Galaxy forest animals

Although I've been blissfully off on maternity leave for almost a year, every so often I get an idea for an art lesson that I just need to try now.

I was scrolling through Pinterest one night in December and came across this photo. It spoke to me - outer space paired with art? Who did I know that taught grade 6? More importantly, who could watch my kids so I could go play art teacher? I needed to do this lesson, fast. The next afternoon I was in my friend's classroom, armed with an idea and...not much else. Luckily this lesson is very low prep. You'll need:

• black construction paper
• white cardstock
• an assortment of paints (we went with red, blue, green, and white.)
• paintbrushes and sponges

 To start, give your students a sheet of white cardstock (8.5x11 is a good size.) I did a demonstration on the board of how to draw three different animals - a bear, a wolf and a deer. I personally found the deer the easiest to draw, followed by the wolf and the bear. Clearly the kids disagreed with me, as most opted for the wolf . The most important instruction here is to keep your animal BIG and to anchor it to the bottom of the paper. I had to remind some kids not to do floating animal heads.

After the animal is drawn on the white cardstock, cut it out carefully. Then, PUT THE WHITE PAPER AWAY! Oh goodness, put it away. If not, I promise you someone will paint on it or rip it or color on it or SOMETHING and then you'll have to find another white paper and the student will have to restart and then you'll have to stay in at recess while they finish. Or maybe that's just what happens when you haven't taught in a year.

The next part of this super simple activity is painting the galaxy. I actually did a lesson on how to paint nebulas here and the idea is very similar. Students can use big brushes or sponges to sponge color on in circular motions until they're VERY faded, then build on them with more colors until they have a dreamy, cloudlike look to their paper. The most important part is not to oversaturate the paper with color. We're talking light coats of paint, all over the paper until it's covered.

After that, it's splatter time! Kids will love this. Teachers and custodians will not. Use a small brush to gently splatter stars all over the black paper.

Now, put the black paper aside to dry.

*Here's where a bit of planning and perspective comes in. You know what would make more sense? Paint the black paper first, THEN do the drawing and cutting on the white paper. Hindsight, 20/20 and all that.*

Once your black paper is completely dry, glue the white paper over top and you're done! This project could be modified in SO many ways. I plan to try it with my toddler, letting her paint the background paper and I will draw and cut the animal in white. So many possibilities!

Have you tried this project? Please link me in the comments!

The world's best grade 6 grad portraits!

These are my FAVORITE!! For grade 6 grad, our school always does some kind of self portrait project with the students. Last year, we did pop art style self portraits. This year, using an idea I adapted from The Lost Sock Blog, students made avatars on www.faceyourmanga.com, which they printed and used as references to draw their portraits onto cardboard.

Just to give some perspective on how big they are:

Here's a quick summary of the way we did it:

• design an avatar using faceyourmanga.com, and print it out
• draw the avatar onto cardboard, using pencil
• trace all pencil in Sharpie (this is a must - even though it will get covered in paint, you need to have dark lines to see them again after you've painted on them!)
• paint with tempera paint (use acrylic for whites and light colors so that they show up well!)
• wait until paint is dry, then retrace your Sharpie lines
• use chalk pastel to add detail (cheek color, highlights in hair, shading around nose and chin, etc.)
• cut out using Exacto knife

Voila!

I just love them. Cardboard was an amazing surface to work on - it soaks up the paint beautifully and gives rich, inspiring color. I love them!

Three more weeks left of school! Many changes ahead, I can't wait to share them all here!!

Junior Kindergarten - Spring Chicks (Easter)

This project is so sweet it kills me.I first saw these spring chicks here, and decided to give them a try with my junior kindergartens. I just LOVE how they turned out!!

This project took two separate days to complete. On day one, students sponged yellow tempera paint to make the chicks bodies on blue paper. The next day, students used black Sharpie to make legs and eyes, and orange marker to make beaks and hair.

I showed students how to make their chicks look in different directions. Some chose to make their chicks all looking forward, some chose to have them all looking up, and some just had them looking wherever!

They're just sooooooooooooo cute!

Robots - Grade 5/6

About 2 weeks ago, our school was setting up to do our big talent show. A HUGE portion of my class was in the show, and missed a morning of classes to practice. Since I only had about 10 kids left of my class of 34, I came up with a last minute art idea - Robot paintings! I had seen a lesson here a while back, and always had it in the back of my mind.

This lesson was incredibly last minute (I didn't realize my kids would be away that morning) so I had very little prepared for it. We did a discussion about features of robots - what is typical to see, how to draw a curved line (with little attached pieces that gradually curve.) Students were allowed to go in whatever direction they wanted.

To paint them, they used silver tempera paint. Following that, they used white and blue paint to shade the robots. This was a great lesson in gradation, and helped them make their robots 3D.

Once they had dried for a bit, students outlined them in Sharpie and added final details. For the finishing touch, they shaded the exterior portion using grey pencil crayons. This was a PERFECT last minute lesson!

Warm & cool peacocks - grade 2/3

 

This is an amazing project that I found on SmART Class. Ever since I saw it in March, I have been dying to try it out. Here's how we did it.

Day 1: Students were given 2 sheets of paper, one large (11x17) and one small (8.5x11). They had to paint one of the papers with warm colors, and one with cool colors. Students also had to paint their hand (black, with red tips and an orange thumb) and stamp it onto a new sheet of paper. They used black paint to touch up any parts that didn't stamp well, and to draw the neck.

Day 2: Students used a tracer to trace their feathers (5 of them) on their large sheet. The small sheet was cut into circles, which were glued onto the feathers. I made a photo copy of an eye shape, and students got to color it with oil pastels and cut it out.They added white feathers to their peacock hand, and colored a line through the beak with pastels. 

Almost all of the kids were done within the two hour period. 

I LOVE THEM! So hard to believe these were done by 2nd and 3rd grade students!

Birdhouses - grade 2

This is a one day project that I did with my 2nd graders. The weather was beautiful, and I felt inspired by the birds outside. Working off a lesson I found at Deep Space Sparkle, I guided the students through a drawing lesson and showed them how to paint their birdhouse sticks so that they would appear "3-D".

Students started by drawing the birdhouses on large construction paper, using pencil. They worked hard on certain details, like the little perch for the bird, to make it look 3-D.

When they were done drawing, they painted in the stick, mixing brown with white and black to give a gradient effect.

After, they painted the birdhouse however they wanted! Some took the time to add in clouds and grass, and one student even colored the sky in the background!

When they were finished with that, they used scraps of paper, from a grade 2/3 classes non-objective art projects back in November, to trace cute little birds which they glued onto their artwork.

Kinder-lions

 

This is a lesson that I adapted from this site. I did it with Kinders, and I'm pretty happy with how it turned out! They worked hard for two thirty minute periods to mak these lions. They mixed paint, washed brushes, and outlined their drawings. It was a lot of hard work, but they turned out great!

 

Peeking polar bear art - Junior Kindergarten

Cute, one hour art project I did with Junior Kindergarten students! I saw something similar to this idea on Pinterest, but I cant seem to find it again - I find Pinterest's search feature can be really unreliable... anyone else have this problem? Once I dig it up, I'll edit this post.

Basically, students drew the bear using Sharpie. They painted a separate piece of paper with cool colored Tempera pucks, then cut out the bear and glued them on (the tempera paint takes about 10 minutes to dry, so we did it all in one period!) When they were done, they used crayons to draw snowflakes (which to me look like fireworks!)

LOVE THE TEETH!

Grade 6 Tipis (Teepees?)

This past week, my grade 6's made Tipis! We are currently studying First Nations of Canada, and we were learning about what people used to live in. I remembered that I had meters and meters of a thick, canvas like fabric. So the next day, I brought everything in and we got to work!

In the computer lab, we researched various First Nation's drawings and symbols, and students used a blank template to draw up an idea of what they wanted to put on their Tipi. Then, they cut out  their Tipi shape using a template I found here. Using Sharpies and paint, they colored in their designs. When they were finished, they used four pieces of plasticine (how authentic) and arranged 4 twigs in a Tipi shape (I think traditionally three were used as a base, but we needed four for support.)



Using thin wire, they attached the sticks together. They fit the Tipi shape to their sticks, then gently removed it so they could lightly stitch it together. When it was all stitched, they slid it over the sticks, and their Tipi was DONE!
Students with extra time were allowed to use the materials in the class to make decorations - firepits, paths, and log stacks. Many of them told me it was their favorite art project we've ever done, and we did it all using stuff I already had in my class. I'm so proud!

Cooool Giraffes - grade 3/4

Back to work today! It went so well, and it was great seeing the kids again. Since I'm still playing catch up, here's a project I did in early December, with a grade 3/4 class. I was inspired by this post but changed it a bit to study cool colors, which goes well with grade 3 curriculum.

We did a group draw of the giraffe - I gave them a piece of paper with only the nose drawn on it, which ended up ended up being the best thing ever. All of the giraffes ended up being similar but different, with the same dimensions. When they were done the giraffe, they painted them with cool watercolors.

Next, they painted a plain piece of white paper using cool tempera colors and silver glitter paint. When everything was dry the next class, they cut out the giraffes and glued them to the background. Then, they added details, like hats, necklaces, earrings, and sunglasses, to make the giraffes look "cool"-er.

LOVE how these turned out!

Also just a mini celebration - today marks the most views my blog has had in a single day! And it's only 5pm! Very inspiring. Thanks to everyone who continues to visit and follow the blog!

Junior Kindergarten - Adorable grinning pumpkin art

I am REALLY enjoying teaching junior kindergarten art! The kids are so good at following directions, and pretty much everything they do turns out adorably. This project was great, save for the fact that we weren't all able to finish (some paintings weren't dry within the one hour period, so we couldn't glue on the teeth and eyes.)

Enjoy these pumpkins, inspired by artsy_t on flickr!