2nd grade Sugar Skulls/suns

This year in second grade I decided to try a new lesson.  I have always been fascinated with the are of Mexico but have never attempted to do a Sugar skull lesson. I found some on Pinterest that sparked my interest. (dont mind the rhyme).  My biggest challenge was how to present this lesson for the few students I have who are Jehovah Witness. Since Sugar Skulls originate from the Holiday of Day of the Dead, this was going to be hard with students that cannot celebrate or have really much to do with any type of holiday. I contacted the parents first and explained what the holiday was, and that it really is part of Mexican culture.  The parents agreed they wanted their child to learn about the culture but didnt want them to do a sugar skull, so I modified theirs to be a sun design, since the Mexican culture and arts use the sun for much of their art and symbols.  I had the students watch some utube videos of Dia de los Muertos and then a small presentation I put together on SMART board.  They students were really modivated and excited.  It helped that the Book of Life movie was out in theatres also!  Students used a tracer to create the skull or sun.  They used markers to color a design they did in pencil first.  Then they measured out a border and chose two things from their designs that they could repeat to create a pattern around the edge.  They then colored those in oil pastel.  Then they glued the skull/sun on.

Kindergarten pattern mats

I wanted a change to the usual pattern project so I incoporated line and shape and pattern to it.  They got four strips each that they had to  cut in two with a line, either straight, curve, zigzag and wavy.  They then created an oil pated pattern on each of the eight strips.  Then they glued them onto a 12x18 colored paper.  After that they tied yarn (yes they all did it somehow after I showed a few different ways).  They came out pretty good.

Second graders are Van Gogh Masters!!!!!

Second grade did an in-depth lesson on Van Gogh. We started with the history of him, and talked about his passion for art and yes, how he cut his ear off!  Thiese are the things students will remember!!!!  They loved hearing about how he applied his paint on thick and how poor he was.
They created sunflower pictures in pencil and then had the choice of outlining it in black oil pastel or a mix of colors.  After that they painted it with watercolors.
From there they created a Starry Night background with oil pastel, trying to recreate the feeling of the small lines creating the wind in the sky.  They then washed over it with a water color of their choice.

First Grade Laurel Burch Cats

I have always had very successful Laurel Burch projects with my fourth graders, but I decided this year to try it with my First graders.  We went to Laurel Burches website and looked at her work, and I told the students a modified story of what happened in her life.  The students found it very interesting that she was sick with a bone disease yet she loved to paint such colorful art.
We had a practice day of drawin cats in her style and they created some thumbnails of cats with different personalities.  They loved this!  The second day we moved on to drawing their good copy on 12x 18 paper.  They then outlined everything in oil pastel and painted it with watercolors.  Of course we talked about emotions, patterns, etc!!!

Kindergarteners in the beginning! Ughhh!!!

I have been working with Kindergarteners for about fifteen years now, and there is nothing that I dread more than those first few weeks of art class with them. They are preschoolers still. They do not understand routines or directions yet, so everything I do is in babysteps. I love them though!! They are so stinkin' cute!! I start off my year, as most art teachers probably do, by talking about the basic elements of line, shape, color and pattern. We start with line and create an oil pastel line design containing the nine line of: straight, curved, wavy, spiral, dotted, dashed, zig-zag, bumpy, and curly. We wash them with watercolors to give a colorful effect. Secondly I talk about shape and we create a shape picture by using pre-cut shapes from found objects. These are colored with crayon. I then move into pattern. This lesson I change sometimes, so I am going to try something new on Pinterest that I found. I have attached some pictures of the line and shape lessons.

Art Assessment (SLOs)

The other art teacher and I have been working for a few years on our SLOs for art. We changed them again slightly this year. Here is an example of what we are doing in each grade: K and 1: The students divide their paper into eight sections and are given a variety of things they need to draw in each section. These differ for both grades, but range from drawing types of lines to certain objects such as a house or their family. They are graded with a rubric. 2: They divide their paper up into 16 sections and will draw in a specific part what I tell them. Items range from overlapping shapes, symmetrical shapes, primary colors, etc. 3-5: Students are given a color theory quiz, each adapted for their grade level, and then must complete an artwork containing a list of all kinds of vocabulary such as horizontal lines, background, middleground, etc. I want to change this a bit for next year to contain multiple choice with some vocab.

Summer was so fast this year!!!!

Wow! Time flies and I havent updated here since February. I wanted to share some new ideas I had this year. First off is my door outside. My theme is "Arty Party" this year, so my door shares the theme. This ties into my beginning of the year assignment. I always like the students to work on something to decorate the artroom. A few years ago I did the triangular flags. This year I decided to do circles. The students traced a plate to get the circle and were allowed to decorate it however they wanted. They could divide up the circle or they could use the entire thing. Designs could be realistic or abstract. I like to do this to just get the creative energy started after summer break. Its pretty basic but I like to have them help with decorating the school/room. I also am putting up photos of a few things around the room that I have. My paintbrush is new. I found a similar idea on Pinterest and changed it a bit. I also have a Principles/Elements board. I have also shown how I had the fifth graders a few years back work in small groups to paint the blocks behind my sink area. This eliminates the dirty look behind them! Lastly I put up an art vocabulary board. As we learn new words we add them to the board. They kids get excited to remind me when new words are discussed and to put them up!