Day 1 in the classroom

Day 1 in the classroom

Today was my first day taking part in a new school. It was also my first time working with a high school age group. A complete difference from the elementary school students I have been so use to. The first thing I noticed was that these students were much more independent. It was a workday so each of them knew what they needed to be doing. 

In the high school I take part in the ceramics classes for the first two periods of the day. Today they were working on slab pots that they had started. Some of them were allowed the opportunity to work on other projects. They could either do work from other classes or start an extra credit project with clay. Either way there wasn’t a ton that I could help them with since each of them knew exactly what they needed to do. Every once in awhile I would ask them if they would like help, most did not. 

I also had the opportunity to work with the 5^th grade students. They needed a lot more guidance and were not as independent when it came to working. The 5^th grade started by learning 1-point perspective.   First they were to create bubble letters with their names. Then they were to draw lines from the corners of each letter and make them reach the point.  This was certainly something that was new for these students because each of them sort of struggled in some way as they went.  I didn’t mind though because it allowed me to help them more. This was something that I missed after being with the high school students.  Since the students struggled with this project they didn’t quite get it finished by the end of the class period.

In the 6^th grade they were working on a project inspired by Kandinsky.  The students folded their papers into 12 square sections. They were then to pick 12 colors that they were going to paint each section of the paper. For the most part the students were doing really well with this project, as there was not much that they needed to actually do but some of the students needed to be reminded that they were only going to need to do one color in each square. Later they would be adding patterned paper to the project for layered circles in each of the sections.

Overall Day 1 went pretty well I thought. I do look forward to working with a different age group as the semester progresses.