January has come and gone, but with it came some outstanding enrichment experiences for our Elementary students. This month carried a theme of revisiting old skills and techniques, both in the content and activities. Fueled by the energy of a new year, students celebrated what they have already accomplished, and prepared for all the new things to come. Let’s take a look inside the enrichment classrooms for this month.
In Art, students took a step back in history and became a team of time traveling artists. They researched ancient art forms, including cave painting and hieroglyphics. After their research, students created their own cave paintings by hanging canvas on the walls and painting while standing up. These painting included traditional bison, mammoths, symbols, and stick figures, along with some current millennia surprises. Through this alternative approach to painting, the students internalized some of the real life struggles that went into cave painting, i.e., there is nowhere to rest your elbow, and how difficult it is to portray complex ideas through symbols. Returning to their time machine, the students later created self portraits in the style of ancient Egyptian carvings. These portraits were challenging for the students in a different way than the cave paintings in regard to the flatness and perspective. Though these works are still in progress, the students are proud of their work and in overcoming these artistic challenges. As in all Art education, this connection to the past is essential to developing their current skills, and in understanding where these skills originated from.
In Latin, students focused their attention on Zeus, Hades, Pan, and Dionysus. This interesting combination of characters led to fascinating conversation among the students and sparked interest, which led to independent research. Students depicted these characters interacting with each other, and made pseudo-comics based on historic paintings and woodcuts. Alongside this research, students also completed word searches, crosswords, and word scrambles regarding the gods and goddesses. It is obvious through their works that the students are not only learning the facts about these historic figures, but also thoroughly understanding their roles between each other and in this ancient culture.
In Music, the students celebrated their fantastic performance at the Christmas show with a party in Music class, it was a great party withy music and a bouncing castle from Jumpers Jungle. They sang along to some of their favorite songs, played freeze dance, and appreciated their peers as they played songs they have been practicing on the piano. Later in the month, they took a step back and practiced the fundamental skill of singing simple songs with emphasis on ascending and descending notes. The task of singing in front of their peers was occasionally unnerving, but with the help and support of the class, each student felt encouraged to participate. Is has been proven that musical therapy works really good for special education, here you can find special education teachers job opportunities. Toward the end of the month, the students were very excited to rediscover the bucket drums in a more creative setting. They practiced rudimentary cadences, played “repeat the beat,” and bucket drum telephone. The students also took this opportunity to explore all the different sounds the buckets could make when set on their side, facing each other, etc. This exploratory setting allowed the students to revisit an instrument they truly enjoyed playing, but in a way that was driven by their own curiosity.
January’s Enrichment classes all came with their own form of a time machine- revisiting an instrument in a new way, recreating ancient art through ancient techniques, and researching ancient cultures. This retrospective was a great way to welcome the new year! We can’t wait to explore what February has to offer in Art, Latin, and Music. For more information regarding our classroom work you can contact us via phone or through our new help desk that we’ve begun using thanks to these help desk solutions.
