Blackshear Elementary Fine Arts Academy
WE ARE ANIMATORS
THE KINDERGARTEN ANIMATORS 2016
PURPLE WAVE
INTRODUCTION
Kindermators™ are animators who are in kindergarten. Kindermators™ have no fear when it comes to drawing with traditional drawing tools, digital drawing tools or animation tools. Kindermators are proud of the artwork they create. Kindermators™don't care what you think about their artwork and they know you love it because they already know it's great. They have no fear of sharing their artwork, they are proud to share their artwork with anybody at anytime, and they are demanding that you take the time to view their artwork. Kindermators™ use colors as they see fit based on their feelings, which they wear on their sleeves at all times. Kindermators™ are ALL professional photographers and they want to take photos all the time. All Kindermators™ will get all in your face to take a picture with absolutely no respect for your personal space. Kindermators™ are cute and lovable which comes out in every piece of artwork they create. Kindermators™ understand that you (we) are teaching them and that you (we) are using tools and methods that they are engaged by to do so and they really appreciate it. Kindermators™ currently live in Austin, Texas and attend Blackshear Fine Arts Academy. Kindermators™ are taught by Ms. Anne, Ms. Houston and Ms. Perez, the kindergarten teachers.
In the video below you will see the first KINDERMATORS™ in the world. They all attend one of the three kindergarten classes at Blackshear Elementary Fine Arts Academy, a National Blue Ribbon School and created by Austin Independent School District principal Betty Jenkins.
THE KINDERMATORS
THE KINDERMATORS
PROJECT 1 : First Digital Drawing and Animation
The first class I taught at Blackshear Elementary Fine Arts Academy was Ms. Anne's Kindergarten class. My daughter Cylera is a student in her class. We started the class with the students doing pencil on paper portraits of themselves.
The next project we did in Ms. Anne's class was to teach the children how to use and care for the iPads. Then we taught the students how to use the digital drawing app DrawCast, which has an automatic animation feature built into the app which redraws what the students draw. It makes drawings move, or it animates drawings. We had the students follow the directions to produce their first digital drawing and then we showed them how to use the app to animate their drawings. In each lesson we combined the artwork with an element of the kindergarten curriculum. They had fun and learned.
This video is of their first digital drawings and animations.
Ms. Anne's Class
Ms. Anne's Class
Word of the Day Video - Pencil Drawing
Word of the Day Video - Pencil Drawing
PROJECT 2 : Pencil Drawing Animation
While we were waiting for the iPad covers to arrive the students did pencil self portraits. Ms. Anne talks to the students about self awareness and about being aware of others. I spoke to them about shapes, positioning and details. We always spoke as one voice. I supported her using the art making process as a visual tool to prove her points and she supported me in the art making process naturally because she is an artist, so she totally understood everything I would say to the stueents. And both of us understood that if you make the learning process fun - the students would eat it up like serving candy and ice cream to hungry kindergarteners.
Please watch the pencil drawn video below. You will see the guide lines we taught the kindergartners and you will feel the freedom and creativity that each student has in them. But what you can't see from the video is the teamwork, respect and support they showed each other, how hard each worked on their scripts, how focused they were as they spoke their lines, how determined the students whom English is their second language were to get it right....and they did, and how excited all of them were when they saw their completed animations on the big screen.
They really are ANIMATORS!
Word of the Day Video - Digital Drawing
Word of the Day Video - Digital Drawing
PROJECT 3 : Digital Drawing Animation
When the ipad covers arrived, thanks to the Elbom and Stearns Family's, it was time to get started! The students followed instructions and did their self portraits. But believe me when I tell you that each of them made at least 10 drwaings per day. Each asked to be the class photogpher for the day and each wanted to be in charge of collection the ipads at the end of their lesson. They all took pride and responsibility for each other, their ipads and their teachers.
Blackshear is not a rich school. It does not have all the necssary tools needed to produce the animations in class. So every night I would have to render each students animation. For reasons I can't understand AISD does not have Apple Macintosh computers in the schools. Macs are the computers that historical used for creative project in creative industries. Oh well I guess we have to work on that next semester so the student can see, learn and experience the total process in class.
So I worked my butt off and back on again so that every day when it was time to do animation the students saw their drawing talking and speaking the words they had written and spoken the day before. I now have added respect for teachers in public schools. Who do not have all the tools, who do not have all the support, who are not paid justly for the great work they do and while not having the money for needed tools and supplies, they spend their own money so that they can teach our children. I saw that EVERYDAY and EVERYWHERE. I think teacher are the greatest people in the world and at Blackshear Fine Arts Academy they are the greatest of the greats.
The video below uses the same audio as their pencil animations, BUT!!! They are in color and were drawn on their ipads. The went NUTS when they saw their cartoons in color!!!
From Gold Stars, to Stickers, from the Grammy to the Academy Awards, everyone wants to be acknowledged. And especially Kindergartners! So we did just that by creating an award called, the i am an animator award, aka a piece of paper with some words and pictures printed on it with a place for the awardee to sign their name and a place for an higher power to sign their name. Then we created a in class show to hand out the awards. Make sure everybody gets one. Then you just created a low cost event that will add value to the learning process and confidence of each student.
That's what you will see when you watch the video below.
We Are Animators Award Show
We Are Animators Award Show
PROJECT 4 : In Class Award Show
Ms. Anne's Kindermators
I have not come close to showing all of the work the students produced. I can't come close to telling all the things they learned, you can talk to Ms. Anne about that. But I can tell you this, the students, their parents, the other teachers in the school, the admin staff and all the schools that participated in the AISD Innovation Summit know that the Blackshear Fine Arts Academy Kindermators™ are the best Kindergarten animators in Austin and Texas and the USA and in the world.
I am proud of all of them, their parents and their teachers. I thank all of them for giving me the opportunity to be a part of their lives. They made my family and my life better just from knowing them all! Thank you Ms. Anne.
Ms. Anne's Kindermators
Ms. Houston's Kindergarten class was the next class I taught. The subject of her class’s animation was Science. We started with teaching iPad care and went into self portraits to teach them how to use the iPads and the digital drawing app. Then we went to “Insects”, which was the subject they were on when I came to their class, They drew spiders, bees, butterflies and ladybugs. They wrote their stories and practiced speaking. Each teacher was involved in the video as a character. Ms. Houston played herself as the teacher ladybug, who instructs the young ladybugs how to speak correctly. We also created a rap song which the students rapped as a choir. The title of the song is, "I'm a Scientist." You will hear the song at the intro and closing of the video. Thank you Ms. Houston.
The Kindermators™ are truly Scientist. Watch the video and you will see they are not just animators, They are Scientist Animators.
Ms. Houston Class
Ms. Houston Class
Ms. Perez Class
In Ms. Perez's class we started as we did in the other classes, we had students from Ms. Anne's and Ms. Houston's classes mentor her students. The subject of her class animation was Numbers and Math. In each of ther other classes we would invited the other kindergarten classes to view their work so Ms. Perez's class was excited and ready by the time I came to their class. We only had one week to do the class project because we wanted to have all Kindergarten classes represented in the AISD Innovation Summit. And the got the work completed with time to spare. Ms. Perez is the voice of Math and she like Ms. Anne and Houston, did an excellent job. Thank you Ms. Perez.
THE KINDERMATOR DIGITAL SELF PORTRAITS
THE KINDERMATOR DIGITAL SELF PORTRAITS
In April 2016, Cylera and her mom came into my studio/office and told me I had to make a animatiom of Cylera asking The President or The First Lady to come to her class to see their animations. Being a know it all man I said to myself, "They ain't coming to your class and you won't even get to see them when they come to Austin for South By Southwest SXSW. But to keep peace in our home I said, "That's a GREAT IDEA." I watched as they wrote Cylera's speech. I watched them practice it. Cylera said, "I'm Ready to record Da Da." I recorded her on my iphone, opened one of the animated drawing she had done in Ms. Anne's class and I made a movie of her animation. Soon as it was done Cylera's mom, aka Cara Briggs sent the video to WhiteHouse.org, Twitter, Facebook, The Mayor, everybody
at her job at the Austin Chamber of Commerce and she emailed it to everyone she knows. Some of you got that email. Each year Cylera and I go to the SXSW trade show, so we were at the Chamber when Drew said to us, "Do you want to go see the First Lady? I was shocked! We went to the event. Cylera and her mom sat in the first row. After the event The First had a meet and greet. She stopped and talked to Cylera and her mom for a long time. They talked about the Kindermators as I took pictures in shock! Mrs. Obama moved on. Then Cylera's mom said, "Hey Dana, aka Queen Latifah, Come here," Dana hosted the event. Cara pointed to me and Dana said, "Jonathan where have you been?" I pointed at Cylera and her mom and she said, " Only You." Click the arrow watch the video
I WAS IN SHOCK
THIS IS FOR MY GIRLS
Blackshear Fine Arts Academy 3rd grade teacher Ms. Rodriguez-Perez was the school representitive for the AISD Innovation Summit in May 2016. She and Ms. Betty Jenkins ask if I would work with her maths students to produce an animation of math problems they would present at the Innovation Summit. We only had 3 days for the students to learn their formulas and produce their animated presentations.
Ms. Rodriguez-Perez selected three math students. We ask them to draw portraits of themselves. I gave the 10 minutes of instruction about their drawings. Ms. Rodriguez-Perez gave each a sheet of college lined paper and they drew their self portraits. She worked with each of the students on their formulas, diagrams and the spoken dialogue. They photographed their self portraits and recorded their audio on the schools ipads. We only had 1 day to bring there self portraits, audio and diagrams together to create there animations. I finished putting the final elements together the morning of the Innovation Summit. Ms. Rodriguez-Perez and her 3 students, the 3 kindergarten teachers Ms. Anne, Ms. Perez and Ms. Houston, 16 Kindergarten, 30 parents, family members and friends all attended the Innovation Summit. Marcos Gutierrez, from Edu Display brought their newest Edu Display which is the best classroom tool I have ever seen. It allowed us to broadcast the kindergartners animation on a very lrage screen. The knidergartners were stars of the summit. We brought ipads and they drew and made animations for the many people who surrounded them. We also let students, teachers and parents from other school participate. It was a fun day. Ms. Rodriguez-Perez did a great job in organizing our school for the Innovation Summit.
Watch the 3gMathamator do their thing in the video below!
3GMATHAMATORS
A parade is an animation of people. On June 1, 2016 Blackshear Elementary Fine Arts Academy and the surrounding community celebrated the lifetime work of Benjamin Lee Joyce, aka B.L. Joyce. He was an East Austin Educator who brought the Fine Arts into a community that had no Fine Arts at that time in History. He taught tailoring at Tillotson College, which is now Huston-Tillotson University. He was a master musician who played in the US Army Band. He was asked to form marching bands at Old Anderson High School and Keeling Middle School. The bands he created won several Black Texas band championships. Blacks were not allowed to participate with Whites at that time. He created a community wide music program that exposed the students and the community who lived in East Austin to the importance and value a good Fine Arts Education. He also brought music to Blackshear Elementary School, resulting in Black students being introduced to music.
Because of his work in building the Fine Arts and the Black Community, Blackshear Elementary Fine Arts Academy is proud to honor him by starting the Blackshear Elementary Fine Arts Academy All Homemade Instruments Marching Band and marched in his honor in the 6th Annual B.L. Joyce Celebrate the Fine Arts Parade, aka the B. L. Joyce Parade.
The B. L. Joyce Parade was originally to take place on April 1, 2016. But the cold and rain caused us to postpone the parade to a day in May. The May date was rained out so we only had a few days we could conduct the parade. That day was the next to last day of school. That turned out to be the best day in the existence of the B.L. Joyce Parade.
The entire student body of Blackshear of 300 students, minus 35 5th graders, marched in the parade. Every teacher, minus 2, marched in the parade. 60 parents and the students younger brothers, sisters and fa,ily members marched in the parade, the entire school administration and support staff marched in the parade and 3 grandmothers and one grandfather marched in the parade. All carrying and playing handmade instruments they made themselves. It was the best BL Joyce Parade and community builder.
The parade started in front of Blackshear Elementary Fine Arts Academy 1712 East 11th Street and ended at the George Washington Museum, where everyone was served pizza and water.
Special Thanks to the Austin Police Department for keeping our childern safe.
The B.L. Joyce Parade - Celebrate the Fine Arts
The B.L. Joyce Parade - Celebrate the Fine Arts
I Agree With You Dr. Cruz
I Agree With You Dr. Cruz
Dr. Cruz, You said it, we did it! Everything you said about the use of technology as a tool to assist in teaching Language Arts, Science and Math. The students created written stories which they spoke while being creative and working as a team. We created in class showcase event and attended the AISD Innovation Summit for showcase their work throughout AISD. We used your words as a guide for the 3 kindergarten classes projects. And yes, the students had fun while they were learning. Now lets grow, expand and spread this to all school and all grade levels.
