Archive for December 10th, 2013

  • Letter to Parents——Dec 10th, 2013

    Date: 2013.12.10 | Category: Uncategorized | Response: 0

    Dear Parents,

    One month went by quickly, and the drawing ability of our students has also been increased quickly.  During this period of the course, we drew and colored an African giraffe.  Not only is the giraffe naturally pretty, but also is the African plateau beautiful.  We also drew and colored night woods’ owls.  Not only are owls cute and friendly, but also are night woods quiet, peaceful and beautiful, too.  We also drew and colored a cartoon turkey which is colorful and pretty, in correlation to cerebrating the Thanksgiving holiday.  Kids did wonderful artwork on these subjects.

    Furthermore, we had two demonstrations of an advanced level of pencil drawing of human portraits and human figures.  I invited to the classroom two high school students who happen to be specialized in these two areas.  They demonstrated in the class their artworks of the portraits and figures and their ways to make them.  While their drawing ability and their artworks are the model for my students in the class to learn, they personally and physically are the role model for my students to be.  All will encourage and stimulate my students to study the visual arts not only today, but also for many years coming. One demonstration is done by my TA, Zhang, Fan, a senior student from Wellesley high school.  She is specialized in human portrait drawing. She brought her sketch book to my attention and I found that many drawings of ears, eyes, mouths and whole portraits are very impressive.  Her time, effort and skill in drawing the portraits are clearly noticed. She has been my teaching assistant in past one and half year and has been learning and practicing drawing for a long time. After my introduction of portrait drawing,  she did a wonderful demonstration with my help without any difficulty.  My young students accepted it very well. The other demonstrator, Yu, Xianger, is a student of the 10th grade Chinese class and a 11th grader in Mansfield high school. Coincidentally and independently Yu, Xianger also brought her sketch book to my attention and I found that she spent a lot time and effort to draw human figures, many different dancer posts, beautiful and artistic.  Many pages of the figure drawings are impressive, too.  The previous portrait demonstration reminds me that human figure drawing demonstration will be worthwhile, too.  As a result, it turned out good.  The attendance for both demonstrations is unprecedented full, 坐无虚席,even having a trying student and parent from other classes. We all watched,  after my brief introduction, the demonstrator carefully to draw a dancer figure  folding the up and low half body together, a nice post.  Even though she still has a lot of room to improve her drawing skills, her function to the class is well performed.  The demonstration is successful.  All kids watched carefully, listened carefully and tried their best to practice, but resulted artworks were not satisfied, which is reasonable.  I did not expect them to do well and only expected them to observe the drawing procedure and be exposed to advanced levels of drawing subjects and the visual art world.  In the last half class, I demonstrated the drawing of Santa Claus and required the students to do it.  Overwhelming information pushed kids back a little bit, but some kids made a wonderful colored Santa Claus.

    I also showed many my human figure drawings and colored by oil pastels in the class.  I will instruct students how to draw and color them in the next year and next semester.

    Regarding to the homework, coloring and contouring of 12 pages in the homework folder should be done now.  From now to the end of this semester, I will request free drawing something interesting kids find or copying from the 12 pages of home work sheets.

    As the Christmas and New Year holidays kick in, the Christmas holiday atmosphere will fill out our classroom, too.  So that next Sunday, we will draw a Christmas tree, a wreath, and a bell.  After this session, the school will have a holiday season break.  We will resume the class in a new year.

    As the registration procedure is on the way, I do not have email addresses to email you any more.  Hope that this letter will serve the communication well.  If you have any questions, please feel free let me know.

    Happy holidays!

    Michelle Yu, Teacher