If Leo Drew Me

Every year I have all my students do a self-portrait. Each grade level does a different media or technique. Some years I change the lesson to go along with a theme or artist we might be studying at the time.

This past year my 4th grade students were exploring Leonardo da Vinci. I decided to combine their self-portrait project with Leonardo's Mona Lisa in some way. I had the students fold a paper in half like a greeting card. On the front I instructed them to draw the Mona Lisa with pencil, paying attention to line and value as they replicated Da Vinci's famous painting. I told them not to worry about the face at all - just to draw the outline of the face and leave it blank. Which is so not what I usually do when having students look at the Mona Lisa. Usually we would explore the face - especially her smile. Not this time! When they finished with the drawing I used an x-acto knife to carefully cut out the face (open paper up and place a piece of cardboard under for ease in cutting and not to damage the other side of paper).

The next class we discussed who Mona Lisa might have been and why they thought Leonardo drew her and what was around her the way she did. They talked about the background, about her clothes, and her facial features. I asked the students to think about if Leonardo was to draw them - what would the picture look like? What would they be wearing or holding? What would be in the foreground, middleground, and background?

We went over the basic placement of features on the human head and then students traced the face hole that I cut out so that when they opened the folded paper they had the shape of Mona's head - which would now be their head. They started with that and drew a self-portrait on the opened paper. I reminded them to think about what it would look like if they were posing for Leonardo da Vinci.

The students had a fun time with it and the results were fun. I displayed these by gluing them to a mounting paper and hanging them up with a push pin placed in the upper left corner. This way viewers could open up the paper to view the drawing on the inside.

Here are two examples:

Newspaper Self-Portrait Collage

This was one of the projects I did with my 4th graders for my "Reuse, Recycle, & Recreate" unit.





Each year I do self-portraits with all my students so a mention that we were going to begin our self-portraits with my fourth graders led to the inquiry, "how are we going to do them this year? Are we going to paint? Rip paper? Oil pastels like last year?" As I laughed at their questions, I held up a newspaper and told them, "We are going to use this." That got them wondering!

We discussed the element of value and I had them do a value scale using pencil. As students were working on their value scales I photographed them. Using GimpI (a free alternative to Photoshop)I desaturated the photos to black and white and used the posterize filter to limit the number of values so students could see the different values in their photo more easily.

Students use the photos as a reference as they worked to recreate a self-portrait using the different values of ink in the news paper. The project took most students 2-45 minute class periods to complete.

Here are a couple of student examples:

A couple of reflection notes on this project -
* Many of my 4th graders found this a project a bit of a challenge. I think that moving it up to 5th or 6th grade might be a better fit for students in my school.

* As some students worked I watched them stop and read parts of the newspaper. This made me think that having students include words and/or phrases they find important to them into the portraits would be a great idea. I was in a bit of a time crunch trying to get these done before our Family Art Night so I didn't incorporate this idea then - but would definitely in the future.

Family Art Night 2011

For the past several years I have chosen a theme that is used in many of the art projects done with students throughout the school year. Then in the spring all of the artwork pertaining to the theme along with student self-portraits are put on display for a special Family Art Night. A night when students and families can come and explore all the artwork created as well as participate in some fun art activities and a snack.

This year's theme was ReUse, ReCycle, ReCREATE! Kindergarten through sixth grade students created art from items that might have ended up in the landfill. It was a very fun theme to work with.

I will post details of the different lessons in the future - but check out this Animoto video showing a glimpse of the projects.
http://animoto.com/play/Z06Qhs21xdnuudQqgATnCg

One of the project details can be found here --> Recycling, Rousseau, & Technology

Recycling, Rousseau, & Technology

A project that started with these -

And ended with this -

As part of my Reuse*Recycle*ReCreate unit with students at one of my schools, first grade students used egg cartons, paint, and lots of odds & ends to create Henri Rousseau inspired collage pictures.
Students were introduced to artist Henri Rousseau through watching Dropping in on Henri Rousseau and exploring his paintings using a PowerPoint I made up for them. This took one whole class period. I also explained what artwork they would be creating inspired by Rousseau.

Next class we started by painting some tagboard to give a jungle-like colored background for our collage. I had students use white tagboard instead of regular paper so it would hold up to all the stuff that would be glued to it. I gave students green tempera along side a little dab of yellow, brown, and blue. This allowed students the chance to experiment with color mixing to create some different greens in their background painting.
When they finished the background painting they picked up two or three egg carton sections and some yellow, orange, and brown paint. They were told these would be lions for their jungle collage and encouraged to mix and paint them with colors that would work for lions.

The third class we started the big fun of beginning to glue down things into our collages. The lion egg cartons were glued on first and then students gave them faces with fine markers and googly eyes. They added manes using yarn scraps or Christmas tinsel. They also added yarn tails.
Once their lions were complete the real creativity began. I had scraps of odds & ends in boxes and students used these and paper scraps to create a jungle environment for the lions. The favorite supply was some green twisted paper ribbon that I had gathering dust on a shelf for years. This, I'm sure, was donated years ago.

Here are some of the wonderful finished works!

To bring this lesson to a close and reflect on our work students used the smartboard to create a jungle scene inspired by artist Henri Rousseau. The program these students are worked with, along with more information on the artist, can be found at the National Gallery of Art kids website
This interactive program allows students to create a jungle scene similar to the paintings of Henri Rousseau. Students can change the sky and ground and then add trees, bushes, flowers, and animals. This program allows students to practice placing objects into a landscape and resizing them or placing them as to create distance and depth in a picture (what we refer to as perspective in art). Animals and plants placed lower on the screen and made larger give the appearance that they are close up, while placing animals and objects higher up and smaller give the appearance of being farther back in the distance. Students can also explore overlapping to show depth and distance. This is a great tool. Student also really get excited when certain animals or objects flutter or move when they touch them on the screen.
While students in pairs got a chance to work on the smartboard - which I rather like to refer to as the smARTboard in my room - other students finished any details on their collage or worked on Rousseau coloring sheets.

It was a very successful project that incorporated a great deal of elements!

A special thanks to Jodi at Onecrayolashort.blogspot for the wonderful idea!

Did You Hear the Oven Beep? Our Cupcakes are Ready!!

The Completion of the Cupcake Unit! Oh...That was FUN!!

Fourth grade students and I had a fun time with this unit. After learning a little about the art of Wayne Thiebaud the students drew cupcakes. I have two fourth grade classes this year - one in each building. The make up of the two classes are quite different, as are the two schools. So I approached this unit knowing I would do some experimenting with the methods and how I planned the progress of the project. For the drawing part, one of my classes used oil pastels on white paper and one class used chalk pastels on black paper. I did this to see which drawing medium would work the best. I think the most successful was the chalk pastels on the black paper. Students were able to blend the colors faster and achieve success easier.

Another difference came with the timeline of the clay cupcakes. The one class has more students who need more one-on-one attention and more students in general. They were the first class I started the clay work with. I realized about 15 minutes into the 45 minute class that the cupcakes would not be completed all in one class, so I told the students to just work on the bottom part and then we placed them into plastic bags so we could finish them the next week. That same week when I began the clay cupcakes with the students in the other school, I was prepared with plastic bags in the event that this class would be the same in their progress. That was not the case with this class. They completed the entire clay cupcake with great success within the 45 minute period.

Here's a look at their cupcakes after they were bisque fired -

Here are some finished glazed clay cupcakes -

Clay Cupcakes Part 1

Cupcakes...mmmm...I Love Cupcakes!

I decided to take my love of baking cupcakes to the Art room. Inspired by other teachers who have created clay cupcakes with their students, I introduced the art of Wayne Thiebaud to my 4th grade students. We started out by first doing a chalk drawing of a cupcake - discussing value and shading as we worked. I told them at the end of that class that next class we would be doing cupcakes again - but this time with clay. That of course got their attention!

The next class these students came into the Art room and you could just feel the excitement in the air. Clay Day! I had prepped the room ahead of time - putting out water cups, assorted clay tools, a stack of paper towels, some plastic cups to help mold the shape of the cupcake bottom, some pieces of corrugated cardboard, and the box of clay mats.

Students quickly created the bottom of the cupcake. I demonstrated how to create a pinch pot. Students then placed the pinch pot into the plastic cup lined with a paper towel. They pressed the pinch pot gently to shape it more like the cupcake bottom. The clay was flipped gently out of the cup and the ridges added to give the appearance of the cupcake liner. The ridges were added by pressing the sides of the pinch pot onto the piece of corrugated cardboard. This was a quick and easy way to create a great texture.

Another quick demonstration of how to create the top of the cupcake gave students enough ideas to make some delicious looking cupcake tops. Students were reminded that when you attach clay to clay you must slip and score. I have students use toothbrushes dipped in a little water to do this. This method works pretty well. I also show that the simplest tools - a pencil- can create some great details.

Here's a finished clay cupcake complete with a cherry on top!

Here is a table full of cupcakes ready to be transported to the kiln room. The students placed the paper towel they used in the plastic cup between the bottom and the top of the cupcake to keep it from sticking together.

Stay tuned to see the cupcakes after students glaze them. I think I am as excited as they are to see the finished results!

My Favorite Project

You just have to love Monet's paintings.

The color...the quick brushstrokes...love it love it! So of course this is one of my favorite lessons to do with my students. I started it long ago - probably within the first couple of years of teaching. There has been a few years along the way that I have skipped it to try something new. Last year was one of those years...and I so missed it. So I knew that I needed to make sure and get it in this school year.

I usually target 3rd grade with this lesson. I love 3rd graders...they still have that sense of inhibition with their artwork but are more capable of understanding a bit more complex directions. They are also still very curious.

Here's a finished 3rd grade acrylic painting inspired by Monet-

I start the lesson out by showing the Getting to Know Monet dvd by Mike Venezia. http://www.gettingtoknow.com/videonew.htm I also have a PowerPoint of photos of Monet and the different paintings he did of the Japanese bridge that I go through with the students. This introduction and discussion takes up a whole class period but gives students a good introduction to Claude Monet.

The next class I show students how to use cotton swabs(q-tips) and sometimes stencil brushes to make quick marks to create the "impression" of trees in the background. Using cotton swabs instead of paintbrushes helps the students create quick marks instead of painting smooth areas. I encourage them to dab colors into colors to change the look of different areas of the trees in the background. We usually have time to also complete the water. The water is usually the only area that I have students use paintbrushes on. Large brushes allow for a base coat of blue to go on quickly. I remind student to still try and use quick impressionistic marks. Switching to cotton swabs, students are then encouraged to add other colors into the water like greens and white. I provide lots of Monet images to remind them of the impressionistic marks that they want to use as they paint.

The next class students finish the painting by adding bushes, the bridge, waterlilies, and any extras they wish to include. All of this painting is again done with cotton swabs. I demonstrate an area of my painting then allow them time to work on theirs. The demonstration is not for them to copy what I'm painting - but to learn how to use the tools to create different types of marks. When I show students how to do the bridge I use black first to paint the bridge lines then use a cool color to go over some of these lines. I finish the bridge off by adding some white onto the lines while the paint is still wet. We discuss how this addition of a little white makes the bridge "pop".

When they work on the waterlilies they need to be reminded to use impressionistic dabs and marks and not try to paint a flower shape. If students have time they might add extra bushes or other plants into the painting.

The results of this project are always wonderful!

This year I incorporated a bit of tech into this lesson. While students were working on finishing their paintings I took a picture of them standing in front of a green screen (a big piece of green bulletin paper tacked to a wall) posing as if they are standing on the bridge of their painting. I used Keynote's alpha tool to cut out the green so that I could place the student in a digital image of their painting. This will then be printed out and students will use paint to touch up the bridge in front of them to give the illusion that they are on the bridge in their painting. Students really loved this idea of being able to be a part of their own painting. We are still working on this part of the project - I will post a picture of a finished one as soon as I can.