I try to start off the year by creating an atmosphere that lets my students know that we have work to do, but we will have fun doing it. I didn't want to bore my students by making them listen to me talk for 48 minutes straight. So, this week i split up each day into 2 parts. One part dealt with housekeeping... getting attendance straight, and introduction to my teaching philosophy, and a "getting to know where you are on your artistic journey" form. The other part included play-doh pictionary, exquisite corpse, and the first (of many) community building activity.
We had fun and got some needed stuff done. Next week we will begin exploring Artistc Behaviors, bootcamp style. I can't wait.