CLIPCO - Cupertino Language Immersion Program Community Organization

  • CLIP Art

About CLIP Art

CLIP Art is a language/cultural enrichment art class funded by parents’ direct donations to CLIPCO.  CLIP students get CLIP Art (taught in Mandarin), as well as regular art (taught in English, and funded by parents’ donations to PTA).  CLIP Art is taught once a month, and each class is 1 ½ hour long.  The class structure is comprised of presentation, discussion, application and debriefing.

Each month our CLIP Art teachers, Ms. Chwen Lim, Ms. Phoebe Kao and Ms. Karen Tseng, show the students a presentation on a different artist or art form.  The teachers make sure to tie in elements from the students’ curriculum, such as language arts, geography, science, history and social studies.  During the presentation, a lively dialogue in Mandarin almost always ensues! 

For example, in April 2009 we compared a contemporary Chinese artist working in California to a contemporary abstract artist from New York as well as a traditional Chinese artist from 500 hundred years ago.  The students then created splash ink paintings using some of the contemporary Chinese artist’s methods as well as their own.  All the students, from kindergarten through eighth grade, were very enthusiastic about this project. 

At the end of each lesson, we have a verbal debriefing of the students’ experience, or, if time allows, the students write about it in Mandarin.  Throughout the lesson, students are encouraged to speak their mind, develop critical thinking, and express their creativity in their art. 

In the past, many CLIP Art pieces were exhibited in the Cupertino Union School District office and in the Martin Luther King Jr. Library in San Jose.  Several students’ works were also selected for the Santa Clara County Office of Education’s permanent art collection.

Here is a sample of CLIP Art projects from the last few years:

  • Plum Blossom Finger Painting – combines poetry and Chinese painting style
  • Flour Dough Pigs and Cardboard Pig Sty – traditional folk art
  • Tree Sketchbook – observe different types of trees, and learn the many ways to use lines to sketch
  • Dragon Class Banner –  learn the symbolisms embedded in a dragon
  • Calligraphy – students create new Chinese characters and giving them meaning
  • Roses in the Salad – Using cross-sections of Chinese vegetables to create flower prints
  • Mouse Bride – sewing Chinese fragrant pouches in the shapes of the characters in “Mouse Bride”
  • Calligraphy – writing 100 Fu (Blessing), Lu (Prosperity) and Shou (Longevity) characters in zhuan style
  • Chinese Peasant Painting – Learn traditions and the meaning of colors through peasant paintings
  • Native American Symbols – using dough to tell stories
  • Frog Painting – learn about frogs and how our environment is affecting them, combines poetry and brush painting
  • Story Snail – Puppet-making using recycled materials; 3rd grade students staged a puppet show
  • Splash Ink Paintings – experiment with ink, water, color, detergent and salt, then create details with a fine brush; students also create their own seals and inscribe their paintings
  • Celebration of Dragon Boat Festival – students learned the story of Chinese poet Qu Yuan, sewed fragrant pouches in the shape of a rice dumpling and learned how to wrap a real, edible, rice dumpling

We look forward to doing many more interesting projects with the students in the upcoming year!

 

Copyright 2008