CRES Students' Field Trip to Arts4all Festival at The Cummer Museum

Such an heartwarming experience, taking my Deaf and Hard of Hearing students to The Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens this week for the Arts4all Festival, formerly the annual VSA Festival. https://www.cummermuseum.org/visit/education/arts4all-festival

The Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens is home to the Jacksonville affiliate of Arts4all, an international organization that provides opportunities in the arts for individuals with disabilities. The annual festival, which takes place in the spring of each year, invites Jacksonville-area students with disabilities to visit the Cummer Museum for a chance to experience art through all of their senses. Over the course of four days, nearly 1,800 children, 700 teachers and chaperones, and 1,300 volunteers fill the Museum to engage in art viewing in the galleries, movement, music in the gardens, and art-making activities throughout the entire Museum. The event allows each student to participate in the creative process and to demonstrate their own artistic abilities. 

Gladys Prior Teaching Award for Mrs. Woodlief!

I was such a surprise to have visitors enter my room with the great news that I had been awarded the Gladys Prior Excellence in teaching Award!  Four Jacksonville teachers were surprised in their classrooms today with the 2019 Gladys Prior Awards for Career Teaching Excellence, which were established by Gilchrist Berg, founder and president of Water Street Capital, to honor teachers who have had lifelong careers in teaching and inspiring students. To date, Berg has given more than $1 million to honor Jacksonville teachers with an award named after his fourth-grade teacher, Gladys Prior, at Ortega Elementary. The UNF College of Education and Human Services manages this gift and coordinates the annual award competition. Each of these career teachers will receive $15,000. Congratulations to Amy Glendenning, Seabreeze Elementary School; Mary Phillips, Duncan Fletcher Middle School; Kevin Sullivan, Edward White High School; and Terry Woodlief, Central Riverside Elementary School! Read more at https://www.unf.edu/publicrelations/media_relations/press/2019/2019_Gladys_Prior_Awards_for_Career_Teaching_Excellence_Honor_Four_Teachers.aspx?fbclid=IwAR3UDVKazWNcrapbCYT8bLw7Czk5CfsBgrKxBdr0RvxQnx3QHHLUl96LzIs

http://digital.olivesoftware.com/olive/ODN/FloridaTimesUnion/Default.aspx

CRES Featured in District Student Art Exhibition - 2019

My Central Riverside art students continue to amaze me with their creativity and skills!

Each year, art teachers from every DCPS elementary school select outstanding student artwork to represent their school in the Annual Library Art Shows at various area branch libraries and the Best of Elementary Exhibit at the Main Library, downtown. This year, outstanding CRES student artwork, along with art representing other area schools, will be on display at the Murray Hill Library from March 22-April 24. 

Student artists will be recognized at a reception in their honor on Tuesday, April 16th @ 6PM at the Murray Hill Library located at 918 Edgewood Avenue South. 

Congratulations to six CRES student artists who's beautiful artwork is on display representing the Best of Central Riverside Elementary School!

Best of Elementary - Mya, 5th Grade, Watercolor

Layla, 5th grade, watercolor paint

Layla, 5th grade - Watercolor

Taleena, 3rd grade, multi-media

Vayda, 5th grade, watercolor

Leonard, 4th grade , Tempera & Oil Pastel

Yaseen, Kindergarten, collage & tempera

Art Field Trips Increases Critical-thinking Skills

And THIS is why I am so committed to booking Field trips to The Cummer Museum of Art & Gardens for my art students!

"A large amount of the gain in critical-thinking skills stems from an increase in the number of observations that students made in their essays. Students who went on a tour became more observant, noticing and describing more details in an image. Being observant and paying attention to detail is an important and highly useful skill that students learn when they study and discuss works of art. Additional research is required to determine if the gains in critical thinking when analyzing a work of art would transfer into improved critical thinking about other, non-art-related subjects."

Learn more about this study at the following link:

https://www.educationnext.org/the-educational-value-of-field-trips/?fbclid=IwAR0g2oevr9uKFJ0PC2MRWBaahgI2IxvgUOEPq4p_6RyTGECldawsz0nHpbs

Artspeak!

Central Riverside students practice the language of art as they mix paint to create values of color.

CRES Abstract Art

Central Riverside's 4th grade students learn about abstract art and create line design paintings using fluorescent tempera cakes. Next, they will add line details using oil pastels.  They were a bit nervous at first because their painting "didn't look like anything" but soon discovered that  Abstract Art has no subject. It is just lines, shapes, and colors.

Teaching Other Teachers

Ever wonder how blind kids make and share art?  I had the honor of teaching a workshop today at Florida Art Education State Conference titled “Art Beyond Sight- Teaching Empathy Through Art.” Art teachers learned how people who are blind make and share art. #FAEA18  

In this workshop, teachers explored strategies to teach empathy to their sighted students by giving them opportunities to experience how it might feel to have low or no vision. Workshop participants learned ways to provide unique experiences for their own students, allowing them to explore art, make art and share their art using the sense of touch.