Howdy, friends! I put together a blog post full of my very favorite Valentine's-y lessons just for you. These are perfect project for any time of the year but with Valentine's Day quickly approaching, I thought they'd be perfect.
First up, printmaking! This is a lesson that the kids love...and I think one year I may have gotten a wild hair and done this printmaking project with first grade. They can do it...but it's a little easier with second graders.
Okay, now this project, believe it or not, I did with KINDERGARTEN! Yes, I swear! BUT then all of my classes saw these giant hearts and they asked to do it too. I'm a sucker for doing lessons with all of my classes if they work. The problem with that is...then the lesson has to be shelved for a couple of years to cycle through the students. Oh well! This one is wildly fun and, tap this link, a video lesson is provided.
My firsties LOVED creating these critters! I got a wild idea to have each class create a different animal and I made a how-to video for each. You can check out the videos and details here!
Aren't they so cute!?
Looking for a fun sculpture project? My fourth graders created these with tagboard and plaster strips.
I created this lesson for my fourth graders who happened to be early finishers for the sculpture lesson. However, it also would work as a sketch for the sculpture too! Details here.
A project that my third graders loved was this one! We used our tempera sticks, tempera paint and...PUFFY PAINT. This is the one time the kids could go nutty with the puffy paint and the results were so fun! Lesson and video here.
Every year, I do a paper weaving lesson with my first graders. This one is perfect as it ties in with positive and negative shapes! We use the negative shape to act as a frame for our weavings. Lesson details here.
Looking for a lesson that introduces students to artists who also love LOVE?! In this one, my fourth graders learned about four different artists who use the theme of love in their artwork and then they created their own! Details here.
By the way, start saving those boxes of candy hearts! Turns out the plastic packaging that holds the chocolate makes for great molds! My third graders used the molds to create their own plaster chocolate. Details here.
Or how about this collaborative? My students created this one WITH A SUB while I was on jury duty. It helps to have videos, I tell ya! Find the lesson here.
And if you are looking for the perfect book to teach about shapes, since we are focused on hearts around here, might I recommend this one! I packed in to much from organic to geometric shapes, the names of shapes, what defines a shape and how to count sides and verticies and SO MUCH MORE! You and your artists will love it!
Have fun, friends! I'll be back with more brand new lessons super soon!
People can tell me how they run their classroom all day long and I do love to hear about it because I am a person who LOVES to try new things. I like to throw EVERYTHING at the art teacherin' wall just to see what sticks. But what REALLY helps me is seeing it in action. Sure I can imagine what Call and Response or a behavior management plan my look like but it's so much better to see it happening. So...that's why I love to share what it looks like in my art room. For that reason, I'll be sharing my first day teaching kindergarten right here!
If this video looks a little familiar that's because...I have been running my first day of kindergarten the very same way FOR YEARS. If it works, stick with it, right? And I'll be adding links to more blog posts with videos here.
This blog post breaks down the lesson and why I teach certain routines on that first day.
So I've been thinking about a couple of things (which explains the burning smell). Last fall, I tried some "Halloween centers" or stations that my students rotated through. I did this on the day our school was having fall parties and costumes because I knew the kids were going to be excited and I wanted to ride that wave of excitement. I liked it, the kids loved it and I thought I should do it more often. And then I didn't.
* The kids got to experience a wide range of mediums in a short amount of time. One thing I've noticed is that I don't 'have the time' to allow my students to experiment with a lot of art supplies. This allowed me to do that.
* Everyone was very excited and engaged. I mean, it's art, they usually are but...it was electric this time around. And they didn't 'need me' or ask for my approval.
* We created A LOT. I always feel guilty at the end of the school year that we only have a handful of pieces. We had a ton each that we created!
For that reason, I decided to take the same concept and apply it to the element of art of LINE. I noticed that many of my students, since the pandemic, are lacking in skill: drawing, cutting, you know, the basics. So I decided to do this centers or stations thing with ALL of my students, kindergarten through fourth. Ultimately, we will use these papers as backgrounds for a variety of projects (which will vary by grade) but for now...I'm excited with what we've made. I see so many possibilities with this idea: the elements of art, art history, new mediums, etc. And it has me excited. Which is something I've not felt in a while as the pandemic, as well as the following last two years, brought me severe burnout.
If you are interested, here is the video I created for my students. I'll be sharing the resources and how I created them in the next couple days. So stay tuned!
In my last blog post, I shared that my students were spending a couple of days rotating between four different art makin' stations. We spent two days doing that and ended up with a TON of dots! We are now assembling our dots in a large collage on 18"X24" inch paper. Here is the video I created to walk them through assembling their work:
Of course we had to take Vashti's advice and 'sign it' before calling it complete. I love how each one is so unique and amazing, just like the artists who created them.
When I asked the kids which dot-makin' center they liked the best, they couldn't decide, they really enjoyed them all. I plan to do rotations of art makin' like this in the future, it's so much fun!
Recently, my kindergarten and first graders created guided painting symmetrical butterflies! This is a very old lesson of mine...which you can find here. The video I created then was geared toward art teachers. I decided to update the video and make it so you can share it with the artists in your life. Here you go:
Of course you'll need to pause as they go.
We used black tempera paint and I told the kids to apply the paint so that it is shiny. This made for a better print. Once they understood how the process worked, they knew what to do.
Color was added with brown, yellow and orange oil pastels. The kids were told to color in those three colors in stripes and then color OVER those three colors with yellow to create a gradation. Afterward, we drew designs in the background with a white oil pastel and then added color to the background with blue liquid watercolor. Have fun!
Hey, y'all! I've been sharing a lot about my kindergarten friends here lately as I feel as though that it a weakness of mine...and just might be a weakness of yours. While I LOVE teaching kindergarten, I find that I often drop the ball when it comes to teaching them my routines. I know they have a shorter attention span and I love to get them creating when they come to art. It's my weakness and it's something I'm working on...because when I don't, I tend to make those same faces as shown above.
One of the most popular posts on this blog was the one I wrote on my Kindergarten Line Unit. It has a ton of lessons, poems and info if you have not checked it out. And while I still do many of the lessons from that unit, I decided to change it up a bit this year with a little Line Game for my kindergarten's first line study. Here's how it worked:
Before the kids arrived, I cut paper into 12" squares. Then I added two black dots on each side of the paper (you can kinda see them now, right?). Then, working with the person seated next to them, they were to pick a start dot and their neighbor was to pick their end dot. Then they had to take their line for a walk from one line to another. When all the dots had lines, they had to go on a shape hunt. Lines make shapes! They had to find those shapes and color them in. We used paint sticks to fill in the shapes.
I loved their final results. One the third 30 minute art class, we learned about collage and created the shape monsters you saw at the start of this blog post. They LOVED that! Here's a little video from one of those art classes:
And if you'd like to see more videos like this or hear my podcast episodes about my dear kindergarten friends, you can hop over here.
.jpg)
