Falling into the World of ART!

 We have been so busy and the work the kids are producing is more than exciting! I have made some improvements this year to our classroom, one of the most exciting is that Kindergartners and First graders are bringing home an artwork with them on Friday and on it parents will fins a sticker that will help the students and parents discuss their learning for the week. I am excited to have my students bring that learning home and into the lives of their families and in their conversations. We have also been busy preparing for the Fall season and the Veteran's Day program that is to come in November. I am excited to share with you some of the work we've been working on below.

Students in Fifth grade created some amazing works. They were beautiful and unique and each student took great time to give their best effort and make quality work they would be proud of. We learned how to build block and bubble letters on our papers and we discussed graffiti and the styles of writing we can create on our own.

Students in First grade worked hard on being architects.  This was a wonderful tie in to our Book of the Month that featured an architect! The kids were excited to share there knowledge with their teachers when they worked on the the book in their classrooms. Students discussed what architects do and why it is important. They learned that architects need a plan and they built one of their own.  Many classes built playgrounds and playhouses and others built cities! Whatever they built we had a great time together building them and using our shapes to draw and our scissors to construct the necessary shapes for our final construction plan. 

First graders working from their plans (sketches of shapes) to create their final structures!  These are buildings.  Students needed to know what business would be in their building so they could accurately plan and construct for the purpose. These first graders did a great job of understanding the importance of function and design!  The city is soon to be constructed.  Mrs. Everett has had a recent injury and this keeps her from climbing to build the city in the hallway.

First graders also discussed texture! We worked on creating owls that will be a beautiful connection to weather  and the seasons that they are studying in their classrooms in science. Students were excited to make their own Owls in their own ways with a few tips and techniques on shape, space, texture, and color! We worked on using whispering pencils to draw our owls, screaming oil pastels to trace over their pencil lines, and learned the way we use our watercolors in the art room (swish, swipe, dip the tip!). Students completed these and several are hanging in the hallway on display right now.

Third graders studied foreground, middle ground, and background.  We discussed atmospheric perspective and we created a fall scene with pumpkins. Students were permitted choice of materials. Some chose crayon, some decided on oil pastels ,and others chose chalk pastels. No matter what media they decided they were beautiful and are soon to be put up in the hallways at Harbins. We looked at pumpkins and how they grow and looked at a large pumpkin to see the evolution of it's growth and how we could best recreate the illusion of a real pumpkin on our paper. Things closer to us are near the bottom of the paper and those things farther away from us are smaller and are found farther up the paper. We also talked about details and texture. As a pre-project, to our pumpkins we created the Statue of Liberty. So we discussed using pencils to draw lightly. we looked at a video on drawing the Statute and we worked together to see how we could use minimal information and still would be able to make a recognizable drawing of it. We used chalks to rub across the paper, this was a reintroduction to the chalks so that students would we prepared to use them as a choice in their Pumpkin creation. We then used charcoal to trace over our pencil lines to add contrast and make her stand out.

Third grade pumpkin patches.

Third grade Statute of Liberty.

Fifth graders have been working on contour line and looking at something to draw it. We looked at our shoes and recreated the bottom of our shoes. We drew with pencil lightly and then we traced with sharpie and wrote about where our shoes have taken us and where they will take us. We talked figuratively how this relates to soldiers and how their boots carry them all over the world and in all types of situations in the course of their service. We hope that these will make a beautiful display for our Veteran's day show.

Fifth grade shoes.

Fourth graders looked at Optical Illusions and how they trick our eyes. We discussed how this is the over all goal of many artists because they want to make a 2D drawing appear to have the third dimension and appear to have form and depth. We looked at the American flag and we tried to create the illusion of space and depth. We were also made aware of how important light is to this process. We completed some shading and high lights in hopes to create the flag blowing freely in the wind.

Fourth grade American Flag

I am also extremely excited to add CLUB CREATE to the list of opportunities provided to students at Harbins. Fourth and fifth graders that were interested in this artistic endeavor were given the opportunity to do so by completing an art application and a work of art. We will begin meeting this week and beginning our collaborative works in preparation for art shows that we hope to have take place outside the walls of Harbins. I am excited about this and hope the students gain more than even I expected when planning for it.

We are ready for inspiring AWE!

We are BACK!

In the last nine school days we have had a great time! I have found myself enjoying the classroom more than ever! I have experienced some wonderful moments already this year. Students are ready to push themselves and accept the challenges that are offered in the art room. I have seen students stretching themselves and encouraging one another.  Ask your 3rd,4th, and 5th graders, about our introduction to the new school year. We are focusing on being a collaborative community and learning from one another. We are making mistakes, learning from them, and guiding others to find their own solutions. We have talked about LOTS of amazing things already. Kindergarten took on Kandinsky, First grade were architects and planned and put together their playground and playhouse ideas, Second graders and fourth graders have had the week to take their SGP's this week but last week they were busy sketching and constructing with continuous lines. Third grade was taking their name and exploring line and shape and then turning their names into a wire sculpture. Fifth graders are working with their names and zentangles and then they are building 3D inspirational words and photographing them. I am very excited about the work we have done and feel that there are only more amazing things to come from it. Here are a few pictures from the week, I'll post some more later.

Fourth grade worked on Thumbnail sketches and made a final large sketch using one continuous line and then took on the world of Twistees to create a face made with a continuous line of wire!  They loved this!

Kindergarten took on Kandinsky. In this week we talked about Kandinsky and his talents and explored how to get our materials out to work and put away for clean up. We learned how to tear paper into shapes and use dots not lots of glue and how to manage the glue bottle, we learned about how we can use pencils, crayons, oil pastels, and watercolor paints in the art room and we even took on loading the drying rack. I can't wait to hang these up! Best of all, I got word from a parent that there child was talking about Kandinsky at home!

Third grade worked on using lines to write their names, looked for shapes within the letters and around the page and colored them in, and lastly, they built their name with wire! The kids were challenged, as I realized how few third graders actually know how to write in cursive! Cursive writing is very helpful with this project.

I will post some pictures from the other grades soon and keep a look out in the halls for some of these works of art!

Time flies by when your making a mess!!!

Well, all I can say is just when I think we've cleaned up one mess we start making another!  It is awesome! We have been so busy around here that I have lost track of time and have failed at keeping you up to date on our happenings.  So hang on tight, I am getting ready to send out a lot of information your way.

Beginning the year with Van Gogh in mind!
Let's get "Gogh"ing!

Everyone starts out small but everyone can
make a BIG impact through Art.

Reviewing and Previewing with First graders about Weather
and Instruments used for measuring it, creating Weather Vanes
with Cardinal Directions and learning to draw weather.

Kindergarten learns about Printmaking and the Rainbow
while learning to use screaming crayons to draw lines and
whispering crayons to color in. 

First graders set up their own still Life using art supplies.

They get busy making sketches of what they see, and then we make
our final drawing after hearing some tips to make it easier.

Have you learned about tints and shades?
These student were given a hue of paint and asked to experiment
with it and white, to see just what happened.

Kindergartners learned about lines and how to draw
them using scissors. We cut our lines and glued them to make
a pattern like the one we seen in our American Flag. We also
learned ways to use lines to make stars and students
drew their stars the way they felt they could be most successful at it.

Some even had time to go back in and add designs and
patterns inside of their white space to make their flags a bit
more artistic and to show more of what they know.

Students made and created sketchbooks in grades 3-5.

Veteran's Day is here and our second graders have been learning the
skill of weaving. They got bust to weave a work of art out of
paper and they were put together to create a lovely bulletin board for
our Veteran's Day program.

Third graders talked about Howard Finster and folk art. They
created paper mache' gourds and were busy getting them
ready to make them into a work of art.

Here are our gourds as they dry.

Kindergarten worked on Mono printing.  A type of printmaking
similar to our hand prints, but we painted the table and drew in the paint
with our fingers.

Here is another example, students were able to go back in
and add more details and designs. We used a limited color
scheme and talked about our flag and the meaning of the
colors.

Clean room- it DOES NOT look like this now!

Students were asked to use Primary Colors to trace geometric
shapes. We then used our drawn shape to trace inside of them,
so we could learn both were a method of tracing. We also used
our Primary colors to mix and make new colors using our
crayons and our paints.  With those paintings we practiced our cutting
of lines  and gluing.

Here's another.

Kindergarten learned about 2Dand 3D shapes.
We learned the differences in the number of faces and
the vertices. We learned how we can draw them
and make them look differently.

Second graders studied Vincent Van Gogh and worked on getting
their new knowledge about still Life drawing techniques and using
their space to make their artwork make sense and catch the eyes of
their viewers. We incorporated crayon, watercolor, and color pencil in
our studies of Vincent Van Gogh's Sunflowers and Starry Night.

Sorry they are sideways... had some trouble getting them to turn
vertically for you to see.

Second graders worked on Printmaking. We then worked on
paper manipulation and created designs that would be seen at
our Veteran's Day program.

1st graders had a review of lines, patterns, tracing geometric shapes
cut shapes and glued. We kept the Patriotic color scheme
and we created a designer frame to finish off our works.

Romero Britto brings his paintings to life with color and pattern
and with a variety of design. Our Second graders pull
their sketches together for a patriotic theme and created
these beautiful examples of works of art.

First graders again discussed weather and weather vanes. We
explored the barn yard and created a watercolor resist painting
that will knock your socks off.

While Mandalas are normally made of beautifully colored sands
Kindergarten explored how they could make patterns and designs
in a radial format.

Red Ribbon Week came quick and a last minute idea came together

Fifth graders worked on creating a still ife of their shoes or
their backpacks. I read excerpts from the book "The Things The Carry,"
they were asked to recreate an illustration based on that. We then
did some writing to go along with it and were able to create and
interesting work of art juxtaposing writing and illustrating.

Fifth grade worked on creating a watercolor painting
that illustrated a symbol of America to them. We were learning
the proper use and technique of watercolor and finding our
art was improving as a result.

Third graders also worked on drawing Light till it's Right and
then discovering how the watercolors would work for the
media. We discussed watercolor techniques and worked on
creating a patriotic work of art.

Kindergarten has been working on cutting but also working on the
skill of creating art ,in this case a landscape of a Winter scene. We were
making things out of shapes to create something new. Stretching their
minds to see the simple so they can build the complex later. We
also used this skill in using pattern blocks to make Mandalas and in creating
small simple drawings using circles as this is a shape they struggle to draw
and cut out, we made teddy bears and snowmen.

Tacky day, I of course came less tacky and more
or less not matchy.  I came dressed in
the primary colors and introduced Roy Lichtenstein,
as this was his color palette.

In Flander's Field was the inspiration for this bulletin board
and it helped us to see Veteran's Day as a moment to reflect
on things we have to be thankful for, including our soldiers.

Fifth grade watercolors.

Second graders reviewed their learned Native American
history and we discussed weaving being more than decorative,
it was needed for a way of life. We also worked on thematic
colors schemes of America and all together our weaving created
a weaving!

Second graders worked on Vincent Van Gogh. We discussed
two of his works and created two versions of a similar
project. Using the Starry Night and the Sunflowers.
Students did an awesome job of completing this and making it
tie into our American theme by including an American Flag.

Veteran's Day displays.

First graders worked on creating a Fairy Tale by first
 discussing and creating textures, figures
 and then by writing about them.

There should be