Week 29: Name Patterns and color

The kids like to doodle and draw, and I thought I would have them do some pattern and color work as well. My goal was to have them use two complimentary colors (ie: blue/orange, red/green, purple/yellow).


I had them use a marker to draw their name on a large paper. To that they added, like ripples of water, concentric rings that went outward from their name. The end result was kinda 1970's funky looking, but fun.

Then I had them use their watercolors, or crayons/markers, to fill in alternating stripes with their complimentary colors.

This was a very meditative process and the kids liked the result. I also gave them the choice to write the word MOM if they wanted, or their name was too long. Since Mother's day was coming up, they could give these little masterpieces to their mothers.

Week 28: Georgia O'Keefe Flowers

Continuing to study famous artists, we turned to Georgia O'Keefe and her iconic flowers. Instead of painting these beauties, I had the kids use tissue paper and watered down glue, so that the result would be as bold and graphic as possible!

I started by showing the students several of O'Keefe's most famous flowers and pointing out that she made her images bold, colorful and really close-up. I wanted the kids to fill their paper as much as possible. The tissue paper allowed for some nice layering of color and bold forms.

Several kids made their art 3-D by crumpling or using paper that tuck out more. I even hd a few cupcake liners that make nice flower centers.

Week 27: Self Portrait in pencil

This is one of those projects that can be repeated several times a year and be a window into your child's world at that moment.  At the begining of the year I had the kids do a self portrait in torn colored paper.
September's self portrait lesson

Come Spring, its time to revisit, but with a different medium, and a different lesson.  Kids naturally like to draw, but they also naturally do not have a good idea of how to draw an accurate face.  So in this lesson I gave the kids a soft pencil, eraser, and mirror along with some nicer paper.

On the baord I drew a step-by-step face starting with a large circle, then a middle line and lines for eyes, nose, moith etc. Then a tutorial on the various parts of the face.


Here is a real nice You-Tube video of an artist doing just that:
How to draw a a face video

This is a not an easy concept, and kids, no mater how old, still want to draw circles for eyes that are way up on the top of the head and a hooked nose and exaggereated mouth, but if you do it step by step they get the hang of it. Plus doing it every year will help with the practice.



Where they can personlize the drawing is in the shading and air and other details.  The soft pencil is great for smudging and adding realism to the drawing.

Week 26: Easter Egg animals

This was the week before Easter Break, so I had the kids make animals out of eggs. I got the idea from Martha Stewart and other places that used real eggs that had been blown. But we had a bag full of the colorful plastic eggs, and no staff of 10 to blow and dye the 100 eggs I would need!

There are any number of animals you can make out of eggs. The more traditional ones are chicks/ducks from yellow eggs, lambs from pink/orange eggs (with cotton balls), pigs, doves, and bunnies from blue or purple eggs. Then you can make bees from yellow eggs, hippos from purple eggs, bears and puppies from brown eggs, and frogs from green eggs.

All you need is some scrap construction paper, cotton balls, felt, sequins, feathers, permanent markers, pom-poms and any other crafty scraps. We used white glue for some parts, but I would advise hot-glue or tacky-glue.

The kids seemed to really like the idea of this craft, but the younger kids had a bit of a hard time with the glue not sticking fast enough. Overall, a very fun project!

Week 24 & 25: Eric Carle Butterflies

It feels like its been a while since I posted, and that's because we did a 2-week project that was inspired by Eric Carle, the famous children's book author/illustrator of many beooks including the "The Very Hungry Caterpillar"




Week 1 involved making the paper to collage the next week. Carle used colored tissue paper to paint, but I had the kids work with large sheets of white construction paper.  They were given just the primary colors and told to mix and play with it on the paper and not in their pallete.  They also had toothbrushes for stippling and spatterings and forks for scraping. No rules, except that if they wanted more than one color to collage they needed to be mindful of making areas of distinct color combos and not overmixing to mud.  They achieved some very rich layered looks!

Week 2,  I gave each student their dried paper back and showed them samples of Carle's work again and then some simple digrams of how to make butterflies, bees and dragonflies from mostly just circles.



Some kids made big bold insects and many made flowers, while some made tiny little insects that seems to be swallowed by the page.  Most had little trouble figuring out what to do.



This turned out to be one of the best projects of the year. The color play with paint during the first step was very abstract and sensual, while they had to do some planning for their collage in step two. During the collage faze, they had to work with abstract shapes to make specific objects and also plan color, shape and size.  The end results are amazingly professional looking and really adhere to the spirit of Eric Carle. Good job kids!

Week 23: St. Patrick's Day

Since the the older kids had a field trip I just had the K-2 class. It was St. Patrick's week, which is one of my favorite holidays, and green is my favorite color too;-)


An impromptu idea was to make shamrocks out of hearts, which the kids are pretty good at making.  The great thing is that the fold in the heart is perfect for maing it look 3-D. I had the kids make a bunch of different green hearts as well as some real simple squares of green and brown for a "leprechaun" hat that the shamrocks would be sprouting from. All this got pasted down, with the idea that the three hearts pasted together made a shamrock and only half the heart was glued so that the other part stuck off the paper to give it a lively look.

The kids did a fine job on these and they were dead simple to get organized and make.

Week 22: Arbor Day tree blossoms

Wow, its already 2/3 of the way through the year!  My younger son had to make a 100th day collection of items, and our thoughts are already turning to Summer. But its still the blustery transition between Winter and Spring. One minute it's raining, the next its sunny. The trees are also noticing this change and beginning to burst into bloom.


I was thinking of doing this project later in April during Apple Blossom time, since this area is know for its apple blossoms. But the area around the school is awash in the gloriously delicates pink blossoms of the plum trees.  The first week of March is also Arbor Day in California due the birthday of local plant scientist Luther Burbank on March 7.  So I was able to wrap three lessons in one!

I had contemplated doing the classic blown ink tree trunk and branches, but we have so little time and limited cleanup ability, so I opted for a faster and cleaner black/brown marker trunk. I gave each child light blue paper and had them draw the trunk. For the younger kids, I advised that tracing their arm and hand make good trees.

After that was done, they used crumpled pink tissue paper to make the blossoms. Some used other colors or  green paper for the ground. Many kids also remembered the technique where you wrap the tip of pencil with the tissue and then glue. That works well, but just crumpling the tiny pieces of tissue works just as well.

These turned out real nice and are very Springy!

Week 21: Year of the Tiger drawings

As a nod to Chinese New Year and the Year of the Tiger 2010, I decided to do a directed drawing project. As for the actual Tiger subject and technique I was inspired by this artist blog and her really cute tiger:

http://www.artprojectsforkids.org/2008/07/rousseau-tiger-drawing.html

I have had luck with doing very targeted drawing exercises with the kids and this seemed like a good fit. Plus, I needed something simple to prepare since my home office where I plan and get projects figured out is in the final throws of being renovated and my files are being chased around the house.


The materials are simple: paper, crayons and/or oil pastels and markers. I talked briefly about the 12-animal cycle of the Chinese New Year and showed them some real photos of tigers. Then I showed them on the board each step: 1. draw a circle 2. draw eyes 3. draw the nose 4. draw the cheeks etc.



Most kids did a great job following directions and I encouraged them to fill the paper with color since many like to rush through things and get done. The best results came from careful drawing and making the lines dark enough so that after the color is applied the lines still show through.

These Cool Cats will make a "purrfect" addition to our walls for our open house next month! I was born in the year of the Tiger, so this is especially close to my heart.

Week 20: Mardi Gras Masks

This project turned into a real crowd pleaser!  The kids liked it and I think their results turned out great.


I try to do seasonal/historical things as much as possible and this ties into Mardi Gras season,  as well as being related to the kids' study of "Island Nations." In this case it was a Caribbean theme, whereas the tiki masks I did the week before were more Polynesian.  I ended up using these Mardi Gras masks as centerpieces for the International Lunch the kids had as a culmination of their Island Nation studies.  The ironic thing is that this theme was picked before the horrific Haitian earthquake and ended up being a great tie-in to some fundraising for Haiti.

This project also fits into my increasingly common use of paper plates as artistic materials. This is at least the third use of plates this year. Maybe I should write a book!;-)  I ended up using plates mainly as an economical alternative to the really costly masks you can buy in craft stores or really tim- consuming plaster method that I would do with older kids.

The prep involved getting small lunch plates and cutting them in half.  Then I used a 1" circle punch for eyes and nose.  A chopstick hot-glued on as a handle completed the work I did before class.

I find that the kids really like the assemblage projects that involve hot glue guns and "stuff."  Since I use the glue gun, this does make for a more intensive class since they lineup have me put the hot glue on their masks.

I printed out several examples of the real masks and gave them a quick background on the signigance of Mardi Gras, Lent and Easter. This being a Christian school probably allows for more leeway in this respect.  I also showed them that the official colors are purple, yellow and green.

For materials I gave the kids colored feathers, sequins, ribbon, pop-poms and markers.  It is amazing how colorful and festive they ended up looking with just a few simple embelishments.  The kids spent so much time making these, that we needed almost two classes to complete.