Green Street Blog

Green Street teaching artists have come together in one last visual display to celebrate the rich relationships and valuable experiences they have gained while working at Green Street.

 

Painters, printmakers, crafts people and makers of all kinds, they have generously given of their time, their talents, and their love to the Green Street community.  In return, their students have honored them with artwork, memories, and smiles they will never forget.  We wish them all the best as we Wrap Up at Green Street. 

 

The public is invited on the evening of Oct. 5^th from 6-8p.m. for an opening reception and sale of our teaching artists’ artwork and handcrafts.   We are located at 51 Green Street, Middletown.   

The Wrap Up exhibit will be on view between 10:30a.m.-3p.m. from Oct. 5-30^th.

This month we will be displaying Dena Winkleman Matthews’ Illuminating Science, an exhibit where the artist’s personal fascination with nature and art, her passion for learning, and her desire to master artistic techniques all neatly coalesce in the medical and scientific visualizations that she creates.  From detailed pen and ink drawings to sophisticated computer renderings, her array of scientific and medical illustrations clearly demonstrate that she has one foot firmly planted in each of the worlds of art and science.

Matthews is currently the Publication Production Manager for Wesleyan’s Office of University Communications, a partner at LifeHouse Productions, LLC, and a board member of the American Society of Illustrators Partnership representing the Association of Medical Illustrators.  Previously, she has taught Digital Medical Imaging at New York University’s Center for Advanced Digital Applications.  She co-authored the chapter on biomedical animation entitled “From 2D to 3D” in The Guild Handbook of Scientific Illustration, 2nd Ed. She holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, as well as a Master of Associated Medical Sciences degree in Biomedical Visualization.

There will be an opening reception for Matthews’ Illuminating Science on Thursday, September 7th from 5-7p.m. and the show will remain on view through September 27th.  The gallery is located at 51 Green Street, Middletown, CT.  The fall gallery hours are Mon.-Fri. 9am-3pm.

 

 

Jon Eastman is a Bloomfield, Connecticut based artist that focuses on object making.  He is currently working simultaneously on 3 different series— a group of box constructions incorporating found objects and post-consumer materials, a series of wall relief pieces that explore form and color, and collage works of cut up acrylics on paper and board. This piece will be featured at Green Street during the month of August.

Amass with textures, patterns and prints of common objects and everyday materials, Eastman’s compact and jam-packed visual narratives are far more than mere explorations of color and composition.  Enigmatic and poetic experiments layered in paint, his “Noir” collages are gritty, autobiographical artifacts which invite the viewer to decipher and decode their history and meaning.

There will be an opening reception for Eastman’s Night from Day: The Noir Collage Series on Thursday, August 3rd from 5-7p.m. and the show will remain on view through August 29th.  The gallery is located at 51 Green Street, Middletown, CT.  Summer gallery hours are Mon.-Thurs. 9am-5pm and Fri. 9am-3p.m.

Cassia Cogger harnesses the inherent simplicity and harmony of the circle as a means for personal storytelling and for connecting with the inner self.  She is the author of the newly published, Creating Personal Mandalas: Story Circle Techniques in Watercolor and Mixed Media, where she shares exercises in self-exploration via the endless possibilities of creating within the circle.  Cogger heralds the circle as the most basic of shapes– one that can open your heart, lead you back to your center, and ultimately, give rise to your authentic voice.

During the opening reception on Thursday, June 1, 2017, Cogger will lead a free personal mandala workshop from 5:30-6:30p.m.  The exhibit will run from June 1-July 26 with an opening reception in conjunction with Middletown ArtWalk evening on June 1 from 5-7p.m.

The gallery’s regular summer viewing hours are Monday through Thursdays from 9a.m.-5p.m. and Fridays from 9a.m to noon.

Our Discovery AfterSchool Instructors share stories from their classes in this guest blog series Discovery AfterSchool Stories. For more information on our AfterSchool Program, please visit – http://wesleyan.edu/greenstreet/youth/afterschool.html.

Musical Storytelling
By: Anna Flurry

A drum machine sets up a rhythm as students take turns playing along on their instruments and making their own beatboxing sounds. “We were working on our blues song,” says Mr. Peter Van Siclen, teacher for the Musical Storytelling class. “They’ve written a blues song where they tell the story of a school day and the funny moments in it.” As a reward for finishing the blues song, the students got to make up their own beat with the drum machine. In terms of the class overall, Mr. Peter says, “They’ve been really creative and done way more than I expected. They did their own original song about a shark-eating whale that lost its saxophone and then used a mermaid to help find it! And then they did their own drawings and made a movie putting that all together.”

In addition to Musical Storytelling, Mr. Peter is teaching BoomWhackers and African Drumming at Green Street this semester. He has been working here for several years and says of the program, “I think the variety of options for the kids is incredible… I love seeing the overlap between dance and music and art and how the kids get to blend it all together and go from one to the other each day.”

Next semester, Mr. Peter is looking forward to teaching more classes that let the students be creative using music. into adding a class on film scoring, as well as a found instruments class. Keep a lookout for next semester’s classes!

 

Dan is a professor of photography at Manchester Community College. His exhibit “Natural Selection” is a modern-day photographic homage to the Cabinet of Curiosities.  The images are larger than life and highly detailed, presenting cultural artifacts and natural objects often in juxtaposition, featuring, among other things, insects, plants, skeletal remains, and other material “selected from nature.”

 

 

 

 

 

Join us for the opening reception on Thursday, April 20th from 6-8 p.m.

The exhibit will run from April 20-May 24.  The gallery’s regular viewing hours are Monday through Fridays from 9a.m.-3p.m.

Our Discovery AfterSchool Instructors share stories from their classes in this guest blog series Discovery AfterSchool Stories. For more information on our AfterSchool Program, please visit – http://wesleyan.edu/greenstreet/youth/afterschool.html.

By: Peter Van Siclen

In musical storytelling we have been playing live music behind books, recording sound tracks on the computer, and writing original story songs. In the beginning of the year we wrote a blues telling a silly story of an average school day. Since then we have been practicing the original song by stamping, clapping, and singing. Not only are we practicing keeping a steady beat, singing together as a group, and learning the blues form, but we’re having fun doing it!

We are continuing to practice this blues, finish recording the soundtrack to “Frog Goes to Dinner” and complete our original whale tale, complete with GarageBand compositions and illustrations.

Our Discovery AfterSchool Instructors share stories from their classes in this guest blog series Discovery AfterSchool Stories. For more information on our AfterSchool Program, please visit – http://wesleyan.edu/greenstreet/youth/afterschool.html.

By: Peter Van Siclen

In Boomwhackers we have been combining the sound of tuned plastic tubes with stomping dance moves to create harmonic beats. The class has created a robotic routine where individual students introduce the beat and the rest of the class “powers up” to join them. Our most challenging song this semester has been playing the Star Wars theme while pretending the Boomwhackers are musical light sabers. The class is learning to work as a team to make music together, and they are even trying to throw in some showy spin and twirl moves, too!

Green Street is looking for a Wesleyan Student with strong content understanding of mathematics and an interest in education. The Intel Math Internship is 8 weeks (June 26 – August 18, 2017) and full time (40 hours a week). The pay is $4,000 for the full internship.

Intel Math is an intense math course for K-8 teachers. The Intel Math Intern will assist with an Intel Math course this summer (July 10 – 21) and then use that experience along with guided research to develop classroom materials for teachers. These materials will be posted on a State website for broad access.

This is the general overview of the Intel Math Internship — regular check ins with Intel Math instructors and Green Street team are required. Much of the work, outside assisting with the Intel Math course, can be done independently. We can offer space at Green Street or the Intern can work within the common spaces in the Exley Science Center.

Week 1:    Overview of a) Intel Math content, b) Common Core Mathematics Standards and Practices,

1. c)  State-vetted mathematics lesson plans and classroom activities website.

• Get familiar with Common Core Practices and “cluster” focus areas for each grade level of Common Core Standards
• Get familiar with the State e-Quip rubric for mathematics classroom materials
• Research existing classroom activities and lesson plans available via the State for examples of what makes a rigorous activity

Weeks 2-3:    Assist with Intel Math course with guidance from instructors Leidy and Keazer.

Interact with teachers in course to get familiar with their needs in the classroom.

Weeks 4-5:    Research materials for Intel Math topics of interest (TBD) that can be vetted for use

on the State website using the State rubric as a guide.

Weeks 6-8:    Developing a set of lesson plans and classroom activities for teachers in Intel Math topics

areas of interest (TBD)

• Include clear connections to Common Core Standards (“clusters”), Common Core Practices, and appropriate grade levels
• Include something on the topic for each grade level K-8 even if it is simply how it relates to the progression of content (for example – you’re not teaching fractions in kindergarten but you are setting a foundation for fractions in higher grades)
• Include a student work analysis for targeted grade levels

Intern must be reliable, self-directed, and have regular internet access to complete independent research. Intern should have strong math skills and an interest in education; experience with K-8 students is preferred. Interested Wesleyan students should email the following to Green Street Director, Sara MacSorley (smacsorley@wesleyan.edu), by May 1, 2017:

1) cover letter expressing interest and explaining why this internship would be a good fit,

specifically  listing the last mathematics course taken in college

2) a resume

3) contact information for a Wesleyan professor who has agreed to be a reference and can speak   directly about the candidate’s mathematical ability

Our Discovery AfterSchool Instructors share stories from their classes in this guest blog series Discovery AfterSchool Stories. For more information on our AfterSchool Program, please visit – http://wesleyan.edu/greenstreet/youth/afterschool.html.

By: Anna Flurry

The Time Traveler’s Club began the AfterSchool semester with a trip to ancient Egypt!! The kids got to learn about the Nile, the pyramids, scribes, and hieroglyphics, and best of all, they got to take a trip on the fantastic time machine that Instructor Aidan made from scratch. The students have already told us about several different places that they want to go next, including Mexico, Puerto Rico, and China! Who knows, maybe the mysterious riddle in the time traveler chest will take us to one of those places next week…