Gumption for Assumption

People ask me, "Where did Clipboard Girl come from?" She is not meant to be a particular person, but she personifies the type of bureaucracy that prevents good things from happening. An example is when the Jones Act prevented foreign ships from helping with the BP oil spill. "Why aren't they helping? Oh, it's because of a rule." That kind of thing bugs me, and the comics with her is my revenge.

Scenes from an Art Show

The Heroes Your Mom Threw Out Comic Shop recently sponsored an art show at the Elks Lodge in Elmira. Proprietor Jared Aiosa is very supportive of artists in the area, in addition to being a writer and artist himself. The events like this that he sponsors go a long way toward encouraging creative people from all walks of life to gather their creations and share them with others. In fact, the community that has come together as a result of the Heroes "art parties" have become a place for artists, writers, educators and other creative people to network and make arrangements to collaborate.

One of the artists was Kevin Falkenberg. His Zombie Mark Twain print is quite a hit.
Jim Duffy, artist and retired art teacher shared many of his creations, including his new hobby -- stained glass.

This artist had some fantastic caricatures that skewered Palin and other political figures.
When I set up my table, I took a page from the Paul Bozzo playbook and offered kids and curious adults the chance to "pull a print" from a block of my character, The Mystic Yak. I have learned from Paul that an interactive station at an art show is a refreshing change of pace, helps the viewers understand how your art is made, and teaches some children about an art form that they may not experience due to budget cuts.

The kids were proud of these and took them home at the end of the evening.



The next big event that Heroes will sponsor is the Herobot Con Comic Convention on Saturday, October 8th. You won't want to miss that. Comic artists from Marvel, DC, the Simpsons and (ahem) some lesser known publications will be there. It is always a blast to talk to children's book illustrator Tedd Arnold, so come on down!

The Painted Word: An Altered Book Workshop for Teachers

Today I presented a workshop for teachers at Mansfield University. This was at a conference called "The Painted Word" put on by the Endless Mountains Writing Project and the Endless Mountains Reading Council. My workshop allowed participants to learn about and create altered books for creative writing journals.

In my session, I introduced some projects that allow for cross-curriculum connections. These are especially great for the students in our classrooms that learn best when they are doing creative projects. We looked at some examples of student projects, and then we all started our own altered book. First we used acrylic paint to decorate the cover of an existing recycled book. After a review of basic color wheel theory, we experimented with acrylic techniques such as impasto and scumbling.

These books are going to be writing journals/visual journals. Next we used watercolor paint to make some pages for the interior. Some of the favorite techniques of the day included salt technique, wet-on-wet, and painting with bubble wrap.


We listened to a short talk by Ken Robinson. He has some important points for teachers to remember about the need for schools to move from standardization to personalization.

Integrating art with other subjects is very important, especially today. The Learning Focused Schools (LFS) model is the current trend in education. One of the key ingredients for success in the studies they cite (Reeves, 2003) is the stress put on "cross-disciplinary curriculum integrating subjects currently downplayed (e.g. art, music)."

Remember, according to Bloom's Revised Taxonomy, creativity is the highest order of thought! Eliminating creative projects from schools is just plain nuts! We need more of it, not less -- especially projects that help them make connections between disciplines.

What a great bunch of teachers! We all had a great time learning and sharing ideas. I sat in on a few of the other sessions, and learned some new things myself.

The picture above shows me trying to look "teacher-ish".

The Music Box

This comic was inspired by an incident described in Rauschenberg by Mary Lynn Kotz.

Comics in the Classroom Prezi

Here is an amazing presentation by Megan Crimmins. She was a participant in the Comics in the Classroom workshop I presented recently at Alfred University. She summarized what she learned from that and explored the topic further. Check out her amazing Prezi production below!

Comics in the Classroom on Prezi

A Vortex in the Nebula

Here's a page from my sketchbook. As a practice exercise, I redrew a page of a Flash/Superman story and made a few "minor changes". (Names have been changed to persecute the innocent!)

I drew it in pen without penciling first, and then colored with marker.

Comics in the Classroom Workshop

Today I presented a Comics in the Classroom workshop at Alfred University. The participants were a fantastic group of young teachers. Most had already completed student teaching and were working with students in a summer literacy program. Some have been hired for teaching positions at various schools in the fall.

It was a great group of committed educators who have a passion for teaching and compassion for the struggling learners. We completed exercises in using comics in lessons to demonstrate:

1. Fun reading opportunities for students.
   
2. Comic Book Readers Theater. Reading a comic together as a dramatic exercise.
   
3. Comics Conversions. Using existing comic strips as writing prompts and to teach the conventions of writing dialogue.
   
4. Comic Book Book Reports. Using comics to help students summarize what they have read.
   
5. Graphic Novel Graphic Organizers. Using comics to teach the theme of a book (or how a character changes through the course of a story).
   
6. Using comics to teach onomatopoeia, alliteration and hyperbole.
7. Using comics to provide opportunities to discuss bullying and violence prevention.
   
8. Strategies to help students create original cartoon characters and letter their creations with speech balloons.

Our "text" for the day was the Sunday Funnies comics section (courtesy of The Daily Review). Their Comics in Education program is a great way to get multiple copies of the same comics text to use when discussing comics with students.


Here's what one of the participants had to say:

I participated in this workshop presented by Andy and found it to be the most informative and eye opening class ever given by a guest speaker. As a result of what I learned, I am going to co-teach a comic based unit during the summer reading program in a couple of weeks. And, I just returned from the used book store with a copy of Bones for 3 dollars. The vast amount of graphic novels spanning all ages was a reality unknown to me before the presentation. I had heard of Watchmen and 300, and enjoyed the movies. But, was not aware of the many other types. My level of enthusiam regarding graphic novels has increased dramatically. I'm very excited about implementing some of the things learned in the classroom. Thanks a ton Andy. This was a blast.

The participants in this workshop read, wrote and drew to experience various strategies they might like to use with their students some day. They had fantastic questions and it was a great day for me.

Even though most participants weren't art majors, everyone created an original character and made a sketch of it. The results were creative and hilarious!