7th Grade Hand Sewn Pet Beds!

The 7th grade class wrapped up the sewing unit by sewing pillows that could be used for pet beds. To my surprise, many students decided to donate their pillow as opposed to keeping their hard work for themselves. I donated 22 student pillows to the Yolo County SPCA this past Friday. A great amount of effort was put into the sewing unit and I am proud of all my students!

8th Grade Historic Skit Masks

The 8th grade class is performing a variety of historical skits for their Social Studies final. The students used Expressions class time to create their character masks for their performances. Creating masks was a fun activity that livened up the week of SBAC testing!

8th Grade Breaks In Silk Screens!

I have been wanting to try screen printing for a couple of years and have written a series of grants that have never come to fruition- until NOW! Just recently, LEAP funded a Donors Choose Grant on a money matching day. That meant that HALF of the grant contribution would be matched! That meant that we acquired around $600.00 worth of silkscreen merchandise for just $300.00. Cartwheels!

I introduced the 8th grade class to a silkscreen street artist named Shepard Fairey. Shepard not only created the iconic Obama Hope campaign image from the 2008 election, but is also one of the founders for the website amplifier.org. I challenged the class to create an original stencil to communicate a social issue that was important to them. Now understand that we are in the last month of school, so though I challenged the students I was a little uncertain how many would take on a heavy topic as opposed to creating something light and fun.

The outcome? As always, my students blew me away with their original creations and their deep connection to our culture and the world we live in. I am also uber impressed with their level of engagement with the overall process of screen printing!