Students from across the Newhall School District got to show off their art pieces, and some had the chance to show parents how hard they’ve been working in theater production, at last week’s Celebration of the Arts held at Newhall Elementary School.
Families were greeted at the door by the district’s art teachers, Usha Penrose and Naomi Keltz-Jones, who said they have helped students in grades three through six get better acquainted with the arts.
“We like to introduce the children to as many mediums as possible,” Penrose said. “So, as you walk through the gallery, you’re going to see all kinds of mediums ranging from chalk pastel to watercolor paints. We do foil embossing.”
Keltz-Jones added that each grade level has a series of lessons and the two teachers try to incorporate art history into the lessons. Students learn about famous artists and their styles as well as the different art movements throughout the years.
“Our lessons are not only aligned to learning about art lessons connected to art history,” Penrose said. “We often will do lessons related to other content areas. For example, sixth grade creates a drawing inspired by Roman sculpture because they study many of the ancient cultures.”
While families were searching the hallways for the art pieces their children made, some were in the Newhall Family Theatre being entertained by theater students. The Walnut Street Players, made up of Newhall Elementary students, put on “The Cheetah and the Sloth,” while the fifth-grade bell choir played some familiar tunes, such as “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star” and the “Barney & Friends” theme song, and a group of Old Orchard Elementary sixth-graders performed a hip-hop dance routine.
George Chavez, co-director of the Walnut Street Players and a fifth-grade teacher at Newhall Elementary, said the drama club has two eight-week courses and each participant gets an ensemble shirt “so they would feel a part of the tribe.”
Each student dressed for their part, whether it was as one of the animals or as a newscaster, as the story of a cheetah racing a sloth was told as if it were a news event.
“Everyone was happy for one another with all their parts that they got and they realized that being an audience member was a lot of fun as well,” Chavez said.
There were some brief breaks in the action while Chavez reminded the students where they were and what was to come next.
“They completely got lost in areas, but they had a great attitude,” Chavez said. “They had the best desire to keep doing more. And so that was what it was about tonight.”
And while the event was meant to wrap up what the students have been learning throughout the year, Penrose and Keltz-Jones are excited to get back to work next year, when they will be adding the entire student body to their art lessons.
“Their brains need the break from doing things like math and language arts and science, to do something creative,” Keltz-Jones said. “So, it really recharges them and replenishes them to be able to be creative. And also with art, you find that there’s a lot of math in art, there’s a lot of science in art. And so it kind of reinforces what they’re learning, but in a different way.”
