Let's Play Checkers!

But First - Let's Make a Checker Set!

This is one of those projects I've had in the back of my mind just waiting to fit it in a good place. I had a fun...but super social...5th grade class at one of my buildings that I knew would enjoy the challenge and fun of making a checker set. So we spent the majority of 4th quarter working on it.

 

• Students spent some time brainstorming and planning what their pieces would look like. They sketched out the designs and discussed color choices. 
• Two class periods were spent creating the clay pieces. I gave each student a paper with a 1 1/2 inch square drawn on it so they knew what size to make the pieces.

• While the clay pieces were drying and being bisque fired, students went to work on marking out and painting their boards. I cut white tagboard to 12 inch square. We had a lesson on how to use the ruler to mark off 1 1/2 inch sections and join the lines. I was pleased that this class picked up on this pretty well for not having past experience with it. The classroom teacher and principal happened stopped in at the end of one class and remarked about how great the boards looked. My principal assumed that I had given each student a pre-marked template for the board. With the students in line at the door I proudly announced "No - they did these all by themselves!"
• Two more classes were spent glazing the clay pieces and finishing up on painting the boards. When the boards were dry, I laminated them so they would be more durable
• The came Play Day! The last art class of the year was spent playing. Students took turns using their boards and pieces and fun was had by all! It was the perfect way to send off these students(that I had taught since Kindergarten) to the Jr. High. 

Click here to watch a video highlights of this project!

An Oldie But Goodie - Kindergarten Symmetrical Drip Butterflies

I've done this project with Kindergarten students and a similar one with 1st graders ever since I can remember. But it's one of those oldies but goodies! I'm sure many of you have done something similar.

This is usually a close to end of year project. The students get excited when I tell them we are going to make a butterfly with paint, but we are not going to use brushes and our fingers will not touch the paint! We review the primary colors and I demonstrate how they will fold the paper - "short side to short side". We open the paper up and I squirt some of the primary colors in lines an drips on one side in the shape of a V.

I refold the paper and show the students how to gently rub in circles on the folded paper. They will feel the paint be squished around. I used to use say "wax on - wax off" with the students...but only the occasional aide in the classroom knows what I mean these days!

After rubbing the paper the student is excited when I tell them to open it up and see what you got. The Oooo's and Ahh's that always follow bring smiles.

While I do this with a couple of students at a time at a table, the students work on making a butterfly body on black paper using construction paper crayons.

Here's my example - 

The next class we will cut out the dried paint wings and glue the body onto it.


I do a similar project with my 1st graders. We do the same process only with one color + black on bottom and white on the top to help teach value tints and shades.  Instead of a butterfly they make a longer body to create a dragonfly.

1st Grade Fields of Poppies

This lesson was inspired by wonderful art teacher Susan Tiedemann from South Brunswick, NJ. Take a look her 2nd graders working on their poppies!

First graders really were able to understand the concepts of background, middle ground, and foreground along with how to use size to make things look farther away and close up.

We started this lesson by working on the Smartboard. I used Notebook software to create a green field and poppies in a variety of sizes - tiny, small, medium, and large. Each student got to come up and pick a poppy and move it to a spot on the field that made sense to them. We worked as a group to decide if the poppy was put in an appropriate place. The students love interacting with the Smartboard.

After working on the Smartboard students painted green lines for our field on a 18x24 paper. The large size and big brushes excited them! We let these dry until next class.
Next class we reviewed background, middle ground, and foreground along with how size makes things look near and far. They worked on painting small, medium, and large poppies in their field. Once the poppies were painted they were able to dab tiny white and yellow flowers using a qtip.

To finish off our paintings students added some lines in the center of the flowers and some more green field lines using oil pastels.

See more of our field of poppies on Artsonia - Roosevelt  & Washington

Birdbath Sculptures with Melted Glass Water

I saw this idea posted on smART Class blog a year or so ago and thought it would be a great project for 4th graders.

The original picture is from Mayco's project section on their website. It looked like it could be done using pinch pots - so we gave it a try!

It took us two(45min) class periods to create the sculpture. The first class we used two pinch pots to create the birdbath. Students added designs into the clay using various tools, shells, and found objects. 

 The next class we finished any designs on our sculptures and added a bird and put them out on a table for us to admire and let dry. The reactions of the other students in and out of the Art room - Oooo's and Aww's mixed with some jealousy - created an air of excitement that made the two classes working on these even more anxious to finish them.

After Spring Break our pots had been bisque fired and were ready to glaze! Students used a variety of colors of glazes on their clay pieces. We use low-fire clay and glazes at the elementary level in our district.

We dropped a couple of glass marble pieces into the middle of the piece after the glaze was applied. I had seen this done on other art teacher's blogs, but had never tried it. The students were excited to learn that they would be the first classes to try this. "You mean you've never done this before Mrs. G? How do you know it will work?"  I just shrugged my shoulders and said - "I guess we will find out!"

Here they are ready to go in the kiln for the glaze firing - 

I couldn't wait to take these out of the kiln!  Here are some of the finished pieces. I did notice some of the birdbaths with wider tops needed an extra marble or two, and the color choice of glaze did affect how the blue marbles looked when melted. So I will use this knowledge to guide my two other 4th grade classes who are about to glaze theirs.

Students Get Into Their Monet Paintings!

We are standing on the bridge of our own paintings!

Claude Monet and the Impressionists are my very favorite and I really enjoy sharing that love with my students. This project is a special one. We end up having two works of art when we are finished!

After learning a bit about Monet's life we use acrylic paint to create a painting inspired by one of his Japanese Bridge paintings. Except for part of the water, students use qtips to give the painting that quick Impressionistic feel. I encourage the students to remember to paint like an Impressionist - worry about the impression of the trees, bushes, water, and flowers instead of painting details (the qtips really help with this).

This took a couple class periods. During one of them, I set up a "green screen" (big piece of bulletin paper - next year I'm going to invest in green fabric!) and had the students pose as if they were on the bridge of their painting.

This helped me remove the background using Keynote's Alpha tool. From there I combined the student image with a digital image of their painting. Then students touched up the bridge with paint to make it look as if they were behind the front railings of their bridge. 

In one of my buildings, we wrapped up this fun project by creating a tissue paper water lilly to put up with our paintings.

Draw out a lilly pad on a green paper

Use 8 layers of tissue & accordion fold

Attach a pipe cleaner & spread out layers of flower

Poke into lilly pad & twist in back

 It put a smile on my face listening to the reaction of the other students as they came down the hall to lunch or to the Art Room. "Oh Cool!"

One 5th grader said, "Those are great - are we going to do them?" I told him - sorry that's one of my 3rd grade lessons. He responded with "That's not fair! We didn't have you for 3rd grade!" --Made my day and the aches from going up and down the ladder putting the display up so worth it!

Clay Bird Bath Sculptures Part 1

4th Grade students have been working on a very fun clay project! 
Using skills learned in previous grades, they are putting together a bird bath sculpture.

The sculptures are created with two pinch pots - one for the base and one for the top. Designs were pressed or carved into the sculpture and then a small bird was added.

The clay pieces drying on the table created a bunch of ooo's and ahh's from the other students in the school!

Once these are bisque fired, we will glaze them and then put a blue marble or glass chip in them. Students are anxious for this!