My Last Blog Post for EDUC 406

Métis Jigging & Métis Fiddling

I want to end my blog with a wish for the future.
I always admire my sister Cherie’s talents and her passion for our Métis culture. Cherie is a beautiful Métis Jigger. When she dances you can tell that she is very passionate by the expressions in her face and her body movements. Cherie also loves to the play the fiddle, which always bring excitement in my family’s life.

My wish for the future is to learn how to jig and play the fiddle. The Bachelor of Education program has been an experience of a life time. I am so happy that I was selected for the 2007-2009 cohort. But I am excited to see it come to an end, so I can have my ME time back again and re-enter my creative journey.

I feel that I am very artistic and I have a wide range of knowledge of visual arts and performing arts, but my experiences is limited in the areas of music and dance. My goal is to learn how to jig and play the fiddle after graduation because these skills would be essential and beneficial as a teacher and for my curriculum. As well as bring personal satisfaction that I tried something new.
Thank you again for the experience of discovering my own creative works.

I would also like to thank Donna Campbell for following my blog. Your interest means the world to me.

Daphne Odjig

Daphne Odjig is a legendary First Nations female artist. In FNST 498 Indigenous Women Artist I wrote an essay about her life and experiences as an artist. Daphne Odjig was born with a paint brush in her hands, and her creative expression and love for art was inspired by her grand-father and father. I was so fascinated by her life and her passion. I found the resource Odjig by Bob Boyer to be an excellence resource because it was similar to the scribe and mistrals idea: beside each of her pictures was a quote about the paining or about her experiences The idea behind creating the platform for scribes and mistrals using Odjg will be valuable resource to teach to my students. I plan to use the project, as well as the puzzle pieces for my next practicum. Her choice of designs and colours do not only reflect First Nations art, but can be used to inspire individual creativity.

A Reminder of the Past

I am so happy that I was given the opportunity to blog about my creative journey. I recently found these clay artifacts, that I have not seen in over 4 years. I made the turtle in grade 7, and the other 2 figures I made in Gr. 11.

Christmas Banquet

I was did not want to attend the Christmas Banquet for the reason that I hate singing in front of others, but I ended up over came my fear of singing. I am glad that I did attend the Christmas Banquet for the reason that it was nice to see and visit with my peers and other cohorts outside of the stressful school environment. I was so pleased that our class has so much ambition compared to the other cohorts. Our passion and our ability to be creative will only be an advantage to us in our future careers.

Personal Response

Two Rivers Art Museum
I always have a fun time visiting the 2 Rivers Art Gallery. I found this experience more beneficial and inspiring compared to our first visit. It always seems that the Gallery has at least one depressing exhibition, and this time I felt uncomfortable viewing Ted Hebert’s images. I found his work to represent someone dying and the spirit world. I had a difficult time viewing his art because all I could see and feel was death. The one image I found the most difficult to view was the one on the opposite side of his bibliography. Furthermore, when we were expected to replica one of his images figures for 30 seconds I had great difficulty just being so close to his work because of the negative energy I felt. On the other hand, I did like Natalie’s work except for her nude images. Although I love Matisse’s image Blue Nude, I like it for the fact that it is not an actual human naked. I do not appreciate actual human nude art because it is something that does not interest me, instead it makes me feel uncomfortable to view.

Kid’s Art Show Activity

The activity I had prepared for the Kid’s Arts Show was inspired by Matisse’s stencil work. In addition, I thought it was important to design an activity where all students could participate regardless of their age and ability. And I wanted an activity that would not be too messy and the clean up be a breeze. The activity proved to be a success, I believe I had over 25 students who participated. I just also want to say thank you to all my peers who stopped by to give me a hand, a pee break (thanks a million), for cutting out all the little pieces, and to Charlea for inspiring me with ideas and helping me purchase supplies.

Beach Ball Lesson Activity

The idea came from the introductory activity at a Métis youth conference. I have adapted the idea for introductory lessons and anticipatory activity. For my grade one class, I created questions that asked them their favouirte colour, healthy snack, sport, subject, TV show, etc. For my grade 4, I created questions about their learning style, favourite manipulative, subject, healthy snack, favourite outdoor activity, etc. But this time the students had to answer the questions and explain why.

Activity: Pass ball (chest pass) to a student. Student answers question were left thumb lands. Student repeats the question aloud for group to hear. Student answers the question in a sentence aloud for group to hear. For example: My favourite healthy snack is? - My favourite healthy snack is carrots. Student passes to another student who has not had a turn.

For Review: ask questions related the previous activity.