Aaaaaaand we're back!

Sorry I haven't been posting as frequently. My school camera was stolen out of my classroom last year:( So it makes it more difficult to keep up with my blogging. But I'm so lucky to have a wonderful PTO at my school. They've given every teacher $250 of wish list money to spend on anything we want for our classroom. So I'll be getting a new camera very soon!! THANKS BAIRD PTO!

Holiday Crafting

I had to post this cute picture of me and my daughter working on her felt Christmas tree over the weekend. She's gonna be two on the first of the year and has already shown a lot of interest in art, YAY! She helped peel off the bar code stickers on the felt and then placed them all in piles for me. She's my little helper:)

Picasso's Guitars

Second graders learned about the artist Pablo Picasso. We discussed and looked at his artworks from the periods of his career: the Blue Period, the Rose Period, and Cubism. We also noticed that Picasso had a lot of musical things in his paintings. They looked at all different types of guitars and got to draw any type of they guitar they wanted and then painted them in with blue paint. They then added details using black and grey paper, and newspaper.
(I saw this project on Dali's Mustache blog, thank you:)

Van Gogh's Chair

Third graders learned Vincent Van Gogh through a short video. We looked at all the paintings that had his chair in them. We paid close attention to the special relationships between the legs of the chair and the corner of the room. The third graders did a pencil drawing first, then painted the drawing in with tempera paints. On the last day of the project, I gave them small paint brushes to do all the small details and outlining.

Kandinsky Portraits

First graders learned about the artist Wassily Kandinsky. We looked at all the lines and shapes in his artworks. They were able to point out all the different types of lines used in Kandinsky's artwork. They also learned about the difference between a line and shape. They drew 7 different types of lines and 5 shapes on their drawing paper. They then painted over it with water color. I took their photographs, they posed like they were pretending to shout. During their work time I had them come up to my computer and they told me 3 things about themselves that we turned into I statements. Their portraits are shouting all the wonderful things about themselves.
(I originally saw the portait part of this project on Pinterest)

Paper Mache Pumpkins

Fifth graders reviewed three dimensional shape. They made the paper mache pumpkins from recyclable materials- plastic grocery bags, old newspapers, and rubber bands. They covered the armature with two layers of paper mache. Then painted it with a glittery orange. Once dried, they added the lines with Sharpies.

Dragons Starting with a line of yarn

Mummies and Candy Corn

Spiders

Third graders learned the vocabulary word, concentric circles- circles that are inside other circles and are evenly spaced out. They gave several examples of concentric circles that they have seen on signs, in nature, and in everyday objects. Some that even I didn’t think of! First we drew concentric half circles then traced them with glue to make the spider’s web. Next we created a three dimensional spider using tinfoil. We painted in the spaces between our concentric half circles and the rest of the background using water colors, then hot glued our spiders to the web.

Different Perspective Trees

 

Fifth graders learned about two different types of perspective, worm’s eye and bird’s eye. Worm’s eye perspective is as if you were a worm looking up at the sky. Bird’s eye perspective is as if you were a bird looking down at the ground.

Fifth graders drew fall trees from a worm’s eye perspective. They used oil pastels for the tree trunks and leaves, paying close attention to blending techniques. They then painted the sky with water color. The fifth graders have a great “perspective” on their artwork!