Schools and Instruction Books

This book is somewhat mistitled. Learn to sketch would be better. Very good introduction that will have you sketching the basic shapes and having fun with it. He has cool little rules (he calls them strategies) that he hammers home. He will state a strategy on page 3 and then just when you have forgotten it he will tell you to draw something and use "strategy number 1." You scratch your head then start flipping pages back to see what the rule was. But next time you read a strategy YOU MEMORIZE IT so that you don't have to keep flipping. That is exactly his plan of course. I like this book - give it a try.

"Learn to Draw Now"
by D. C. Dubosque

"There's no reason to go through life saying, "I can't draw!"--from the cover of "Learn to Draw Now"

This book would fall into the classification of Drawing-For-The-Absolute-Beginner. I do not want to be unkind to this book, for it is a nice set of lesson materials on working with the basic shapes. Author D. C. DuBosque covers this basic material and covers it well. For example, the author covers elementary perspective so well that any beginner could acquire sound knowledge very quickly.

The book covers elementary lighting and shading with a nice introduction to techniques that work. The books is very affordable and it is a good buy, especially for those who are frustrated and want another book covering the basics.

Another thing to admire about this book is that it avoids using an excess of wordy text. There is brief instruction and good illustration. Author D. C. DuBosque could expand this book I think, into sections that move beyond the elementary. The author's grasp of how to write a book specifically for discouraged beginners is evident.

This book has no instruction concerning figure drawing, but for a concise book of 64 pages it is okay. I think it is just the sort of thing that a parent might want to introduce a child to basic drawing, or that an adult might use for self-teaching; but the student will soon find himself needing still more books.

Very nicely made cards but would prefer if the size is a bit smaller, like flash cards. Also prefer more instruments.

These cards are beautiful and have wonderful information about the sound and family of each instrument. Great size with beautiful boarders. As a teacher, the 8-yr-olds and 2 year-olds all love them. Great price too.

So much art history and criticism is just a pose of knowledge instead of its communication. This book, thankfully is not one of these. Focusing on one of the pivotal points in the history of art, this work tells the story of the effect the European Surrealist painters had on the American Abstract Expressionists. Sawin communicates in clear readable prose that usually succeeds in avoiding the petentious, tautological jargon that passes for art writing elsewhere.

The interest in this story is in the way it reveals the start of a kind of artistic Munro doctrine. The European emigres with their Parisian sophistication, aloofness, and arrogance come over as Masters but then have all their best ideas stolen and Americanized before trickling back with their tails firmly between their legs to a Paris that had all but forgotten them during the War.

The period concentrated on in this book is a dividing point in the history of modern art, marking a watershed between two clear movements determined by two opposing trends, something Sawin could have perhaps emphasized more.

First there was a move towards increasing explicitness in art, which climaxed in the efforts of Surrealists like Dali, Masson, Ernst, and Matta to drag the processes of the mind out into the daylight. This tended to strip away the veils of mystery and made art almost unnecessary, so this was quickly followed by a move to mask and hide the subject of paintings as we see in the work of the abstract expressionists like Pollock, and the colorfield painters like Rothko. This was a vital and no doubt self-interested U-turn entered into by artists and the art establishment.

When the 20th Century began, proto-Cubists like Cezanne and the last remnants of the Impressionist movement like Monet dominated European art. No one could foresee the rise of Surrealism. Surrealism was a reaction to it's times that exploded in France in the years following WWI and later migrated to the United States during WWII. In SUREALISM IN EXILE, Martica Sawin says surrealism was inspired by many events. Certainly the surreal literary movement led by writers such as Baudelaire affected the visual arts. Similarly, the writing of anthropologists and sociologists beginning to make "scientific" contact with traditional societies also played a role.

However, Sawin suggests it was the personal experiences of artists like Max Ernst who had served at the front with the German army in WWI and French artists like Paul Eluard who faced him on the battlefield who felt the need to explore surrealism --"Rational" realism was too narrow. Later on, others joined the movement. Onslow Ford, whose physician father had witnessed the slaughter at Gallipoli as an English medical officer and returned home bitter, became a primary player after watching his father slip into depression and madness.

Ford was to say at a later date in New York that artists needed to "tear down the veils one by one that hide the reality of our own incomprehensible universe." He and the other surrealists felt the rationalist view was too restrictive. The surrealist artist could tap into the collective unconscious described by Jung (whose book on that subject was published in 1939) and bring to light a broader view of reality. Ford said artists could escape the cubist-driven semi-abstact dead end they found themselves in by opening their third eye--the Cyclopian eye, or the mind's eye, or the inner eye, and tap into their unconscious.

Sawin's book is a history of Surrealism, a movement that borrowed and incorporated ideas from the Navaho sand painters, the Tsimshian Indians (totem poles), German fairy tales, Celtic myths, Tarot cards, and menhirs--dolmans in Brittany. From these inspirational sources the Surrealists created paintings such as "Rotary Disks" --an optical illusion comprised of revolving concentric circles; "Star, Flower, Personage, Stone' --depicting alchemical transformation; and other physical transformations of space that exploded the confines of the convential 3-D world humans see owing to their limited view of reality. Surrealist art attempted to depict time and change seen by a third eye.

SURREALISM IN EXILE is filled with photographs (black and white) of the lives and works of the Surrealists, beginning with the early works in France and ending with the later works from the New York school in the late forties. If you are interested in exploring the influences that affected the work of Jackson Pollock, Piet Mondrian, Kandinski and other modern artists this book is invaluable. I gave it 4 stars because there are no color photos.

As a novice acrylic painter, I found this book to be the best beginners guidebook. After reviewing many, many books on acrylic painting, this is the only book that had it all. Chapter 3 provides the fundamentals on color basics. Understanding how to mix colors is a principle foundation that many other books failed to address. The rest of the book delves into various painting techniques that are simple to follow and understand. I would've given it 5 stars if the book came spiral bound, making it easier to use while painting. Wonderful book to have in my acrylics reference library.

This book is great for the beginner. Great presentation and tips. Easy to read.

Well thought out and intersting progression of the Barbizon school and its influence on impressionism, and the art world at large. Compelling historical account for the non-art lover as well.

It is great to see that a variation of the clinical supervision model developed by Goldhammer & Cogan and modified by John Smyth (now at Flinders University) has been dusted off and polished up by Peters and March. Those of us who worked with the clinical supervision model realised that the term "clinical supervision" was problematic, particularly when applied in schools. To us, CS was a collegial model of pedagogic improvement where the teacher who wanted the feedback on performance initiated the process and this was the tack taken by Smyth who used the model for peer assisted learning.

Preobservational conference
V
Collaborative action plan
V
In-class data collection
V
Postobservational conference

Figure 1: COMPASS cycle. (Start at top, move to the bottom and loop to the top again).

Peters and March have called this four part process COMPASS (Collaborative Observation for Monitoring Practices to Achieve Sustained School reform).

The real strengths of the book are that it develops proformas for teachers to show how COMPASS works in the classroom situation, and it gives teachers current research references to support this process.

This book is worth purchasing for teachers' reference libraries in schools which are trying to develop a "bottom-up" approach to improving classroom instruction.

This book is a very accesible account of Heathcote's work in the field. There are a number of articles on a variety of facets of her work. I first read this book when I was thinking about working with drama in a cross curricular context and this book has advice on teaching and learning not just in the drama class-room but in other subject areas and non-statutory settings. Heathcote's writing style is very accessable and her humble nature about her own work is refreshing to read.

The Complete String Guide is specifically directed toward teachers of violin-family instruments, but is quite useful to anyone wanting to buy an instrument and who may not have a backgound for intelligently evaluating a purchase. It is originally published by MENC: the National Association for Music Education (formerly the Music Educators' National Conference), the professional association for music teachers. You will often see student violins advertised as conforming to MENC standards. This book is what they're talking about.

In addition to basic information about building a string program, perhaps the most useful information are the instrument standards. These go into specific details recommending everything from string guages to bridge curvatures to string spacings and details of every single part of the violin, bow and case (though oddly lacking details about rosin). There is a handy chart of instrument sizes (do you know the difference between a 3/4 and 4/4 size violin?). There are guidelines and checklists for evaluating an instrument to be purchased. This concise little book provides a fine grounding with objective criteria for anyone wanting to purchase a violin/viola/cello/bass with one caveat: just because an instrument conforms in every way to these standards, it does not automatically mean it's a good instrument or worth a given price. This is all just a starting foundation for an intelligent search. Highly recommended.

The authors present a school wide approach to teaching in our public schools where student diversity prevails in all ways - academic, socioeconomic, cultural, behavioral etc. This book is for you if you are a teacher, administrator or parent.

For our education professionals, it will help your school chart a course toward school improvement with a focus on staff development and tapping into student's own desire to learn. It includes specific strategies you can use in the classroom and in working with staff. Their approach is not a quick fix, but requires a long term, intentional commitment to improve teachers teaching and students learning. The authors bring hope to the process, yet their approach recognizes and addresses real constraints and impediments to school improvement and how to address these roadblocks. This book is valuable for parents too. The authors' descriptons of successful teacher moments, classroom environments and teaching strategies will help parents evaluate their childrens' educational experiences. It will help you identify when an effective, creative teacher is teaching your child and provide insight as to why. It will help you broaden your understanding of what "good" teaching is all about and help determine what school improvements efforts deserve your support.