Bee Mural

My last session of art club helped me to jazz up the art room. We are the Baird Bees, so I thought why not paint the drab white walls with some school spirit. I used an overhead projector to project the bee image for my kiddos to trace. They painted and did a great job! I love how it looks...now the art room looks a little more arty!

Giant Flowers

I found this on Pinterest originally, but it was linked to someone's blog. (I forget who's, sorry!) I made these with art club to help decorate for our spring concert coming up. They turned out so awesome! Bigger is better!

Papa Get Me The Moon

2nd graders watched the video story of Papa Get Me, by Eric Carle. The first day we painted the background paper two types of blue and then used paint scrapers to scratch in a design. I also took their photograph this day, of them pretending to climb a ladder. The following class they cut out moon and stars from silver and gold paper. They then created a ladder by gluing tooth picks down their paper to their moon. The last step was to cut out their photograph and glue themselves climbing the ladder to the moon.

ROYGBIV Yarn Painting

1st graders learned about the color spectrum of the rainbow. I showed them this really cute music video to introduce the project. The link is below. We created the rainbow by glueing down string. It was a little messy and challenging at first, but they got it after the first color. They also made the magical elf ROY G BIV in the corner of the rainbow with his magic rainbow wand. They were so cute. I had so many students ask me if ROY G BIV was real. Of course I told them yes, how else do we get rainbows?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gf33ueRXMzQ&feature=player_embedded&safety_mode=true&persist_safety_mode=1

Flying Pigs

I borrowed this art lesson from my friend over at Artolazzi! I needed one last fun project for my adaptive art class. So we made the flying pigs. They turned out so cute. And the kiddos did great with the paper mache part. A few of my kids are very sensory and hate touching sticky or wet things. It was so cool to see them try though, two of my boys just put their hands on top of mine or their aids to help paper mache. It was awesome to see them try and to adapt to the project.

Dream Catchers

Third graders learned about the Ojibwe Nation and the purpose of Dream Catchers. We used hangers for the hoops, wrapped them in yarn, used yarn for the web, and then decorated with beads and feathers.

Oneida Clay Pots

My second graders made pinch pots with our Artist in Resident. Our artist, (from the Oneida Nation), talked about the designs that are important to her people. She discussed water symbols, the sky dome, hearts, and the turtle symbol. I was on maternity leave last year when this group did clay, so this was a great review on pinch pots and clay techniques. I tried a new way of coloing the clay after it was fired. We used oil pastels first to color, then painted them black with tempera paint. After a few days I washed the paint off and coated them all in Modge Podge and glitter gloss. They turned out awesome.

Onieda Nation Clay Turtles

This was another project done with my artist in resident from the Oneida Nation Native American Tribe. The first day students concentrated only on building techniques. We really emphasized quality craftsmanship in making the pinch pot, and using proper attachment techniques when attaching the limbs and head. The second day the artist talked about the different symbolism used in Oneida artwork Students were to incorporate those designs onto the shell of the turtle. The turtle represents great importance in the Oneida culture. There are 3 different clans in the Oneida, Wolf, Bear, and Turtle. Our artist was from the Turtle clan. The Oneida also refer to North America as Turtle Island...there is a great story that goes along with this that our artist told my classes while they worked. To summarize it, the story tells of how Sky Woman fell from the sky onto Earth which was all water at the time. She landed on a turtle that saved her. She danced and spinned on the turtle's back and as she did this the turtle's shell began to grow and grow and grow until it became a vast land- North America.

Corn Husk Dolls

My school was lucky enough to have an artist in resident for two weeks during the month of April.She is a working artist from the Oneida Nation, Native American Tribe. Not only did my classes make great art projects, but they also got a cultural lesson on the history of the Oneida People.

Third graders learned the story of the Iroquois Corn Husk Doll told orally by the artist. (She also provided little cards with the story on it to attach to the dolls once we were done making them. The first day we built the dolls.Some of the knot tying is a little hard for the third graders, but everyone was able to finish building the first day. The second day we made clothes for them with scrap fabric, added hair, and other accessories, like feathers, belts, gemstones, and braiding the hair. They turned out great!