Eric Carle, lots of paint, and Kindergarten

Eric Carle is a well known author and illustrator, especially among the younger set.  We watched the video, "Eric Carle, Picture Writer" in class, and then used his methods to create our own collages.  I like how he just makes decorative papers without an image in his head.  He just makes them, and later pulls the sheets he needs to create the image. 

After I cover the room in paper (this is one messy project), I set up for stations to create the colorful papers.  The girls splatter-painted, rolled, scratched, and stamped their hearts out.  They loved it!

 

 

You can see the mess!  During the next two class sessions, they girls cut out shapes for their collage and glued them onto large pieces of paper. 

 



Working on the floor was easier for most of the girls.

 

 



 The one above was one of my favorites!  I loved the rhythm of the snakes!  They are large as well, she used the entire page.  Wonderful!

 

 I loved the ears on the animal on the right!

Using the prints to make a book 1st Grade

The first graders made styrofoam prints of a cityscape, as I posted earlier.  I went through their prints and selected one from each student, which I mounted and then displayed on the boards near their room.  The comments regarding the prints have been awesome! 

The next time the girls came to art, I gave them all of their prints back, from 5 to 25 prints per students. Some were quite prolific! They selected at least 4 prints and mounted them on white copy paper, and then signed the print. There are 4 students at each table, so they kept one print and gave one to each person at their table. If they were so inspired, they could mount more and hand those out to other students. They took two pieces of 9 x 12 construction paper and drew a cover on one sheet. After they were done, they assembled all the prints in the order they wanted, added the cover and back pages, and then I stapled them together.

As you can see, there were lots of prints and activity as the girls selected their prints and mounted them.

 

 

 One of the covers finished, some used "art" as the theme, a few liked the "city print" theme for their book.

And then the final book.  I let them take them home that day.  The parents get to see their own students' work as well as others.  It also is a great way to use the printing process in a practical way, a good reason for having multiple images.

They were very proud and excited about showing off their books!

 

Kindergarten and Primer Art Exhibit and Reception

We are blessed with a gallery area at my school.  Once a year, the lower school has an exhibit.  The kindergarten and primer girls have an annual exhibit with an artist reception.  It is like the real deal.  I pick a theme, we do several projects based on the theme, and the girls pick one item to be displayed.  This year the them was "Animals".  The owls they girls made from clay were so amazing that I made a tree and displayed those as well.  So, this year, each girl had two items.  Here are just a few pictures from the reception.  Enjoy!

 

Printing with 1st Grade

Printing is such a great process for kids.  They can take one image and manipulate it in so many different ways.  If it does not work, try something different!  It is quite demanding on the art teacher, but for the sake of art, I do it!! I have these two classes for 1 and 1/2 hours once a week.  They printed the entire class.  They were so engaged. 

We looked at lots of city skyline photographs and artwork on the internet.  They drew a cityscape on paper and then transfered it to the foam piece.  After tracing the picture, I have them go back and make each indentation deeper.  Then we ink up the plate.

 

 

After inking, they move to a clean area, top with paper and rub.  The look when they first pull the print is priceless... and the woooooowwwww!  Love it!

I give them opportunities for experimentation.  The one below was printed on some sort of tie dye patterned paper.  It gave the lines a little extra color.

I cut up tissue paper, and some other kinds, and they use glue stick to put on a blank sheet of paper.  We tried regular glue once, but the papers did not stick enough by the time they printed.  Even with glue stick, pulling the print can get tricky.  This class got into wadding up the tissue and printing on that!  Maybe not a clear print, but some cool results anyway!

The girl who did the print above wanted to do a Pompeii cityscape, with the volcano and all.  Yep she is in first grade.

They think that they invented inking up half the plate in one color and the other side another color.  After a while, they had so many different things going on that the prints became a little cluttered. 

An art teachers dream, students so excited an into their art work.  Love this job!

Some 8th Grade work....vessels.

Here are some pictures of vases made by my current 8th grade students.  They are made with white low fire clay slabs around rolled up newspapers.  The students added to the surface and included textures.  The vases were glazed with Amaco gloss glazes to make them waterproof. 

The girls created some wonderful pieces.

  

The textures on the fish came out well on the above right vase.  The orange glaze was beautiful on the one on the left.

The vase to the right, the big flower, gave the artist a lot of trouble during construction and glazing.  However, she persevered and ended up with a wonderful vase.  The other vase has a variety of textures on the coils. 

This one carries the jacket theme quite well. 



 

The vases above turned out so well.  The one of the right kind of fell into an organic shape, and the student continued with it.  She added some wonderful textures on the "leaves".  The blue one has a speckled glaze.  To coat the inside of the vessel, she put masking tape all around the outside of the vase and then poured the glaze in.  What great problem solving!



 

 

The two above are marvelous, with contrast between textues and colors.  

"I Want My Hat Back" in 1st grade

 

In 1st grade we read "I Want My Hat Back" by Jon Klassen.  As we learned about the bear looking for his hat, we noted the textures and the use of red to emphasize certain items in the book.  We also discussed the use of animals doing human things in books, and why that would be done.  Some other books that used animals were also looked at.    I got the idea for this from Mrs. Knight's Smartest Artists blog, here.

 

 

The elephant above broke his student chair while the lion was teaching!  The artist used yellow to emphasize the broken chair!

 

The snake is taking a bubble bath.  I guess the artist wanted to emphasize the red rubber duck!

 



Snowmen.... when it is 80 degrees!

 

Yep, it is December 4th and 80 degrees in Dallas.......

 

 

Let's make snowmen!!!  The Prekindergarten girls drew a snowman picture with Sharpie Markers, and then painted them with white paint.  The next class, the used oil pastels to add details, redraw noses, or add more snow.  I think I made these when I was little.. a throwback I guess!