In the Art Room with Mrs. Hurley!
We are so excited to be back to school and into our new art room! Room 21 is our new art space—it’s a big, bright,
wonderful room! Joining me this year on Tuesdays is Mrs. Amy Hussey. Mrs. Hussey teaches art at Killam, too. This
year we will continue to utilize Artsonia as another means to showcase your child’s artwork. It also serves as a snapshot
to what your child is creating in art during the year. Just a reminder, I hold all two dimensional artwork until the end of
the year. This allows me to display art in school as well as choose work for displaying in our superintendent’s
conference room and for Arts Fest. All artwork will go home at the end of the year in a student-made portfolio. For
those of you new to Artsonia, this website is the “World’s Largest Student Art Museum”. Joining Artsonia is strictly
voluntary and requires parent permission for you to view your child’s artwork.
Another way to see what’s happening in the art room is to follow on Instagram at mrs. hurley_art. This is a private
account and requires permission to view. mrs. hurley_art is also shared with the community at Barrows Elementary ,
where I teach as well.
Our school year started with reviewing classroom expectation and introducing new procedures and routines for our new
space. Grades 1 and 2 worked collaboratively to create a mural based on the Peter Reynolds book, The Dot. In grades 35, students created sketchbooks that will be used throughout the year for practice drawing, generating ideas, and
holding informational papers. The students have been busy creating, learning new art techniques, and strengthening
their problem-solving skills. Here’s a peek into what’s been happening in each grade:
Grade 1 is working with the line variety, both in painting and sculpture. We will continue with our line unit and soon
move on to directional lines.
Grade 2 is creating artwork using value. They are learning how to mix tints and shades of a color. We read The GhostEye Tree, by Bill Martin, Jr and are using the book as inspiration for creating monochromatic landscapes.
Grade 3 is currently learning about implied texture and how to use lines to create implied texture. They are using a
crayon resist technique with watercolors. Next, the grade will be drawing superhero self-portraits.
Grade 4 used their observation skills and made contour line drawing of autumn harvest corn. The drawings were used in
a relief print using colored markers.
Grade 5 is involved in a unit on observation drawing. The students created gesture drawings while observing the poses
of volunteer student models. We viewed the tall, thin sculptures of Alberto Giacometti, who sculpted the cast shadow
of the human form rather than the actual human figure. The culminating pieces of art were foil figure sculptures which
are on display near the cafeteria. The fifth grade is currently learning about blind contour and contour line. They have
done practice drawings with each technique and will begin a contour line drawing of their shoe. The students have been
reminded to bring or wear the same shoe to art for the next few weeks.
Look for the fantastic work from the Eaton artists to be on display around the building!