How I Start My Middle School TAB Classes Day 3...

Day 3

Students get their art journals (these are made in my school print shop). You can see my art journal pages here.

We go over the fun stuff like the syllabus and how students will be graded (syllabus is one of the pages in the art journal linked above).

I take students on a tour of the art room (there are much cooler ways to do this that people have come up with like scavenger hunts. I keep it quick because of how short my classes are, and because I haven't had time to label the cabinets they can't use.

I Demonstrate Drawing Experiments that we call, "What if I...?" Students are challenged to try as many things as they can with the different drawing materials provided; "What if I put oil pastel on top of marker, and then scratch some off?" "What if I drip water on top of marker?" etc...

At this point, I start an exit reflection that we do after studio time (last 2-3 mins). It is a Social Emotional Learning activity that I really like. It is called, "Appreciation, Apology, Aha!" I have a stuffed doughnut that is the "Doughnut of Dialogue" whoever has the Doughnut has the floor to speak. Students share an appreciation, an apology or an Aha. I have to make it clear that it's a reflection about the class period and redirect at first until they get the idea, otherwise, they can get sidetracked (which is fine if it's productive). I love this activity because middle school is so social, and some of them really want time to speak, and things come out that happened I might now know about...it's pretty great.