Apple Stamping

 
Ah, the smell of apples in September and the pitter-patter of Kindergartners! A fall classic is apple stamping, but I gave it a bit of a twist this year by having them assemble it into a tree. My K-1 class only has 30 minutes and this was a non-stop lesson with three different paint stations, three different parts and three colors that had to rotate 12 kids through.

To check out all the art photos click here. 



I cut apples in half and then collected leaves (I used cherry leaves since apple leaves are not very flat)

The apple station was red, leaf station green and the bark station was paper bags that they used brushes to explore texture on. The kids really got into the stamping and art really feels like art when they a re slopping the paint around! Its amazing to see the reactions to the young kids exploring texture and printing.

In the next lesson, after paint had dried, we cut out the apples, leaves and the trunks were cut from tracings of their arm and hand.

2008 Fall projects

Here are some of the projects I did last fall with the K-2nd graders:

This was our first project. I had the kids trace hands onto construction paper and then crumpled up butcher paper for the tree branch. It was simple but a good "get to know you" project.

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To tie in with harvest and natural themes: This was natural vegetable dyes from veggies and fruits that we blended and added water. It got kinda messy, but the kids thought it was cool. We did experimental painting on paper. The thrust of the project was the technique and not the final result.

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I had the kids bring in fall leaves, and other natural things and we made collages. A bit too much glue gun and elmers misshaps for the younger kids though;-)

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We used apples to print the frames and did a painting of an apple tree for the center. This was my sample. I guess I was too busy or had too much paint on my hands to snap the kid's work!

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A kid-favorite. Plain old wooden spoons from the craft store jazzed up with lots of odds and ends to make scare crows. This was pretty glue-gun intenzive, but fun.