James Rizzi Birds

This beautiful lesson comes from Patty at Deep Space Sparkle. Before stumbling upon it via Pinterest, I'd never heard of James Rizzi, but having taught this lesson, I'm eager to learn more about his bright, bold work. The kids loved looking at it, too!

I've never been one for much directed drawing. But as I learned in one of the AOE classes I took over the summer, DDs can be a great way to boost kids' confidence in their abilities. And who doesn't want that?

After drawing with a pencil, kiddos outlined their birds--or as we called them, pudgy budgies!--with black oil pastel, then painted with liquid watercolor. To prep the kids, we discussed the warm and cool color families; I made a simple worksheet to enforce the content, as well as have kids pre-select their color scheme. Warm colored birds got cool colored backgrounds and vice versa.

 

The kids ate this up! And since we did our initial DD, older students have reported that their second grade siblings cannot stop drawing birds on their own!

Thank you, Patty! This one's a keeper!

Handprint Fish

I've done this project with my first graders for a few years now, but I'm particularly pleased with this year's results. I changed things up a bit in an effort to enforce the learning aspect, though getting more consistently great-looking final pieces was a happy side effect!

On the first day of art class, after the 'welcome to art' blah-blah, we painted our backgrounds. Yes, I painted with first graders on the first day of art class. This group of first graders did not have kindergarten art, meaning this was our first time together EVER. Call me silly or call me brave, but please don't call me 'cause I hate talking on the phone.

Using blue square paper as the canvas, kiddos used multiple values of blue, as well as white, to blend their colors directly on their paper. Ooo-ing and ahhh-ing ensued! Not having to wash the brushes in between colors made this part quick and easy and was a good introduction for my amateur painters.

On the second day of class, we discussed background, middle ground, and foreground. Since the backgrounds had been completed previously, the students proceeded to adding a middle ground--seaweed, sand, and bubbles--while I called kids a few at a time to make an orange handprint on a separate sheet of blue paper.

Once the handprints were dry, I proceeded to add orange fish lips and a white spot for the eye. Then I cut out each fish. All 100+ of them. Thank goodness for a good pair of scissors and Netflix!

Since these kiddos never had kindergarten art, proper glue bottle usage was pretty foreign to most of them, so we spent a decent chunk of time covering that before using "dots, not lots" to glue the fish, creating the foreground.

A little black paint on a Q-tip made a sweet little fishie pupil, and the kiddos were all set! Square 1 Art, here we come!

Time go get back to my Netflix. This time, I'll be gluing all of those sweet underwater scenes onto the Square 1 Art paper. Le sigh.

Get out your popcorn, it's time for a preview

I'll warn you right now: this post contains a Downton Abbey spoiler. That makes sense on an art ed blog, right? Okay then.

We have close to three cycles under our belts, but only my youngest students have completed their initial projects. (I see my classes just once every 6 days, for 45 minutes apiece.) I'm hoping to get a few of those project posts completed in the coming days, but if you're like me, you love a good preview (or a preview that's way too fast and leaves you hanging and questioning WHY MATTHEW HAD TO DIE!?). So here are some candids from the first few days of art class, showing what the little artists are working on for their Square 1 Art projects!

 

Square 1 Art update

Earlier this week, all Square 1 Art artwork, order forms, and free stickers arrived back to us! I handed all packets back to teachers for distribution, but thought you might like a little peek of the artwork we sent away and had digitized. Please forgive the heinous quality of some of the pictures, which I took in a rush using my iPhone.

I went into all kindergarten classrooms to do a little project with them. We made handprint butterflies, which I didn't get a chance to photograph, but you can imagine how precious they are.

First graders stick with the handprint theme, turning a single print into a goldfish. It's a good intro to painting for first graders, since the paper is so small (less than 9" square).

I love me some Henri Matisse, and the second graders really love his cut-outs, which we mimic when we review organic and geometric shapes, as well as figure drawing, for these colorful, playful projects.

Previously, I discussed the third graders' Georgia O'Keeffe flower drawings here.

Fourth graders look at Picasso's Cubist period and use oil pastels to chop a leaf into 'pie pieces,' which they color with complementary and analogous colors.

Yes, this autumn-themed artwork was made by a girl named Autumn. Hehe.

And probably the most popular (and dare I say NO-FAIL!?) project is that of the fifth graders, which I call Henna Hands (totally incorrect, 'cause Henna is the plant, Mehndi is the process, but I like alliteration!). While it's probably one of the more abstract lessons in terms of concepts--what makes good design and layout, unity, balance, repetition, etc.--I've never had a bad result!

In years past, I had to collect all order forms and money, process it all, and whoa mama--that was lots of work. This year, Square 1 blessed art teachers everywhere by creating an online ordering process. YES! So, I'm thinking that the next steps will be simpler. Fingers crossed.

Do you do Square 1 Art? What projects do you do?

Circle 2 Art

My husband thinks it's hilarious to call things by alternative or mixed-up names. Sometimes understanding him is like interpreting a new language. Tonight he'll be helping me finish up the Square 1 Art projects--which he calls Circle 2 Art--by gluing all artwork to the 'official' paper sent by the Square 1 company.

To lessen our load, I had my Art Enrichment (art club) fifth graders help out as well:

 

Notice all the red? Happy Red Ribbon Week!

Work, my minions, work! Mwahhh haha...

Alas, the little minions--er, darling students--didn't get it all done, so Mr. Connell and I have a lot more gluing to do this eve. Good thing we have our Sunday night shows DVR'ed to keep us entertained whilst we glue. Homeland + Elmer's = one rockin' Monday night.

Funding: Square 1 Art

At a PAEA conference a few years ago, I visited several vendors who had information about art fundraisers. Shortly thereafter, as budget cuts became the norm, I decided to jump on the fundraising bandwagon and see what I could do.

For the last three years, all 600+ of my kiddos have been doing the Square 1 Art fundraiser, which is a hit with kids and parents alike.

Basically, the kids create an 8.5" square piece of work which is shipped away, digitally archived, and then available for families to purchase on a variety of items: mugs, coasters, T-shirts, even iPhone covers!

At least 30 percent of the profits stay here for the art program. Each year I've done the program, I've earned the equivalent to my school-sponsored budget, which is pretty great. The best part (in my opinion) is that every kid gets a free set of 20 stickers with their artwork printed on 'em, regardless of whether or not they order anything else. I love that.

It's a significant amount of work for the coordinator (yours truly), but I think it's worth it.

The third grade project is one of my faves--it's simple yet covers a good chunk of curriculum, and the majority of the results are great.

We talk about warm and cool colors, Georgia O'Keeffe, perspective, subject. Everyone does a few sketches:

After drawing final copies, a color palette is chosen: warm colors or cool colors. We review proper coloring techniques: outline or 'trace your space,' then color in stripes, kinda like Dad mows the grass in rows. :-)

To finish, all pencil lines are traced with black Sharpies, and the kids sign their work:

Voila! Georgia!

(The 'pink' on here is truer to purple in person)