Elementary Art Overview
How We Roll - Our Schedule and Jobs
Bethlehem area elementary schools operate on a Monday through Friday schedule. Students in grades K-5 have art for 45 minutes once a week.
At Asa Packer and Hanover Elementary Schools all students share in the responsibility of managing our art room through various “Job Squad” assignments. Each table will have a duty and will rotate through all jobs on a monthly basis. Be sure to ask your child about his or her assignment!
Super 7 A.R.T.I.S.T.S.
Our expectations for conduct in the art room are:
Arrive like a ninja.
Rock the directions.
Think, create, imagine.
Inside voice.
Share kindness & respect.
Try your best.
Sparkling clean up.
By demonstrating citizenship skills and making good choices classes have the opportunity to earn points. The accumulation of points will result in a variety of rewards for the entire class.
Individually, students who are caught being OUTSTANDING in the art room will earn an “Art Room Leader Postcard” to share with their family and a “Sit by a Friend Pass” to use in class.
Smocks a.k.a. Old Shirts
Cover ups are a must have for students in grades K-2. The art room has a collection of smocks available, however most are quite large and tend to overwhelm tiny kindergarten and 1st grade bodies. It is very much appreciated if you can supply your student with his or her own smock to be stored in their homeroom. Please avoid items that are difficult for your child to put on independently.
Grading
Each project, activity, and art class is an opportunity for students to demonstrate learning, effort, and skill development. In assigning grades, I frequently use a rubric to clearly outline the objectives of a given project and to measure student progress. However, taking into consideration that the range of abilities among students in a single class can vary so greatly, my approach to grading is flexible and sensitive.
Students in grades K-2 may earn one of the following grades:
4 – Excels within standards
3 – Meets standards
2 – Approaching standards
1 – Not yet making sufficient progress
Students in Grades 3–5 are graded using the O, S, S-, N scale with O representing outstanding, S for satisfactory, S- for less than satisfactory, and N for needs improvement.
Elementary Art Curriculum
An Art Curriculum that Challenges the 21st Century Creative Learner
Philosophy
In this updated curriculum, schools will rotate through 4 themes each year that are based on Boyer’s Human Commonalities. The 4 themes we will focus on each year are: Artists at Work, The Natural World and Our Community, Language and History, and Life and Its Meaning. Students will create, connect, respond and present artwork related to their own identities, family, and communities. They will explore topics such as traditions and history, nature, the life cycle, work and our search for meaning. Skills and learning objectives are built upon each year as students are introduced to historical and contemporary artists, pop culture, and art traditions from around the world. Utilizing these themes helps students recognize their commonalities to each other and to others across the globe. They will emerge from the program with creative problem solving skills, a sense of self and community and an appreciation for the role artists play in our everyday lives.