Zentangle like boxes

My 3rd graders love the idea of Zentangle.  We watched a few videos on Youtube and they were hooked.  now they add hints of Zentangle in all sorts of places.  We used our pictures to make origami boxes.The results were great.

Coil Clay Faces

This is a neat project I did with 5th grade to cover coil building with clay.  Next time I would make the coils thicker to avoid so much breakage.  Those that are about the thickness of an index finger were the best.  We used Picasso as inspiration and emhasized organic shapes.  I like them unpainted, but you could probably add color if you wanted.  Here they are displayed on top of the original sketches.

Central Office Display

I finally have a chance to display artwork at our Central Office.  We only get this opportunity once every other year.  So I brought some of my best work to show.

This is Mouse Paint by Kindergarten, I have about 4 versions of this and do it differently each year.

I love these collage snowmen with radial symmetry snowflakes by Kindergarten.

This Mondrian inspired artwork was inspired by one of my fellow teachers, Andy Rohde.  Kindergartener's loved making the faces.

These 1st grade snowmen are actually relief sculptures.  The shadows are cool colored chalk.

My first graders printed these robots with mat board scraps and tissue tubes, then colored them in with metalic crayon. 

My second graders made these great Scream pics with oil pastel and model magic for the screaming guy.

3rd grade created these porthole pics with oil pastel and tempra.  These used techniques for creating space. 

This was a quick 3rd grade filler.  We printed asymmetrical tree with mat board and added the thumbprint owl.  The whole lesson helped students understand how artists works as illustrators, having to think obout where text will fit with their pictures.  We used the Robert Frost poem, Stopping by the Woods on Snowy Evening.

These 4th grade masks inspired by Native American masks, cover up some fabulous student self portraits.

These other 4th grade projects are sandwiches made in relief with paper and center of interest snowmen done quilt style.

My 5th grade has really knocked it out of the park this year.  These pop out chairs in a room are inspired by Van Gogh's paintings of his room and the Renaissance artists.  They learned about basic 1 pt. perspective and really got it!

And these are the Monet oil pastel and baby oil pics I posted last week.  Again, pictures just don't do these justice.

Monet Projects

I am so thrilled with the results of my 5th grade Monet projects, based on the Agapanthus Tryptic on display at the St. Louis Art Museum until Jan 22nd.  These are done with several layers of oil pastel smeared with baby oil.  Some are amazing, unfortunately they don't photograph as well as they look in person. 

Exploring Depth in the Depths with a Porthole Window

This project turned out so beautifully!  My third graders were introduced to several new concepts with this 3 week project.

Week One- Learn about tints and shades. Then students painted a large blue oval on the paper.  They mixed white with the blue and painted inside the circle, each ring gets progressively lighter until you get to the center.  Next add black to the blue and paint rings on the outside of the circle.  Each ring getting darker until you hit the outside.

Week Two- Learn about 5 ways to create depth.  Students did a warm up drawing worksheet where they practiced creating space by...

1)overlapping
2)placement on the page
3)size
4)amount of detail

5)boldness/paleness of color

Next we watched a video about jelly fish on Discovery Streaming and learned about what they look like and how they move.  Students drew jellyfish on their paper in white oil pastel using as many techniques for creating depth as they could.

Week Three- Watch another video on Discovery Streaming this time about coral reefs.  Have students continue to create depth, by using the 5 techniques, but this time add fish and coral to complete the picture.  Cut out the most interesting part of the picture and assemble into a porthole window. 

Newsletters

How many of you send out a newsletter?  How often do you sent it out and what is in it?  I keep experimenting with different formats and I keep refining to find something dynamic, but less time consuming. 

Some Snowy Projects

A friend asked for a few snow related projects and since they are thinking we may have snow here before Thanksgiving, I thought I'd post a few of my favorites from the past.

Pointalism Snowglobes

Foil Snowflakes

Tints and Shades of Primary Colors based on Snowman at Night 

Sillhoutte Monoprint Snowflakes (makes great wrapping paper)

Shading with chalk Snowman

 3 views of a snowman in oil pastel (borrowed from another blog)

Painted tints and shades snowmen from Snowmen at Night.