Saturday, January 29, 2011

When in Rome....


We have had an unusual amount of both snow, and snow days here in Nashville.  I decided to roll with it, and have my 3rd graders make simple line drawings of winter landscapes.  They had to use size and placement to show Foreground, Middle Ground and Background.  Then, we carved them into foam trays, and pulled prints.  I chose white ink, with dark paper to not only give a wintry feel to the prints, but to review the idea of Contrast with the class.  I think they turned out great and because we kept it simple, we had time to focus on the printmaking process, so that we got clear, bright prints.

Thursday, January 27, 2011

Snowbird visits... by accident





OK, I look forward to a visit from Snowbird as much as everybody else, but today, he showed up unannounced.  Seems he was supposed to be at another school in the area, and showed up at our school instead.  The kindergarten students had so much fun, and I had them right after, and figured, if you can't beat em, join em.  We were going to do winter landscapes with textural details anyway so instead of doing trees, houses, etc, I decided to go with it, and let them make penguins in the snow.  What fun- and not too shabby for a last minute switch up.

Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Tints- by K




Believe it or not- these are my "Kinder-Babes".  Before Christmas, they were so young, it was so hard to get anything completed.  I think... knock on wood, that maturity may be setting in a bit.  Look at them, with a paint palette (ok, a paper plate) mixing their tints, and NOT mixing all colors together.  They do an art teacher proud some days.  We did a simple landscape, working on the concept of the horizon line, and different sizes showing distance.  I had them trace their pencil lines so that they could really focus on where to put paint, but also wanted to reinforce the concept of outlining, and lines for structure.  Plus, a little work on the fine motor skills never hurts at this age.  Then, they mixed tints, and used them to paint their winter scene.

Freedom



It is Black History Month, and I thought a fitting way to bring that into the art room with my 4th graders would be a lesson on Freedom and Oppression.  After a class discussion on the difference between the two, we paired up and traced our "Profiles".  I had the students work together to trace their partners.  Then, I showed Marc Chagall's " I and the Village" and we talked about Profiles, Abstraction, and the idea of using color for expressive reasons.  I had the students take their profiles, and add images/words of things that represented freedom.  Be it the freedom to listen to whatever music, or eat whatever food, or have whatever friends.  I gave them freedom of choice as to how they would abstract/change their images.  This was a drawing lesson, and we did not spend a great deal of time on it, but I think the students enjoyed it very much, and I'm loving the results.

Thursday, January 6, 2011

My MInd is Reeling!

So- while all my other art teacher friends went back to school this week, I am at home, on the tail end of recovering from a herniated disc.  Knowing this was coming, I brought things home so that multi-tasking me would not go crazy sitting in the house.  I have this bucket of Animals.  My students are K-4, and like me, they love a good toy.  My initial thought was that this would make for some great drawing projects.  My kids (like me) love to get messy, but want instant results.  This makes drawing projects hard, because they have to focus for a little longer.  I was thinking that this would give them something to look at, and hold, forcing some attention to details, and the thought also occurred to me that a fantasy lesson could easily spring from this.  So- here's my questions... if you had a bucket of animals, and group of elementary students, what types of projects would you cook up?