Little ballerinas

As probably most people in the class know, dance is my favourite art form.  It shouldn't be surprising then how much it warms my heart when I am able to share my appreciation for dance with children. 

I grew up doing ballet my entire life and hated every minute of class because of the high level of competition and what I saw as inequality in abilities to practice.  Most of the kids in my class took 7-13 classes a week, but my parents only had to time and money to enrol me in two, so I didn't see the point in competing when I didn't feel I stood a chance.  Now when I look back, I am glad I decided not to enter into the competition, but that I had chosen to have fun instead of just dreading class.  Thankfully, my experience didn't completely kill my love of ballet, and that is for one reason: recitals.  I absolutely loved free dance time and performing.  Everyone in the group attended the same number of practices, and I used to spend hours practicing at home in my kitchen.  I was intrinsically motivated once there was a purpose to the dance (not just the skill building exercises in most regular ballet classes).

I think that maybe the door started to open for me to teach ballet to the girls in my neighbourhood when the youth pastor of Timbers taught a six week hip hop class to a group of girls and boys of multiple ages (from my neighbourhood), which I helped out with.  During the breaks, sometimes I would do free ballet (basically lyrical) to the music playing in the background.  One of the girls began to become interested.  So, I started to teach her a few positions and I discovered that she learned quickly.  It was a great confidence booster for her and a relationship builder between us.  I also started to introduce her to classical music, which I called "ballet music."  I took her and several other children to a few different symphony performances.  I showed her and others the Lindsey Sterling music videos to show the connection between music and dance.

Then, I was ecstatic last summer when I friend told me she was starting up a ballet class for the girls in my neighbourhood.  She had already booked the Connaught Youth Centre, which was going to let her use the building for free.  I immediately offered to help her, and with the support of another friend who has no ballet experience, but is willing to help with behaviour management, we team taught the class all last year (and will hopefully start up again next year).  It was pretty special.  Judy Russel's donated ballet slippers for all of the girls and we found tutus for them as well.  We incorporated a small amount of skill building each time, some circle sharing time, and a lot of free dance time, usually an adorable game of dance  freeze tag where one person has a big flower they wave over people's heads to freeze them. We really had no idea what we were doing, with no dance teaching experience, but we had fun and we increased the girls' exposure to dance, which I think is valuable.  The girls really enjoyed their time and looked forward to dance class each week.  Same girl who watched me do ballet in the hip hop class bought herself ballet slippers at a garage sale we were both at last summer because she wanted her own ballet slippers to keep.  That warmed my heart because I knew I knew I had helped her find something she could shine in, and that something just happened to be my favourite thing in the world!

Thumbprint Timeline - Art Show

Thumbprint Timeline - Art Show

 

My art show project was a class mural, a thumbprint timeline!  I enjoyed doing the project with my class.  It was my first experience with a Montessori type lesson.  I really liked the system.  First I gave a whole class lesson where I demonstrated the technique and provided the context for the project.  I then set up a centre where I had groups of students coming and going and finishing one part of the lesson at a time.  I had a checklist to make observations about students’ understanding of the science content and to monitor that each have met all the criteria.  Because I was only working with five students at a time, I was able to conference with each student individually for each section of the lesson.  It was fascinating to watch which students carefully followed instructions, which made realistic looking creatures, which wanted to only make the creatures in the samples, and which wanted to create their own creatures.  I instructed each student to create some and follow the instructions for some so that I could assess their abilities in each area.  Integrating art with science was also a fabulous way to learn the content because after they created, sorted (with realia and pictures), and glued their creatures onto the proper evolutionary eras, most students could easily tell me which plants and animals belonged in which sections.  The students applied their learning in kinesthetic and tactile ways and used higher order thinking skills while creating and sorting their creatures.  Each class learns the same lesson each year (called the Second Great Lesson, on the Coming of Life), where the teachers use realia and pictures to provide a hook, overview lesson of the earth’s entire evolution.  I painted each section of the mural the same colours as the cloth one that the school uses.  My CT has done the thumbprint creatures for the lesson in the past, but never the entire timeline.  The school is going to try to laminate the mural and use it in future years.  It was exciting to contribute a resource to the school.

Batik School Wide Art Project

 

 - Laura Berkeley

 

Batik – School Wide Art Project

During our practicum, Kathleen and I had the opportunity to initiate and organize a school wide art project.  It is a healing, community building project for the school and parents to work on together.  It was meant to be a step forward after the fire.  The focal resource is a book called Seeds of Peace, by Laura Berkeley.   In the book, two men live at different ends of a rainbow.  One is a hermit who lives in a cave and one is a rich man who lives in a mansion.  During the book, the rich man realizes he is not happy like the hermit and learns that peace is a choice and happiness does not come from belongings.  The illustrations are all brightly coloured batik paintings.  The students will each make their own batik painting on a small square of mueslin cloth.  To make Batik, they draw a picture on the cloth with blue glue, wait for it to dry, paint over it, soak it until the glue comes off, let it dry, and then there will be white space where the glue was (see pictures below).  The paintings are supposed to symbolize peace to the students; the squares are the students’ opportunity to show how they are choosing peace in their new school building.  It is a decision to heal.  Kathleen and I prepared some kits to move between the classes so that students can work on their squares as they have time.  Once all the classes are finished, a parent volunteer is organizing parents to sew the squares together into a quilt that will be hung in the school foyer to cover up the previous school’s symbol.

The following quotation will hang above the quilt:

Peace comes from within you. It is

   Like a seed. You cannot force

   It to grow or shape it into

   Something you want it to be.

   You must give it love and

   Freedom so that it can grow

   Outwards into something pure

   And beautiful. Only then will you know

  True Happiness.   

(excerpt from The Seeds of Peace – by Laura Berkeley)

 

When I was teaching my class about the project, I showed a video about some children in Indonesia (where Batik originates) who also used Batik to heal, but from an earthquake.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0MKSNsX4Bg

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

** Pictures taken from www.kidworldcitizen.org/2012/09/11/diy-glue-batik-t-shirts/

 

 

 

 

 

China Trip part 2

Here is another random assortment of pictures I took on my trip.  I'm so pumped to use photography to teach about China.   Soooo much more interesting than a textbook.  I think it will be a great way to help them make inferences and personal connections too.

 

 

The no honking sign always cracked me up, because I have never heard so much honking in my life.  Apparently though, their driver's manual used to say that they are supposed to honk to pass.  One local told me that she doesn't like how they do it though and that they're not really supposed to, so I think this sign is an example of attempts to reduce honking.

 

Subway handles in Beijing.  (They weren't all like this.)

 

Bowza!!  These were little buns stuffed with meat or vegetables.  Pretty good most of the time.  I bought one of those things at the Chinese store in town so that I can make them for my class.

Playing Chinese checkers in China!



The allergen free meal prepared for me by my friends (from here) and the Swiss kids we were staying with.  Thanks guys!

 

Mmmm.... Chicken feet.

 

Of course I tried it!  I'm no wimp!

 

Chopstick sanitizer

 

Makeshift telephone line.

 

Better view of my favourite bathroom

 

Bathroom door (and the famous Blair and Randi!)

Every day, all the kids in the high schools flood onto the field to practice their synchronized exercises.  Not quite the military precision their parents would have shown, but still pretty interesting.  I filmed it too, but can't load it on here. 

 

At lunch time and after school, there was always a sea of different uniforms on the buses.  Those kids have to practically live in those things, because they barely get to go home.

Interesting steering wheel protector

A little friend who snuck into our backyard to see us and play with our puppet.  (yes, that's right, the family my friend lives with loves puppets.  They even have a little theatre in their entrance area.  Their daughters loved swing too! Match made in heaven.)

There was constant construction, everywhere.

Storefronts

Typical street

Lots of cargo type trucks

This sign was my favourite part of the bus (notice the dripping blood from his hand and the tears).

I thought it was neat how they counted down how long you had to make it across.  Sometimes it was safer to go on a red light anyways though, because pedestrians never have the right of way.  Just try and run as fast as you can across a couple lanes, stand in the middle of the freeway, and wish you weren't wearing a backpack.  Then run the rest of the way.

There were lots of people using sewing machines outside their stores.

China trip, part one

Some people have been asking for pictures, so I thought I would use a few of my art posts to show some of my favourites.  I took over a thousand, a lot that I'm planning to use for my practicum.  My CT said I would be teaching on meeting daily needs and wanted me to take pictures to go with that, so I have tooons.  I would be willing to share if anyone wants!  I asked Karim for his picture of the pyramid next to the city from his Egypt trip and used it in my practicum last year when I was doing ancient Egypt.  If you can't use pictures you took, it is a little cooler to use pictures your friend took.  Also, when you travel, annoy your traveling companions by constantly collecting realia!  It might not make you their best friend, but your students will thank you for it!  

 

 

 

My first night in China!  ... on the floor of the Beijing airport!  (waiting for morning train)

 

View of my city up on a hill.  They live in the bowl like us!  I think that will be a neat connection for students.

 

The reason we rarely touched seafood.  Dead fish anyone?

 

Trough toilet.  There were a few off to the side, and this is where it flushed.  It was all open, with a sheet for the door.  Most weren't like this, but this one was pretty memorable.

 

Various transportation methods for moving produce.

 

A mall.

 

Plants vs. Zombies shoes!!

 

One of many his and hers outfits. (also an example of mistranslation)

 

My proudest moment.  This is one of the farmers who discovered the terracotta warriors.

Beijing Opera

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RrxvgZtsuow --- Woman singing


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=knqe-asAcKw --- opera (men)

Nicole posted awhile back about the opera and I wanted to compare it to my experience visiting the Beijing Opera.  Opera is one of the things Beijing is most famous for, so I was pretty excited to get a chance to go, and I’ve never been to one before, so that in itself was neat.  I always have the image in my head of big ladies in Viking suits singing really high and people watching with fancy little binoculars.  Lol I know it’s not really like that, but it’s a fun little image that pops into my head.  It definitely was not what I expected though.  It was pretty interesting.  Wow, Chinese female singers can reach notes that I don’t think the Viking ladies even could.  Pretty impressive.  I was surprised that it was actually several short, unconnected skits.  I thought that they would all be connected, but they weren’t at all.  Because of that, there was more variety.  The last couple ones were neat, because they involved sword and stick fighting and some acrobatics.  That was pretty great.  Anyways, I think that this will be valuable when I’m teaching, because comparing art forms in different countries will be great for Social Studies.  I will probably get them to watch a bunch of clips from operas in different languages to pick out cultural differences.  I will definitely tell them to pay attention to the musical style.  It sometimes sounds a little chaotic to me, like a bunch of noise strung together (sounds like Nicole’s opinion of rap!), but in a grade six music lesson I sat in on when I was down there (international school), the teacher said that was because they use a different scale other than the “do re mi” scale, so our ears aren’t used to it.  I think that’s fantastically interesting.  I brought back several Chinese cds, so I have tons of examples of different styles, but this one was in a lot of the opera skits I saw.  I have really been enjoying listening to a lot of the music I brought back, especially the songs with violin.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention, someone from the local opera taught my friends and I how to sing a local folk song (which they made us sing in front of 5000 people and broadcasted it on the news, as part of a folk festival).... but that's another story.

I couldn’t figure out how to attach my own video without first loading it to youtube, which I don’t want to do, so I just found a couple examples already on youtube.  One is of a girl singing in a traditional style, with the kind of music I heard in the opera.  The other is of an opera, so that you can see a bit of the acting.

History Music Videos

History Teacher's Music Video Youtube Page

This right here is one of my all time favourite resources.  It is the youtube channel of a history teacher in Hawaii, who takes popular songs and changes the lyrics to teach about history.  She has 57 videos!!  In my non-musical opinion, her voice is decent, and the idea is novel.  Some of them are entirely of her and other people in costumes singing in different locations, and some have clips from historical fiction movies and tv shows.  You have to watch a few to get an idea of what they’re like.  Some are fabulous and some are a little too long and slow.  Some of the tunes are pretty catchy, so the kids get them stuck in their heads, and some have some great visuals.  One time I was teaching a class and heard the class next door singing the Henry the VIII song, and I could also often hear that one at lunch time.  Beware: YOU will also get that one stuck in your head.  It is also a great resource to show as an inspiration to students in preparation for an assignment where they make their own videos.  It is far more fun to write and sing a song than to write a paragraph, so the students are more engaged.  Most of the videos focus on high school content, but some of them apply to elementary, so everyone should check it out!!