Cyberkidz is a Dutch ‘edutainment’ site with lots of educational games, covering Maths, Literacy, Geography, Art, Music and more. The games are sorted by subject and age range, suitable for children aged 4-11.

www.cyberkidz.net

The site has recently been translated into English, so even more children are now able to take advantage of these resources.

The Art Classroom is a wonderful blog about art and design in secondary schools. It is run by David Dunlop and shows the day to day workings of an art classroom.

There are lots of examples of student work, as well as unit plans and ideas for other schools to try. Take a look and leave some comments about the work that is shared.

One Million Giraffes is an online project in which one person is hoping to collect 1 million giraffes by 2011. People are sending pictures of their giraffes (which can’t be created on a computer) and at the time of writing, the collection has reached over 250,000!

Could your class get involved?

• Ask each child to draw one giraffe… or maybe more! This could be as part of an Art activity or set as homework.
• Think of creative ways of making giraffes… they don’t have to be hand-drawn but they cannot be made using a computer.
• Explore the giraffe images on the site… how were they made? Could your pupils create their own giraffes using similar techniques?

Get your pupils involved and have one of their giraffes as part of the million!

Hartbeat presenter and artist Tony Hart died yesterday, aged 83. He had suffered from ill health, including two strokes in recent years, and died peacefully in the early hours of the morning, according to his agent.

Hart inspired generations of budding artists over his 50-year television career through programmes such as Vision On, Take Hart and Hartbeat, before retiring in 2001 due to ill health. His agent, Roc Renals, said his health had recently been in decline and he had been taken to hospital with a chest infection. He described Hart as a "kind man" who was single-minded in his dedication to his work.

You can watch a tribute to Tony Hart on YouTube.

The British Association for Modern Mosaic (BAMM) is running a mosaic competition which is open to primary school aged children.
   
The
competition is called MEGA MOSAIC MAKERS 2008 and it is
nationwide. They are aiming to raise the profile of mosaic art in
schools, with the principle of getting children interested at a young
age. It is  open to groups/organisations/workshops who work with
children under the age of eleven. Both teachers and students are
awarded prizes, which have been provided by the sponsor, Topps Tiles.
There is a group and an individual category. 

This year’s entry is open from now until 7th Nov 2008, and work can have been completed anytime in the last three years.

Link: http://www.bamm.org.uk/portal/content.asp?ContentId=1103

Ten areas around the country are to pilot the Government’s £25 million Find your Talent programme to give young people the chance to encounter a range of high-quality cultural experiences for five hours a week both in and outside of school. Children in the pilot areas will be able to discover and develop their talents in the cultural sphere.

In time, the Government wants all young people to have the right to experience five hours of arts and culture every week.

The ten lead organisations chosen as pilots are:

• Bolton Borough Council;
• The Creative Foundation (serving Shepway District and including Folkestone, Hythe and Romney Marsh);
• Customs House (North and South Tyneside);
• Hampshire County Council;
• Leeds Children’s Services;
• Leicestershire County Council;
• ‘Liverpool City Region’ Partnership (serving three Merseyside neighbourhoods);
• North Somerset;
• Telford and Wrekin Council; and
• Tower Hamlets.

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Using ICT in ART lessons can be difficult – but by having a look at ArtisanCam on the Interactive Whiteboard or suite, you can really inspire the children and use ICT in the art lesson rather than for producing the art. This superb site is suitable from KS1 right up to KS4 and beyond. For me the best part is the Activity zone.

I can’t list everything here that is worth visiting – but some of my favourites are the ‘Figure it Out‘ for drawing bodies, charcoal drawings with Louise Bradley and the movies and interviews with Andy Goldsworthy my favourite artist.

Link: http://www.artisancam.org.uk

With all the controversy about the 2012 Olympic symbol what better time than to challenge the children to design their own.

Joe emailed a link to http://www.fubra.com/london2012/ which allows you to upload your own 2012 logos and then vote. Why not upload some from the children and see if they can fair any better than the one unveiled!

A great mini challenge for the children.

The school science advisory service, Cleapss, has sent out a warning to all schools and local authorities about the dangers of mixing plaster of Paris with water by hand.  This was sent out after it was confirmed that a teenage girl had to have most of her fingers and thumbs amputated because
of severe burns caused by mixing plaster of Paris by hand during a (secondary) art class.

Be warned!