Chaides Receives Innovation Grant

Marquez Elementary fourth-grade teacher Theresa Chaides received a $1,500 Lori Petrick Innovation Grant on June 2 from the Palisades Charter Schools Foundation to support her creative, hands-on approach to teaching.
Inspired by the old crate labels she repeatedly saw at antique stores and flea markets, the former advertising account manager created an orange crate art project for her students.
“I knew the crate labels, and I taught California history. So, I created the whole unit,” Chaides told the Palisadian-Post.
“I come from advertising, where there’s the primary sell and the secondary sell. What do you want to do, the fruit or the state? We talk a lot in class about advertising, and how the crates were an advertising piece for California.”
The students use a technique called rip art, which involves tearing sheets of paper into different sizes, and then gluing them down onto large sheets of paper. Chaides does an initial drawing and color key, and then it’s up to the students to make the images come to life by tearing and carefully gluing down the pieces.
This year’s design was Pacoast Brand fruit, and featured colorful mountains, orchards, the ocean with a sailboat, a pier and more.
Chaides divides her class into groups, and alternates the leaders, forcing everyone to take on different roles within their team. Each year’s crate label project is chosen according to what Chaides thinks the children will be able to manage, which is not only about artistic talent.
“It’s patience and concentration and how social they are, because sometimes the social aspect gets in the way of accomplishing anything.”
Early in the school year, the children make their own individual pieces, a precursor to the big group project towards the end of the year.
“It’s what we do to kind of Zen out,” she said. “The kids get to hang out with their friends for 20 minutes, and not worry about anything but tearing and gluing. They’re having a good time, and you can’t interrupt that.”
They are proud of their work, and Chaides says at open house the kids are excited to show their parents what they’ve done. The class works on the poster for about seven weeks, every other day. “I just love the teamwork and the ownership,” she said.
A California native, Chaides spent 12 years in advertising before changing careers, and has been at Marquez since 2000. She started doing the crate art project 10 years ago, coming up with the idea after studying at the Summer Institute at UCLA. The first one was on artist Diego Rivera, and it turned out so well that Chaides was “flabbergasted.”
She’s using $400 of the grant money to frame one of the pieces, which needs to be mounted on a special type of wood, on three panels.
During the summer, Chaides will continue to work on ways to get corporate sponsorship. Her goal would be to have a company like Sunkist sponsor one picture a year, and then hang the finished product in their lobby.
Chaides, who grew up in the Conejo Valley, went to Cal State Northridge for her undergraduate degree, and later for her teaching credential.
“I always knew I wanted to teach, but coming out of college at 22-23, I didn’t have that confidence,” Chaides said. “And so I went into business.
“It was good to come in as a second career; it’s so much more fulfilling. I’m a customer service person. Teaching is customer service too, you know—deliver the goods. I love it. It’s the greatest thing I ever did.”