Back into the Thick of it!

Hello All!!!! I know it's like the 4th week of school but man how time flies and I just remembered that I forgot to update thee ol' blog. I am going to try to update like once a week this year.

This year I started out the year in Kindergarten with shape monsters, after being inspired by the Book, "The Monster Who Lost His Mean", by Tiffany Strelitz Haber, Kirstie Edmunds. Pictures to come.

In First Grade: We started with Warm/Cool Color Leaf Echo line Drawings. Pictures to come. 

In 3rd Grade: We are working on studying the Elements of Art in depth and we are starting with LINE. We discussed lined and filled out a line design graphic organizer. We then studied different tree houses and created some beautiful tree houses. Pictures to come. 

In 4th grade: We are studying the Element of Art: Color, specifically COMPLEMENTARY colors. We are doing this by creating OPTICAL illusions and adding complementary color groups to help make them POP! I know that many of you have either saw this project before or maybe have done it before with your classes but I allowed the students to color it in anyway they would like, as long as, they developed a pattern using a COMPLEMENTARY color group. 
To create the "Web" we created a dot inthe middle of the paper with pencil.
We added 6 lines (from edge to edge) through the dot. 
Then we added "smile" lines to every other triangle. 
Then connected the "smile" lines with frown lines in all the blank triangle spaces. 
We outlined with a fine sharpie marker and erased any pencil lines peeking through. 

Then we discussed COMPLEMENTARY colors and did a couple of class activities. 

Here are some of the end results:

Well I hope to add the k, 1, 3 projects by Monday! 

Happy Art Making!!!!

1st Grade "Where the Wild Things Are"

So I know a lot of people have done a lesson on this Book. I really wanted to start out the year with using our IMAGINATION!
We started off by defining what imagination was and what the difference between pretend and real.
I read the story aloud, stopping to ask questions, and predictions of what will happen next.

We started out with an 8 1/2" x 11" white construction paper and pencil. I showed them some ideas on how to start out with Shapes to make the basic form of the body. Then add "details" like eyes, nose, mouth, hair, horns, tail, scales, ear rings, antlers, etc.
We focused on drawing large enough to fill the page, we discussed what a HORIZON LINE is and added one to our page.
They outline with permanent Sharpie Markers, erased their pencil lines, and then used construction paper crayons to add Bright and Bold colors.

LOOK AT ALL THESE TREASURES!

NO that is not my huge recycling pile, It's future recyclable monsters! Our Art club will be starting these tomorrow. AND some of our 4th grade classes will be making either animals/monsters.

The school staff and some of the Art Club parents have donated their plastic, paper, etc. recyclable products.

I CANT NOT WAIT to see what the outcomes are for these clean plastic bottles.
I made a monster but I think I will keep you all in suspense and put them in with the student work and see if you can pick it out. All my students, including my ART CLUB students don't get enough chance to work with 3-Dimensional because we don't have a kiln for clay. So I thought we could do a eco-friendly project, as well as, 3-Dimensional one.