Studio Art: Candy Bar Triptych

Whew!  I'm finally starting to get things caught up on Artsonia, in my grade book, and on my blog!  It's been a New Year's resolution to keep on top of my grading this year, and so far so good!  These triptych drawings were the last thing students finished up right before our Christmas break.  It was also the final project in the drawing unit.

For this project, students had to bring in a candy bar (or similar type of food item) from home.  At this point, we had practiced with different drawing media in our sketchbooks, so students were allowed to draw with any medium they wanted.  The only stipulation was that one drawing had to be full (true) color, one had to be black and white, and the last could be done however they wanted.

On a side note, while we did these drawings, I used pop artist Wayne Thiebaud as their bell ringer artist in their sketchbooks, since the subject matter students were using was similar to his.

Most students stuck with drawing pencil, ebony pencil and colored pencil, but a few ventured into oil pastels as well.  We haven't actually framed these with mat board yet (I cheated and just photographed them on top of the mat board), but right before the art show, we are going to have a big mating day to frame artwork for the art show.  Students have mated two projects themselves so far, so they should be pros by the end of the year!

3rd Grade: Wayne Thiebaud Cake Drawings

Hopefully I'm going to be playing catch-up these next few days!  I've got SO MANY projects to share from before the winter break, it's not even funny!  Things have been insanely hectic with the holidays, conferences, and committees at school.  I also recently became a consultant for Jamberry in order to help pay medical bills from last year.  My blog has unfortunately taken a back seat to all of these things, but it's my goal to make sure that stops happening!

This next project I'm going to share is probably one you've seen on Pinterest.  My students in 3rd grade LOVED making these oil pastel Wayne Thiebaud cakes!  (Did you know his last name is pronounced "tee-bow"?  Like the football player?  I didn't until I presented this project!).  This is the first time I've used this artist as a reference in my classes, and the students just loved it.  I find that they always love oil pastels anyways, because it's so easy for them to be successful with color blending and value, but the added fact that they were designing cakes like the Cake Boss just made it even cooler!

I am in LOVE with this one!  There is a local, elementary art show coming up and I wasn't sure if I'd have four pieces to send to it, but I do believe that this one may be going! :)

This project even correlates with Common Core math, as students were turning basic shapes into 3-D forms.  We used vocabulary such as cylinders and cubes to describe the shapes of our cake tiers.  Students practiced drawing their cakes on a worksheet for the first day.  Then, they drew them on 12"x18" black paper the second day, and I demonstrated how to blend the colors together on the cake tiers, adding in a little black for shadows.  On the third day, students finished their tiers and colored the background, finishing them up!