Friday, December 18, 2009

Snow globe art



Each of the Wednesday classed created snowglobes this week using a great deal of imagination and a bit of plastic. (pictures from top 2nd, 1st, 3rd)

The 1st and 2nd grade used recycled yogurt/jello cups and paper bases. The 3rd grade used larger clear drink cups and recycled CDs for bases. They drew scenes and colored them, glued the scenes to the bases and added plastic snow.

The 2nd grade was able to use clay to make 3D figures for their globes. 1st grade used wadded tissue paper to make the snowmen 3D.


This project was able to bring out the creativity even in some of the most reluctant art participants. It also created a bit of OH, WOW from many as the base was attached to the top.
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After school group completes Vincent's boats


Amid the hustle of working on the history fair board, the after school art group was able to complete their watercolor painting of Vincent Van Gogh's boats on the beach. They spent 3 weeks on this to get it from a blank sheet of paper to the completed painting. They learned how to mix the paints to the right wetness for each stage of the painting. They created white space by not painting it. They learned a variety of techniques to get the paint onto the paper. Truely impressive!
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Friday, December 11, 2009

1st & 2nd Grades do multi-media numbers

The students were told to select their favorite number from 3-9 (my example was 7) and to draw it very large on the paper. They were then to divide the page from the number to the edge 5 or more times and use at least 3 media to make the picture. I supplied tissue paper, construction paper, cut-up old bookmarks, crayons and markers.

They show a lot of imagination and creativity. Some did 3D with the number behind a "secret door", rays coming off the sides of the page, and curry haired #8.

It was fun to find the numbers and hear about how they did their number. The 1st graders are at the top left, the second grade at the bottom right.
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Wednesday, December 9, 2009

Vincent's boats are getting color afterschool


Posted by PicasaThis week we started putting color on the boats and finishing the detail on this painting. We hope to be done next week. The students learned how to mix different concentrations of color and how to put 2 colors side by side without them mixing. We did not use a resist but painted wet-on-dry with great results. Some of the students will refine their masts next week as a few lost proportion in the drawings.

4th grade takles water color technique

We took a step back this week to work on technique before finishing the water color picture. Water colors are not an intuitive medium and need a bit of practice to see how they work. The students were to work step by step and use 3-4 colors wet-in-wet and wet-to-dry. They discovered that water on the paper creates a barrier between wet and dry paper, tipping the paper helps colors to run into one another and make new colors, the water does the work if you let it, putting more water next to a color will cause it to move. All in all it was a good lesson and one that turned out well.
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Candles for the Kindergarten

This seemed a challenging project but everyone was able to complete it and proudly display their candles. We started discussing heat and light and were able to handle a battery candle to see that there was "cool" light. We were unable to observe the electric "candlelight" for more than a few seconds as it blew its bulb.
The project is made from TP tubes and tissue paper. The students had to cut the top 1" with scissors vertically then fold down all the flaps. We then used glue stick to glue down the flaps making the top of the candle. While one of the helpers cut wicks from black paper the students folded yellow tissue paper to make the flame. We glued that over the wick leav
ing a little at the bottom for "feet" and added a red center to our flame from another piece of tissue. We flattened the feet out and attached the wick to the top of the candle and had our "Oh wow" moment.
Lots of smiles on this one. We ran out of time to decorate the outside of the candle but a couple of students nabbed a strand of tissue paper and had it wrapped around in a flash!
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Sunday, December 6, 2009

2nd grade learns how watercolors work

It was hard and scary to let the paper do the painting but for the kids who let themselves go, it was an OH, WOW moment. We started with painting with water to wet the page. Almost no one got the paper wet enough the first time. We did a simple landscape with a tree, sky, sun and some ground. Quite a few of them really let the water and paper do the work and had great results. We did not get to use other elements like salt today butr we will.
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3rd grade completes prayer rugs


At long last the 3rd grade was able to complete their prayer rugs complete with tassles. Each student worked hard designing the pattern, marking it onto the surfaces, painting the design, then making tassles and sewing them on. They did a remarkable job on this from start to finish and wanted to celebrate by immediately putting them into use. You can see the tassles in the bottom right of the picture.
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1st grade does fractions and art to make a picture

The first grade spent this week creating art from Ed Emberley's Picture pie: a cut and paste drawing book while reviewing their fractions. We did 6-8 of the figures from the book using 1/2, 1/4, and 1/8 circles in a variety of colors. The class then could create their own picture from one of the examples or using their imaginations. What a great result we got. Several took a look at other pages and found pictures we had not made. Some needed to cut the pie pieces into smaller slivers to achieve thier picture. We are glad the Wells Branch Library has great books for us to use in class.
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