Share Your World 2016 – Week 4

Posted on January 28, 2016 by Mama Cormier

…..a cave or glass dome, focusing on today or tomorrow?….just two of the things that Cee has me thinking about today

What one thing are you really glad you did yesterday?

When this post first came out and I started to think about this question I was really glad that I made the effort to get in my 10 000 steps. Unfortunately I wasn’t as diligent yesterday and today isn’t looking much better.

Are you generally focused on today or tomorrow?

I like to be in the moment but I have to admit that I can’t help but think about tomorrow.

Would you want to have as a guardian angel/mentor? What would they tell you right now?

I believe that I have a guardian angel that looks out for me. Years ago I had a nasty fall from a 10 foot drop and came away with barely a scratch. Someone was definitely looking out over me that day. I think that today they would tell me to enjoy my family, take care of my health and don’t put off till tomorrow what I can do today.

Would you rather live in a cave house or a dome house made out of glass? (photos of the houses found on google search)

I think I would like both if they had the following:

Cave House

• enough natural light so that I wouldn’t feel claustrophobic

• dry smooth walls

• in a warm climate – the cave would be nice and cool

• a deck or porch where I could sit outside

Glass Dome House

• a room where I could get away for some privacy

• situated high up in the trees for privacy from the outside world

• window coverings to keep out the hot noon day sun or a canopy of leaves

Bonus question: What are you grateful for from last week, and what are you looking forward to in the week coming up?

I’m grateful that I was able to finish my report cards last Friday during the PD day. It was nice and quiet at school. I don’t like taking home my work if I don’t have to. I was also able to spend an hour at the Olympian pool and watch a former student compete in a synchronized swimming routine. I had never been to one before and I found it quite interesting.

I was also happy to spend some more time with my daughter’s family and I was very grateful for the time my son-in-law spent with me to help me with some of my issues with the new camera. I also got all my Christmas decorations put away and I did a thorough cleaning around the main floor of the house. I always feel so good when my house is company ready.

I’m also grateful for all the photos my daughter sends me of Miss Winnie. She’s growing so quickly.

Birds of a Feather

Posted on January 21, 2016 by Mama Cormier

…..just add a beak to a scrap piece of paper and voila you have a bird

I got this idea from Carla Sonheim and I find that it works with all age groups. I’ve used it with kindergarten children and children in grades 1 to 5.

This year I had the children create a tree by printing the shape with the edge of a piece of thick cardboard dipped in brown paint. While we waited for it to dry I had the students practise drawing a variety of leaf shapes and then deciding which one they would use on their tree.

Once the paint dried I instructed the students to tear small pieces of coloured and patterned papers and then glue them to the tree branches. With a pencil or a black Sharpie they started creating their birds by adding a beak and then an eye. After that they could add as much or as little detail as they wanted. Once the birds were done they were instructed to draw the leaves in the open spaces and colour them in.

I love how these turned out. The following are examples from my grade two class.

Christmas Delights

Posted on December 25, 2015 by Mama Cormier

…while many of you are busy preparing for Christmas dinner I’m having a little down time

Our big Christmas celebration took place last night on Christmas Eve. My husband has long enjoyed the German tradition of opening gifts on the 24th since we first met 42 years ago. Now that our children are grown and have significant others we only prepare Christmas dinner every other year and this is that year. Later today we will be driving to Hamilton to enjoy a dinner prepared my daughter and her husband.

I thought I would take this time to share some of the highlights of this years Christmas season. As many of you know I’m a teacher librarian/art teacher. I essentially teach every student in the school for library and I have four classes that I do art with.

The week before Christmas I started receiving gifts from students and their families. There’s always one gift that stands out for me and this one brought a huge smile to my face and I couldn’t wait to share it with my colleagues and friends.

One of my grade one students brought me a small box that he had clearly wrapped himself and very proudly handed it to me. When I unwrapped the paper I discovered that the box was from Juicy Couture. When I read the name out loud, T very quickly declared that the box had nothing to do with what was inside. When I opened the lid I couldn’t help but smile for inside the box lay an angel that he had clearly made himself.

He used masking tape, paper and marker to create this little gem. Today it sits prominently on my Christmas tree, just below our angel tree topper. Aren’t kids wonderful?

Hopefully I’ll have more stories to share throughout the week.

Merry Christmas to all and happy holidays.

Carol

Blindly Drawing Lines to Create an Abstract Masterpiece

Posted on November 21, 2015 by Mama Cormier

….with their eyes closed my students started to draw lines randomly across their paper

I didn’t want students to have a preconceived idea of what they wanted to draw so I asked them to close their eyes, and start drawing one continuous line all over their paper. When they opened their eyes they were allowed to add some more line if there was a lot of untouched space or if some of the shapes that they created were very large.

They rotated their paper to see which way they wanted to orientate their design and then they chose a variety of pencil crayon colours. I encouraged them to start with one colour and fill in spaces in different areas of the paper. Then they moved on to the next colour and then the next. When they had used all their colours they re-examined their work and decided where more colour was needed and determined if it was balanced.

After all the colour had been added I suggested to some that they go over some of the same areas again so that the shapes were fully covered. Once that was done they were allowed to take a black fine point Sharpie and start adding some line detail to their shapes. Some students found animal shapes and added eyes, noses and scales, while others made random lines and dashes.

I think they did an amazing job. These samples were done by my grade 1 and grade 2 classes.

Starry Nights in Oil Pastel and Watercolour

Posted on November 9, 2015 by Mama Cormier

….children in grades one, two and three create their own version of Van Gogh’s Starry, Starry Night

Once again I was inspired by Carla Sonheim’s Free Kids Online Art Classes. In week two Diane Culhane introduced the kids to a crayon resist night sky.

The children loved how the watercolour brought up the crayon designs, especially the white marks. They also loved sprinkling salt over their creations. The concept of cutting out a black silhouette of a city or country skyline was a bit more challenging, especially for the grade ones. Here’s a collection of paintings created by my grade two class.

Share Your World 2015 – Week 43

Posted on October 27, 2015 by Mama Cormier

…debating, tea, strongest sense and a title for my autobiography

Four more great questions from Cee. I had to give two of them a bit of extra thought.

If you were on a debate team, what general subject would you relish debating?

Seeing we’ve just come through a very long election campaign, by Canadian standards, I’d have to say that I enjoy debating about politics. I’m actually pretty passionate about it and I find people who make rash statements, quote political ads as facts and make sweeping generalizations very frustrating.

What’s your strongest sense?

No question that my strongest sense is visual. I have good colour sense and I love to explore the smallest detail in my photographs. My husband thinks that I have selective hearing and my sense of smell is very weak. I love the taste of most foods but I’m not sure I could pass a sommelier test.

What would you name the autobiography of your life?

This is probably the question that stumped me the most. Here are a few titles that I might consider:

Learning to Appreciate the Small Things in Life

Being Loved, Giving Love, Loving to Learn

My Life – It’s Not What I Thought it Would Be

Happy Being Ordinary

Always Looking for the Next Adventure

List your favorite flavors or types of tea.

My favourite tea at the moment is a good strong orange pekoe tea from Ireland or Britain. I still enjoy a good cup of spicy Chai and in herbal teas I like anything with ginger and lemon.

Bonus question: What are you grateful for from last week, and what are you looking forward to in the week coming up?

I pretty much wrote about what I was grateful for from last week on Sunday so I won’t repeat what I’ve already said but if you missed it you can check it out here. One other thing I am grateful for is being able to work with such wonderful people. As you may or may not know, teachers, here in Ontario, are going through some pretty tough negotiations and we’ve been without a contract for 14 months. Everyone is getting pretty frustrated and even though we’re still in the classroom doing our jobs and still running extra-curricular activities for the kids, the media is relentless and the rumours are frightening. Needless to say tensions are high but for the most part people are supportive and forgiving.

For the rest of this week I’m looking forward to finishing up some of the art assignments in my classrooms so that I can display them in the halls and share them with you. I’m also looking forward to Hallowe’en. I have no idea what I’ll wear this year but I may go with a traditional costume. I’m glad that the 31st is on the Saturday. The weather is suppose to improve by then and I won’t have to rush home from work to carve out the pumpkin.

Here are a few more photos of the Farmers’ Market that I visited on Saturday and photos that I took on our walk.

Share Your World 2015 – Week 42

Posted on October 25, 2015 by Mama Cormier

….thanks to Cee for four more great questions

Are you usually late, early, or right on time?

It depends on the situation. For appointments I’m almost always on time or early. The only time I’m late happens if I get caught in traffic because of an accident. For parties or social events I’m sometimes ‘fashionably’ late. If I do arrive on time I find that I’m the first one there and end up waiting for others to arrive. If someone has made a reservation for a specific time I try to be there on time. For this blog post I’ve been late recently because of my circumstances in my personal life. Cee would probably say that I’ve posted this in the time frame given but when the next set of questions come out the next day I feel like I’m late.

If you were or are a writer do you prefer writing short stories, poems or novels?

I don’t know if I have the patience to write a novel. I would probably prefer a short story or a poem.

Where did you live at age ten? Is it the same place or town you live now?

When I turned ten I lived in Oakville, a small city between Toronto and Hamilton. We only lived there for four years and my father used to commute to work in Toronto every day. By today’s standards that’s not a very long commute but my father hated it and we moved back to Toronto when I started grade 5. I’ve lived here ever since.

Would you rather be able to fly or breathe under water?

I think I’d rather fly. Flying is faster than swimming and being underwater I think might be somewhat claustrophobic.

Bonus question: What are you grateful for from last week, and what are you looking forward to in the week coming up?

I’m grateful for walks in this lovely crisp autumn weather. I love the colours. I’m grateful for a dinner and tickets to the opera, downtown, with my friend D who treated me for my birthday. My blogging friend Judith over at Curious to the Max says that after 50 you can celebrate your birthday season for as many days as you are old. So even though my birthday was in August I can still celebrate for six more days.

I’m also grateful for a fun evening with friends and colleagues from school. We went to a great sample sale, where I bought gifts for Christmas, something for my daughter and a couple of things for myself. Afterwards we had a very nice dinner in a great Italian restaurant, Caffino, in Liberty Village.

As always, I’m grateful for time spent with my family. On Saturday, my husband and I picked up our daughter, A, and her partner, J and we all drove to Hamilton to visit G and her new baby girl. My sister, CJP, drove down from Chatham and her son came in on the Go Bus from Toronto to visit as well. It was like a mini reunion.

Our little Miss Winifred is starting to show her true colours and was a little fussier than I’ve seen on previous visits but this morning after I checked in with my daughter via What’s App she reported that she was able to get more sleep last night than she’s had in awhile.

While we were in Hamilton we went for a walk and I discovered more wonderful shops. Everyone is so friendly and I spent quite a bit of time talking to the shop owners. One of the shop keepers ended up being a former student that I taught in middle school. She made the connection before I did. What a small world we live in. Shine is the name of her store.

Next week I’m looking forward to closing the cottage for the season and spending more time with Miss Winifred.

Cheers!

Warm and Cool Picasso Dogs

Posted on October 10, 2015 by Mama Cormier

….this will be the last group of Picasso Dogs that I post

Carla Sonheim has inspired me to teach my students about Picasso. Each grade level was approached slightly differently to meet the curriculum expectations for that grade. This gallery of Picasso Dogs was done by my grade three class and the emphasis was on cool and warm colours.

Picasso Dogs From the Imaginations of Grade One Students

Posted on September 26, 2015 by Mama Cormier

….thanks to Carla Sonheim’s free on-line kid’s art lessons for this idea

For my very first art lesson this year I introduced my grade one, two and three classes to Pablo Picasso. We looked at his traditional vs abstract paintings and explored some of his unusual portraits. Carla’s unique approach to drawing an abstract dog made the assignment fun and less intimidating than drawing a traditional human face.

After we practised drawing some dog features (snouts, eyes, ears, tails, paws) I gave each child a piece of watercolour paper and instructed them to draw an eye, turn the paper and draw a larger eye and continued like this until there were six or seven features on the paper. Then they had to turn the paper and find the layout they liked best and start joining the features to create a dog. They could change things around and add more features as they went along. This took up pretty much all the time we had in our first class. I collected the papers and stored them away for a week.

The following week we discussed what the primary colours are and I demonstrated how to hold a brush and apply paint to the paper. I returned their work from the week before and handed out the paints. For many in grade one it was a challenge to stay in the lines but for the most part they managed to keep the colours from blending into one another. We used tempera paint so it took a while to dry. I asked the homeroom teacher to give the students time to go over the pencil lines with a black Sharpie so that their dogs would reappear.

I loved their finished works of art. I’ve selected a few to share with you.

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Share Your World 2015- Week 38

Posted on September 24, 2015 by Mama Cormier

….I don’t know how she does it but Cee keeps coming up with new questions each week

What do you do to make a living or during the day if you are retired. If you are a student what are you studying?

I’ve been a school teacher since 1976. I started out teaching Family Studies to middle school adolescents. I did that for about 15 years and then I did guidance for two years. I was toying with the thought of becoming a principal and I started taking a lot of leadership courses in the evenings. I successfully became a chairperson which is like being a principal’s assistant where you take on a few extra responsibilities while still teaching. For many people this is a stepping stone to becoming a vice-principal or principal. In the end I decided that this was enough responsibility for me and that I liked being in the classroom too much to give it up.

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When I became a chairperson I was transferred to a junior school where I taught grade 5 and sometimes a 4/5 split. Five years ago I took a library course and qualified to become a teacher librarian. One year later the library position opened up at our school and I’ve been the librarian/art teacher ever since.

Have you ever participated in a distance walking, swimming, running, or biking event? Tell your story.

Three and a half years ago when I first started this blog I was determined to lose weight. At school I agreed to assist in a program called Girls on the Run and I started to walk/run with the girls twice a week for 10 weeks. At the end of the program there was a 5k run and at the age of 59 I participated in my first serious race. I did the whole thing and ran for most of it but I was so emotional at the end that a dread overcame me and I thought I was going to die. Of course I didn’t and I did the run again the next year. The second time around it was a little easier. Last fall I participated in the Railpath Community Run and I’m doing it again this weekend. This one I did with my daughter.

What is usually your first thought when you wake up?

My first thought is usually to switch my Jawbone Up from sleep mode to wake mode and then check on my phone to see how well and how long I’ve slept.

Complete this sentence: Look out behind you, it’s a …

…it’s your son. I often fantasize that my son and his fiancé pay me a surprise visit. They both live in London, England and I only see them once a year. A few years ago my son did come to Toronto for a convention and I was truly surprised.

Bonus question: What are you grateful for from last week, and what are you looking forward to in the week coming up?

I’m grateful for a visit from my daughter who now lives in Hamilton. I was especially grateful because she was 38 weeks pregnant and I didn’t think that she would want to make the trip and be that far from home. We went to my older daughter’s house and my good friend L and her mom joined us. They weren’t able to make it to G’s shower in the summer so they anxious to see her and bring her the gifts that they had bought. It was also the first time that L’s mom had seen A’s and J’s house.

Years ago my daughter, A had volunteered to undergo testing and see if she was a good match for L’s dad who needed to be treated for C-dificile. It turned out that she was and her donation ended up saving his life. When L and her mom arrived on Saturday they bought her a gift as well. L’s dad is a very accomplished and renowned artist and they gifted my daughter one of his paintings. We were all very touched.

Later in the afternoon my girls and I went for a walk in the neighbourhood along Dupont street and stopped for lunch at a small Vietnamese restaurant and checked out the interesting little businesses that have sprung up in the last few years.

I’m obviously looking forward to the birth of our first grandchild. We all took bets on when she would come into the world but we were a little surprised when our daughter went into false labour yesterday. She’s fine today and this baby may take her sweet time about making her official appearance. Her actual due date is October 4th.

I’m also looking forward to participating in the Railpath Community run on Saturday but I think this year I may do more walking than running. On Sunday some of my friends from high school are getting together again for another lunch. We’re hoping that CM from Thunder Bay will be able to join us this time.

Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend. The first weekend of autumn looks like it’s going to be especially nice and warm in my neck of the woods.

Cheers!