Papier Mâché Birds (This Years' Version)

I just wanted to post a couple of pictures of the current Grade 3 class' papier mâché birds. I posted my original lesson last year here. Again, thanks to Julie at Art for Small Hands who inspired this project in the first place.

The Grade 3 classes from last year are still talking about their little birds, and this new crop of Grade 3s started asking me at the beginning of school if they would be able to make them. So here they are again. For some reason, it seemed as though this group needed much more support in making their bird bodies than the previous ones. For the few weeks that it took to make these (3-4 double classes) I felt like I was running here and there all over the room helping with a head, or a beak, or some droopy wings-but again, they were worth it.

They only change I made to the original lesson was to use bendable electrical wire for the bird feet-as the floral wire was so difficult for the students to bend themselves. It was great because more of them were able to do this part independently.  

Poppy Fields for Remembrance Day

This week, Grade 3 painted these poppy landscapes in honour of Remembrance Day. They were inspired by a lesson I saw on Artsonia here.

Students began with a tempera wash for the sky, then began adding poppies, starting at the bottom of the page going from large size to small size (little red dots). (I reviewed the concept of foreground, middle ground, and background at this point.) Black dots were then painted in the flowers and oil pastel was used for the grass, additional flowers, and clouds.

O'Keefe-Inspired Glue Line Flowers

Magnification is one of the image development strategies that I need to cover in my Grade 6 art curriculum. Georgia O'Keefe's flowers are, of course, great for teaching this concept, but I was getting bored of all of the variations on the close-up flower lesson.

For this lesson, students chose a flower photograph or a silk flower to study and then made a simple close-up drawing of it in their sketchbook. Using Elmer's Gel Glue (my new favourite glue!) they drew their flower on a large piece of watercolour paper. (I demonstrated how to draw a smooth glue line, with the tip of the bottle just slightly brushing the paper.) After the glue was dry (next week's class), students took a Sharpie fineliner and traced around both sides of their glue lines. Then they added colour using semi-moist watercolour paints.

There was way more success with this project than when I did the close-up flowers with acrylic on canvas last year. Both the boys and the girls in my class were happy with their results.

Frida and Diego at the AGO=Awesome!

I was in Toronto last weekend and got to see the exhibit Frida and Diego: Passion, Politics and Painting. It was amazing!!! I don't think I've ever been so engaged in an exhibit ever. It was the interesting combination of accessible text, photographs of the couple, and both artists' paintings that made it so fantastic. I wish I could have taken more photos inside, but I managed to snap one with my camera phone before being asked to put it away.  And then outside of the show were these larger-than-life-size papier mâché skeleton sculptures of the couple. Loved them!  

        

Kindergarten Cardboard People

These little people were made from cut cardboard scraps, googly eyes, yarn, and paper and fabric pieces.

It was our first time in art class working with white glue. I was under the assumption that most students had already had some experience with it but I assumed wrong. Even though I demonstrated gluing techniques, I guess they just need a little more practice. (We had some very large glue spills on the tables!) Having said that, the Kinders loved creating their people and giving them personalities. And my Grade 2s came in afterwards and graciously cleaned up the big mess. Haha.

Not sure what's going on with the guy on the right but it looks unfortunate!

Thank you South School Art Studio for inspiring these!

Halloween in the Art Room

I love owls and all of my students know it. So for Halloween, it only made sense that I went as one. I painted yellow circles on sunglasses with hole in the middle to see out of. Then I glued on some feathers and made a paper nose. I found a shawl at the thrift store. Super easy but very effective!

Here are some painted and collaged Halloween pumpkins inspired by this Deep Space Sparkle project. 

Kindergarten loved doing these and then posing with them afterwards. 

Back on it: some highlights from the start of the school year!

Hello there. So I'm finally back on the blogging scene after a long hiatus. I partly blame Pinterest for sucking up all of my Internet time and energy!

I've had a great start to the year and taken soooo many photos that I've wanted to post and write about. But for now, I thought I'd just include a few to get my blogging life up and running again. Here are a few highlights from the start of the year:

Bulletin Board:


My simple yet eye-catching bulletin board. I love it so much it might just stay up there all year.

And....Circle Painting Project:

This is a project that seems to be working its way through many art rooms these days. Here is the first place I saw it on video. I tried it with my Grade 4s, with groups of 6 each working on one large canvas. I assigned each student a colour, played  music, and had them begin. It was awesome. My only regret is that I let it go on for 5 minutes too long. There was some smearing of colours that went on at the end as students tried to paint huge circles over the whole thing. Oh well!

 

And...Grade 5 Sketchbooks

These sketchbook covers created by Grade 5s look great. I got some inspiration from an art journal image on Pinterest which can be found here. Students drew wavy lines with fineliner, added text beginning with "art is...", and then used liquid watercolours and markers to finish.