those early years. There was Mikalya, the darling recumbent student who taught us about her individuality as she practiced handwriting. Here was a six-year-old who could have been employed developing elaborate fonts. When it was time to journal she spent hours and hours crafting her name in script, but this was no ordinary script, this was script straight from her imagination. The term “fanciful letters” embodied the personality of the child.

Then there was Evelyn, my daughter the Kindergarten student who contentedly spent hours tracing illustrations from an entire book. Stopping to consider the academic standards involved in this task, Kim and I realized that in this single activity Evelyn not only met, but transcended certain state standards. Tracing complex illustrations, Evelyn developed her fine motor skills, strengthened hand-eye coordination, became aware of the connection between images and words, thought deeply about character and plot development and, perhaps most importantly, completed a complex task that was personally meaningful. Fast forward to high school, Evelyn would capture that certain something that made Mikayla Mikayla in the lines of a poem, “Dreamer Girl dangles / Her feet through downy clouds / Wiggles her toes over the earth / Beaming.” I have no doubt that her ability to make this profound observation about Mikayla’s individuality is in part due to the observation skills she learned to attend to as a child.

Reminiscing on our accomplishments during those first three years in San Luis Obispo borders on poetic:

• Pumpkin quilt

• Pysanky eggs

• Embroidery and soap making

• Rug hooking, and yes, basket weaving

• Ceramic snowmen

• That cool woven stool that took so much time

• Yarn dying and hand crafted knitting needles

• Pinwheels and the tee pee

• Lewis and Clark and US history quilt

• Little stone houses

• California quilt

• Woodshop class and glass mosaics

• Cooking cakes, breads and pies

• Taffy, cookies and Parker house rolls

• Crater experiment with marbles and flour

• Volcanoes and mapping the systems of the human body

• Bean sprouting and butterfly hatching

• Monarch field trips

• The rat maze and the rabbit’s chariot

• NASA launch and the Smithsonian

• The Saint Louis Arch

• Tide pools and deserts

• Piano keys plunking at all hours and the rat a tat tat on drums

• Pumpkin patch about a thousand times

• Elephant seals and beach clean-up on Earth Day

• Rug hooking

• Mark Twain’s childhood home

• Wilder girls in the hand sewn prairie dresses

• Visiting the pizza kitchen

• Over and over to the LA Science Center and the Natural History Museum

• Faith Ringgold slide show and giving her gifts

• Zoo trips and the whale watching boat

• Del Monte Café and the Santa Barbara Mission

• Teddy Roosevelt and the 13-year-old expert in NYC

• Civil War Sites, amestown and Williamsburg

• Clipper ships and Carnegie Hall

• D-Day and the beaches at Normandy

• Monterey Bay Aquarium

• Pigs, horses, goats, bats, iguanas, elephants

• THE GETTY!

• Misty of Chincoteague

• Mount Saint Helen’s National Park

• Timelines and maps

• Medieval history, War, and the ancient world

• Chinese history and the history of Israel

• Chumash Indians and the California Gold Rush extravaganza

I will never forget that first year we reserved the Community Room at our public library for a little open house, a time to help our students celebrate their accomplishments. My brother-in-law, Mark had one comment, ”Evelyn did more work in Kindergarten than I did in all of elementary school.”

– Sara

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Salon des Artistes

The most inspiring and fun-filled day of the whole school year is our annual Salon des Artistes. Reveling in all that been created throughout the year we celebrating and affirm the work of each young poet, filmmaker, artist, and writer. AMAZING!!

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Running to Somewhere

A great story has something for everyone.

As a kid, I was jealous of Claudia. I mean what girl wouldn't want to stowaway in an art museum? And not just any art museum, we're talking the Met

“Claudia knew that she could never pull off the old-fashioned kind of running away. That is, running away in the heat of anger with a knapsack on her pack. She didn't like discomfort; even picnics were untidy and inconvenient: all those insects and the sun melting the icing on the cupcakes. Therefore, she decided that her leaving home would not be just running from somewhere but would be running to somewhere.”

This is the precise passage that captured my imagination as a young reader, and if I am being honest, it still intrigues me. In fact, I spend my days encouraging my students to grab hold of this concept of “running to somewhere.”

When we mentor with books, great characters, like Claudia, give young readers a reason to press into their imagination.

“Some days you must learn a great deal. But you should also have days when you allow what is already in you to swell up and touch everything. If you never let that happen, then you just accumulate facts, and they begin to rattle around inside of you.”  — E.L. Konigsburg   

This past year, I explored The Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler again with my 5th grade reading circle—five boys. It was fun to watch them connect with different aspects of the story. While they unanimously disliked Claudia (she's a girl after all), they identified with Jamie. My youngest son Søren had this to say, “I liked the mysterious statue. Remember when Claudia and Jaime snuck a peak of the angel? I liked that part mom.”

I could not help but smile when my budding artist decided to sculpt an angel in the style of Michelangelo for his culminating project. Søren's imagination was not sparked in the same way that mine was as a child and this is a good thing, is precisely what I love about great stories. 

Angel
So Søren dove into what inspired him, found a Michelangelo(ish) image on his own to fashion his sculpture after. I did not have the heart to tell him that it is not a Michaelangelo in the midst of his creative process. I am glad that he discovered this on his own when he decided to do some research on the angel like Claudia and Jamie who went before him.

Now I know there is bias here, but in the end, I believe Soren's original work of art made of aluminum foil and paper towels surpasses the work being studied!

Søren's buddies thought his angel a masterful work of art. They even checked the base of his statue, just to make sure it was not a Michelangelo!

– Kim

Monogram

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Folds

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“There are several words that sang above the rest in my high school science classes.

From botany, photosynthesis is the one.

From marine biology, Echinodermata and Coelenterata.

From chemistry, stoichiometry.

And, from cellular biology, mitochondria captured my imagination.”

So begins the lesson.

"Mitochondria located in the cytoplasm are little energy factories within the cell. These amazing organelles enable respiration, which allows the cell to move, to divide, and to thrust their unique purpose. Mitochondria can have different shapes depending on the cell type. Because they contain their own DNA, ribosomes and can produce their own protein, mitochondria are only partially dependant upon the host cell."

What I set out to explore with my students is the fact that mitochondria possess a double membrane, an outer, which is smooth, and an inner, which possesses many folds called cristae which exponentially increase membrane surface area.

“All living cells have mitochondria. But it is amazing to consider that typical animal cells have up to 2000 mitochondria… in each cell!”

I wanted to take their imagination on a journey between these folds.

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“Folds give mitochondria their unique potential; enable the organelle to be highly productive. Cristae take batches of sugar and oxygen and produce ATP (adenosine triphosphate)—cell food.”

At the beginning of the year, science began by exploring the idea that science and art are uniquely connected.

Leonardo himself reminds us, “All our knowledge has its origins in our perceptions.”

My hope was to connect the exploration of mitochondria to the unit we had just completed on the human nervous system. We explored the potential of individuality as we explored the brain—human potential, genius. And here another potential to bridge the gap between learning information and sparking individuality presented itself, this time on a cellular level.

“So today, to continue our exploration of mitochondria, we are going to watch a film about origami.”

Yes, origami.

The students gathered round the TV. I popped in the DVD and set out to accomplish some administrative goals.

Not far into the film I overheard the little group letting out amazement. I was not surprised. But soon I witnessed something that caught me off guard. One-by-one individual students from the group ranging from the 5th through the 11th grader, got up to grab a stack of paper.

They were folding.

The film did not provide a directive to viewers. This was not a "fold-along" film. These students were engaging in the task spontaneously.

Being inspired is magnificent.

During the next biology workshop I provided instructions and large pre-cut squares of paper for the students to fold a hyperbolic parabola. This, to reinforce the film’s message that even paper has hidden potential.

“Folding paper is work. But your work is not in vain. Your work utilizes a fraction of potential. And the paper will never be the same.”

Dare I say, neither will they?

I think mitochondria is one of those words that will stick.


 

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Lost Wax: Connecting the Dots

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Evelyn is a high school graduate. I closed the book on her transcript over a year ago. Recently she taught me how to connect the dots:

Ever since my mom introduced me to pysanky egg making many years ago, I have been hooked. When Easter rolls around I have my friends over to create these brilliantly dyed eggs. Every year I get better and better and learn more helpful techniques. This year I was so obsessed with making eggs I would stay up ‘till midnight painstakingly scratching on eggs with a wooden kiska.

Ukrainian egg making teaches patience. It’s a quiet, slow, endeavor but all the hard work and patience pays off. My favorite part of the process is when, after hours of work, I finally get to melt off the black wax with a candle and reveal the masterpiece!

A few years ago we suffered a pysanky egg tragedy: Years worth of eggs had been left on the kitchen table while we were out to dinner one night. We returned to a floor covered in smashed eggshells. Our dog Jack had smelled the eggs and jumped onto a chair to get to the top of the table. He crushed them all.

My mom cried. She’s never gotten over the loss. I, on the other hand, just wanted to punt Jack down the staircase.

Slowly we have begun to build up our pysanky egg collection…

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I remember being on a Patricia Polacco roll one spring. After reading Rechenka’s Eggs to our group I heard Sara say, “We can do that.” 

The next thing I know we are blowing the insides out of eggs and teaching our primary aged children the art of batik. I find it interesting that the Ukrainian word “pysanky” comes from the verb “pysaty” which means to write. So picture teaching a group of 12 or so under ten-year-olds to write with wax on eggshells! Did I mention that there is fire involved in this activity? Yes, that’s right, fire.

Here’s the deal: children are capable. Was this activity chaotic? You bet. But not once did it cross our minds that this group of children was too young to engage in a sophisticated craft. We rarely purchased construction paper! Looking back those young children proved that focus is not the issue. Children possess an incredible store of focus power, but we deny them opportunity to demonstrate their prowess when we hand them coloring books.

The art of pysanky teaches patience, true. When pure white shells, a tiny surface of potential, are painstakingly decorated individuality emerges. As a teacher who’s a poet, I see a metaphor emerging.  

– Kim

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Perloo the Bold

When my youngest son, Søren, and his literature circle buddies began reading Perloo the Bold, by AVI his imagination was captured. Perloo, the protagonist, is a peaceful, fairly introverted scholar much like my son. I think they hit it off from the get go.

So in this story, Perloo has been chosen to succeed Jolaine as leader of the furry underground creatures called Montmers. When Jolaine dies and her evil son seizes control of the burrow, Perloo must step up to the plate.

During the second week of thinking deeply about the story, my quiet, unassuming son slipped under the loft where we keep our overflow art supplies and came into the study arms loaded with a box of assorted Fimo clay. He got to work conquering his idea.

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When I asked him about the project he told me he was making a claymation film of Perloo the Bold. Søren spent many hours cleverly crafting characters and posing them in one position, then another using his camera to capture the motion.

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Midway in his movie making he set the project aside, went back to the art cabinet, this time for paper and colored pencils and began work on a set of original proverbs complete with ornately illuminated letters.

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With this task complete, Søren resumed progress on his little film. When the filming was complete, he enlisted his older brother, Taylor to compose original music for his piece. He was so proud when Taylor was done and his movie was complete. When I made one last suggestion, that Søren make a title slide, he knew just what to do, “I will make the title fade in, Perloo… the Bold. Yes, that’s it.” In a matter of seconds the slide was complete. Most fascinating of all, at least to me, was the strategic placement of the slide that was seemingly intuitive. He did not put the slide up front, but a couple frames into the movie to line up with a significant change in the rhythm of the music. Fantastic!

 

Søren’s creative response to this book not only demonstrates his deep understanding, but that his critical creative thinking skills are alive and well.

Sometimes it is the quiet, unassuming creatures that save the kingdom. Pondering this possibility, no doubt, inspired my son.

– Kim

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It Begins with Red, Yellow, and Blue

Colorwheel

We teach our children that letters have sounds, that sounds combine to form words, that words combine to form sentences, that sentences grouped in just the right way form the stories we all know and love. We teach our children to read and write.

Last week it hit me as I was helping my students mix color wheels. I was teaching color literacy, an equally important academic (and life) skill.

Color is scientific. Color can be harmonious or not harmonious. People who understand this can use this knowledge to their advantage—artists, painters, designers, people just trying to get dressed in the morning.

We teach color because we see in color.

We teach color because human beings feel color.

Color affects us so profoundly.

Why wouldn't we teach our children about color?

– Sara