3 is the magic number:)

the force was strong at naea14.

NAEA 2014 is in the books! 3 whirlwind days of attending sessions and meeting art ed peeps. I'm looking forward to NOLA 2015 already:)

On my way down to the conference today, I stopped in the East Village to document a few of the murals I had been passing by each morning. It's nice to see the public art realm growing and thriving in San Diego. It's about time...

Day 3 started with a fantastic session by Phil Hansen. He just had is new website, goodbye art academy, go live today. It's full of info for kids and teachers. Some very cool introduction videos that the kids will love! A lot of it is breaking down fear in art and creation. A couple lines stood out in particular-
"Creativity is the currency of the 21st century." So true.
"The repetition of the mundane bears a deeper state of mind and this is where creativity can happen." Amen.

There was a pretty cool session on play and ideation and how to use play in the classroom to engage kids and encourage visual and spatial exploration.

I also attended a session by Mario Torero, who is responsible for numerous murals in San Diego's Chicano Park. He led a charismatic discussion on politics, art, and healing communities.

So much information gathered in the last 3 days. I'm glad I have some time off to digest it all. I continued to meet more great art educators from near and far, and I look forward to growing these connections and relationships in the future.

play.

naea. day 2!

Another great day downtown at the national conference. Got to check out a bunch of kick butt sessions and continued to meet new, fascinating, creative people.  I also got to witness the atmosphere and optimism outside the ballpark down there as it was the home opener for the Padres today. It'll probably be the happiest Padres fans will be all season. Ba da bing!

Han was my co-pilot today. 

I caught an on point common core session to start the day, followed by one on working with minecraft in the art room. Learned about minecraftedu and some interesting ways of integrating it into my curriculum. My students would LOVE this.

I would really like to start getting more digital explorations into my instruction, so I also went to a session led by Katie Hatch of ipad Studio that was focused on using ipads to do work and play through a big idea curriculum. Got a number of new processes and apps to play with!

Took the opportunity to listen to Ted of Art with Mr. E talk about the blogging process, and in turn I reflected on the purpose and goals of my own blog. Reflect, promote and celebrate, collaborate.

Jessica Balsley and the team at the Art of Education hosted a meet and greet for bloggers today and I was able to talk with somw wonderful readers and writers/art gurus like Ted, Nic of Mini Matisse, Phyl of There's a Dragon in My Art Room, Ian Sands of the Art of Apex High, and Cassie of, well, Cassie Stephens:) Got to spend some more quality time with Rina of K-6Art and her North County peeps too.

a serious bunch;)

Good times, indeed!

Continued to make a small drawing at each session today. I caught myself thinking ahead to later this week when I'll be off from school for the start of spring break and I couldn't help getting a little giddy at the prospect of drawing for an extended period of time in our art studio, Ethel! I also started thinking about what incentives I'll be using to get my son to come with me as I document some more of the mid century architecture in San Diego...

Until tomorrow. Shine brite.

minecraft and spills on my shoe.

NAEA so far...

Wow!

This is my first visit to the national NAEA conference and I am loving it so far!

It started with hosting a couple tours of Zamo and then I headed down today to the convention center for the first full day of sessions.

The first one I went to was called "Comics! Art, literacy, and learning." 3 different speakers about the use of comics/graphic novels to engage student artists and struggling readers. Of the 3, Josh Elder from reading with pictures stood out.

Kerry Freedman also spoke and dropped this interesting quote, "Art is a commodity and a love that floats." Love it.

Then I went to Katherine Pohl's session on melding Pac Man and Mondrian! Very cool:)

Checked out Andrew Watson's session on the art of video games. Got some info on some basic programming and animation sites to apply to the elementary level. Thinking my son (aka "the boy")  would love to try some of this out:)

At the end of the day I caught Nancy Walkup's session with Elementary Colleagues. It was at this one that I got to personally meet Ted  of Art with Mr. E and Patty of Deep Space Sparkle. I also got to catch up with Rina from K-6Art and her North county artners in crime. I got to hear many different, yet similar art educator stories from this one.

Can't wait for the next two days! So many sessions to see, so many people to meet:)

early morning coffee in the yard:)

one of Josh Elder's images:)

5 sessions. 4 sketches.

drawing of me drawing. by rama from glendale.

ted of art with mr. e!