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Friendship Bracelets and Boondoggle fun

Johnna, our student teacher, enjoyed sharing her interest in arts and crafts activities during investigations. She choose to teach the students how to make friendship bracelets. Each student was given the chance to make a friendship bracelet to then give to a good friend. Boondoggle was another way Johnna engaged her students in conversations. This activity also gave some Read More >>

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Green Eyed Monster

This mini unit explored the connections between visual art and language arts, and how both are used to creatively tell stories and express emotions. After listening to the picture book, Go Away Big Green Monster by Ed Emberley children were introduced to adjectives as descriptive words. The students then brainstormed adjectives they could use for Read More >>

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Highland Forest

Twice a year the whole school spends two days camping in Highland Forest. This outdoor adventure provides us with a wonderful way to get to know each other better and to share in the delights of nature. Our two days are full of hours playing by the pond, catching and releasing critters, hiking in the Read More >>

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Architecture 101

Paul Otteson, Alaira’s father, came to the New School to share a strangely beautiful student architectural model in balsawood to introduce the underlying structure of a building. The students were fascinated to learn about joists and studs and to think about placement of windows and doors…

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Midsummer Night’s Dream

The older students at The New School thoroughly enjoyed Syracuse Stage’s production of Midsummer Night’s Dream. Once again we were treated to front row, center seats.  Following are comments, compliments and observations made by our students Ben, Ciara, Ace, and Maia particularly enjoyed the costumes: All the costumes were very detailed. The costumes were really Read More >>

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Word Stretch

Once a week the youngest students take part in a class called “Word Stretch” which gives the students an opportunity to write words. Each class begins with the students writing their names, the date and numbering their paper 1-6. As a group we brainstorm a topic such as colors, pets or sports. Each student thinks Read More >>

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Biome Art

Children in the middle grades created landscapes of the biome they researched earlier in the year. First they were asked to consider where the horizon would be on their landscape. Then they considered the time of day. Would it be at dawn, dusk, at night or in the heat of the day. We talked about how Read More >>

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Chinese Brush Painting

After we learned about the aboriginal art of Australia we traveled north to the continent of Asia where we started learning about Chinese brush painting. We looked at slides and discovered how the Chinese “like to draw nature” and use “a lot of white spaces.” Another child said, “The paintings are not all filled in.” Read More >>

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Listening Center

Once a week the youngest students listen to a book on tape. As they listen they copy the title of the book and start drawing a favorite scene in the book. More recently children have been asked to write one or two sentences. Some of the titles they have listened to this year include: Thidwick the Read More >>

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Australian Aboriginal Art

To kick off a yearlong appreciation of visual arts from around the world we first looked at the word “continent.” What is a continent? How is it defined? We soon discovered that people around the world do not all learn that there are seven continents. Some places teach there are 5 continents with North America Read More >>