GRAND AVENUE SPECIALS

Art - Krista Geier and Molly Froelich

Music - Amy Hiel and Rebekah Knitt

Physical Education - Jacob Breunig and Seth Kostroski

Email: contact@saukprairieschools.org
Website: www.saukprairieschools.org
Phone: (608) 643-1900

This newsletter is to help you stay connected to what is happening in the Grand Avenue Specials. The Specials are composed of Music, Art and Physical Education, each student has each specials class twice a week. We hope that you find the information useful and please feel free to contact your student's Specials teacher with questions or concerns.

Thank you to everyone who attended the Youth Art Month opening reception at the Sauk Prairie RIver Arts Center! It was great to see so many families and be a part of the excitement the the young artists have when they share their art!

If you did not get the opportunity to stop by during the reception, the show will be on display through April 19. The Sauk Prairie RIver Arts Center is open from 8 am -8 pm on school days and on the weekend during special events. Every kindergarten through fifth grade student in the Sauk Prairie district has a piece if work in the show, that is over 1000 pieces of art!!

WHAT WE'VE BEEN WORKING ON:

Fifth Grade: During February, Fifth grade artists learned about the art of printmaking and famous Pop Artist Andy Warhol. Student artists drew a food item, transferred their drawing to a printing block, carved the block and then printed their image multiple times. When the prints were dry, artists collaged them together to make a multicolor printed piece of art!

Fourth Grade: During February, artists have been learning about Wisconsin born painter, Georgia O’Keeffe. O’Keeffe is best known for her paintings of enlarged blossoms and New Mexico inspired landscapes and skulls. Artists designed their own artwork inspired by O’Keeffe style. They traced their line drawings with glue and colored them with chalk pastel, using an analogous color scheme.

Third Grade: Third grade artists learned about the landscape painter Ted Harrison and his use of atmospheric perspective and abstract colors. Students drew landscapes and added implied texture with crayon using complementary colors to different areas of their drawing. When adding color with watercolor paint artists created tints and tones or lights and darks by adjusting the amount of water used.

Tuesday May 12th @ 6:00- 3rd Grade Concert at Grand Avenue

Thursday, May 21st- 4th Grade Field Trip to Overture Center for the Link Up Concert

Thursday, May 21st @ 7:00 p.m- 5th Grade Chorus to perform at Middle School Choral Concert

Thursday, May 28th- 5th Grade Chorus Field Trip to sing at Bridges Elementary

Fifth Grade spent the month preparing for their concert. Congratulations 5th Grade students on an awesome performance!

Fourth Grade students are busy preparing for our May field trip to the orchestra! We have learned some songs we will be singing with the orchestra, and have been diligently practicing our recorder skills. This month we spent some time learning about two famous orchestral pieces- Beethoven's "Ode to Joy" and Dvorak's "New World Symphony".

Third Grade students began their recorder unit this month, learning how important it is to use warm, gentle air, and how to play the notes B, A, and G. We also spent some time learning about Lunar New Year and learning some music for that.

We were lucky enough to welcome the Stoughton Norwegian Dancers to our school for a performance this week. They shared about the culture and dance of Scandinavian countries.

• We finished up gymnastics by taking some time to challenge ourselves at improving different gymnastics skills.
• We then transitioned to kicking off our Kids Heart Challenge. We are excited for this event during PE classes this week.
• We dedicated some time to developing our Team Building Skills. This was a fun way for students to work with classmates for the good of their group. 3rd grade students have been doing an activity we call Mission Impossible and 4th and 5th graders are doing team building challenges which are a lot of fun to watch them collaborate on.
• We will be beginning our basketball unit before Spring Break and pick back up with it when we return.
• Have a fun and active Spring Break!