Starting the PGCE in Primary September 2012

After many years of building up my experience and knowledge through arts facilitation, I'm extremely excited to say I have been accepted onto the PGCE in Primary teaching!!

It is week 1 and I have learnt so much already in all areas of learning. 

One of our first assessments is to work in a group of 6 and create an interactive story board about a nursery rhyme suitable for foundation level.  

My group have chosen Mary Mary Quite Contrary. 

Mary Mary Quite Contrary 

How does your garden grow, 

With silver bells and cockle shells 

And pretty maids all in a row.

So far my job is to make Mary and her different outfits. 

Below you can see a turquoise hat with a flower, a furry scarf, short sleeved top, warm spotty jumper, short skirt with pompoms, sparkly trousers, an apron with pocket, flowery boots and trainers with laces.

Mary's variety of clothing will encourage foundation pupils to consider what type of clothing they should choose on a warm/cold day and why. We focus on extending the use of language and literacy here by discussing their own experiences of choosing clothes for different seasons/weathers.  

Here are the 'pretty maids all in a row.' They are smaller and more simple than Mary as they are not a main focus of the storyboard, but very important little characters all the same. 

Here is is the final storyboard with my amazing group.
There are lots of areas for further development and learning: Counting the bricks on Mary's shed, talking about the types of flowers, the weather in Mary's garden and in real life, suitable clothing, imagining our own garden, etc.
I absolutely loved working on this project and looking forward to future ones with my group!

Foamy Fish at Belfast City Council's National Play Day

Earlier in the summer I facilitated sea-side arts and crafts for the National Play Day at Lady Dixon Park. 

We created foam fish, which could be used during play time around the park. They could also be used as key rings, bag charms, decorations in bedrooms... whatever the children fancy!

Children practiced cutting, glueing, tracing, drawing patterns and threading pipe cleaners. 

More complex fish have greater attention paid to scales, fins, tails and eyes. 

Castlereagh Borough Council Summer Scheme

I visited 5 community centres to deliver art workshops during Castlereagh Borough Council's summer scheme 2012. 

I really enjoyed meeting all the participants and youth leaders again and we had lots of fun creating mini aquariums. 

We discussed what kind of creatures are found under the sea, in aquariums and in our fish bowls at home. We cut out the creatures from colourful and patterned paper and used pencils and felt tips for the water. As you can see below everyone came up with lots of great ideas. Here are my favourite ones...!

Love the pop up shells!

And finally, one massive group work showing a porthole on a ship looking out to sea. What creatures can you spot?

Screen printing at InterAct Youth Arts Festival 2012

Full information and photos are in the 'Arts Festival' section at the top of this site. 

Here are a few photos to give you a taster of the amazing designs we created! 

Screen printing at Crescent Art Centre

On a rainy August afternoon what's better to do than design and print your own T-shirts in Crescent Art Centre! I worked with a small group of teenagers to design and print unique designs using lots of vibrant colours. 

First, we draw the final design and decide what colours to use. We need one stencil for each colour. The design above has 5 colours so we must cut 5 separate stencils. Look how they come together to form a complete image below!

The example below shows three stencils for three colours and how it looks when printed.

The amazing final designs!