My fourth graders are getting ready for a new sewing adventure! Last year, they stitched these pizza pillows. Next up, we are dying our own fabric and creating a kind of faux-Shibori dyed pillow (see below).
I love teaching sewing (and all things fibers) to my students. If you are interested but don't know where to start, I share all of my tips and tricks in my book Stitch and String Lab for Kids!
I'll be sharing my favorite fibers projects in an upcoming post but if you just can't wait, you can hop over to my YouTube channel and visit my "Fibers" playlist! Be sure and subscribe, I'm currently adding a lot of video content!
I decided to create a video to walk my students through sewing basics. I played it today on our first day of stitching and it was a hit! I didn't have to thread a single needle and only tied one knot. If you'd like to view it, here you go:
Feel free to use it in your art teacherin' world!
There are a lot of things I've learned about teaching children to stitch over the years. Many of my tips you'll see in the video. However, I plan to share much more in upcoming Art Teacherin' 101 videos.
Just a preview: fourth graders opened their dyed fabric, pinned it and began stitching in 30 minutes! When they are interested, it's amazing how fast they can work.
Here's where we're heading. Again, this is a project from my book and always a hit. Happy stitching!
Howdy, friends! If you live in the Tennessee area than you know what a wet and wild week we had! I like to thought it was NEVER gonna stop raining. Which means to outdoor recess for the kids...and it was full moon week. Regardless, we were rockin' through our paintings, embroidery, weaving and sewing projects this week and I couldn't be more excited about the progress the kids are making. We also got to meet a new friend to the art room this week: Our Monster from Cotton Monster Jen!
Last week, I had the chance to see my mom who had picked up for me some fun things for my art room: these floats! I'm using them as "flexible seating" for my third graders as they weave.
They were in heaven. So that folks who wanted to sit in the floats could have a turn, I set a timer for every five minutes. I also have a small fort, beach chairs and plenty of pillows for them to pick from. We played music and it was a regular weaving party! If you'd like to learn more about circle loom weaving, check out my blog posts with video.
Even if I did look like a crazy person walking down the halls with these bad boys. I literally couldn't fit through my door!
Since my students are involved in fiber arts projects right now, I'm thrilled to introduce them to Jennifer Strunge. This isn't the first time I've shared her work with my kids. You can see our Monster Sewing Project (with video!) here. We are voting on his name next week after brainstorming tons of ideas! Will keep you posted.
Another thing my mama got for me? This hilariously inappropriate and yet so appropriate t-shirt. The kids had a big laugh over that one.
While my third graders are weaving, my fourth graders are sewing. Some are sewing pizza pillows, donut pillows or, in this case, emojis! I'm hoping to have these complete by this coming week...ready to move on, y'all! Lesson details to come.
My first graders are wrapping up their reversible dot paintings. This is a revamp of a lesson I did years ago with my second graders...I love this project! I'll be creating an updated blog post about this and what we did differently super soon. I purchased the cardboard pizza rounds from Gordon Food Services but you can also found them on Amazon.
Did y'all know I like rainbows? What was the first clue...?
Two of my second grade classes are stitching right now...and totally rocking it. They finished them off this week and they were so proud of themselves. Lesson details to come. I love stitching with kids.
I think the best part of this week was seeing so many projects finally coming to fruition. It's been WEEKS and I'm so excited for these young artists.
Tonight, on Facebook LIVE at 8pm CST, I thought we could talk about how to prepare for a sub. I'll share with you what I do to insure that I'll won't come back to a Hot Mess Express. I'd love to hear your tips. ALSO...I have BIG NEWS about our LIVE chats that I think you are going to love love love! So I'll see you real soon.
My lovely and sweet (ahem) spring-break-ready third graders are starting their string art project this week. We have prepared the boards by painting them (we are using cardboard pizza rounds purchased in bulk via Amazon) and adding texture. We also punctured holes in them to prep them stitching. Next week, we'll sketch out our designs and start stitching. Here's the video I created to introduce the kids to this process. Feel free to use and share in your art teacherin' world.
Even if you don't do this project with the kids, you might wanna watch it for the needle threading trick alone. Or you can just follow me here and catch a short clip.
There are many methods of string art but I'll be introducing my kids to ones that I call Spectrum and Radiating Design. I found the above, the one I call Radiating Design, to be a little more taxing simply because you have to get more yarn to make the lines go all the way around the board.
This one I'm calling Spectrum. This one is fun because you can use a lot of different colors. It's up to the artist just how much stitching happens within the design.
My third graders were at the end of this project when I introduced this new one. So during the second half of one art class, when they were finished with their candy sculptures, I had them quickly color, paint and scrape a texture onto their boards.
Today, the first half of class, we did this. I had a handful of kids that were absent the day so they worked on coloring and painting while the majority did this. Thankfully, we had this project to also work on. Have I ever told y'all that I have a habit of having the kids work in exactly 37 projects at once? I ain't proud.
The kids are stoked! I can't wait to share with you what they create.
So all my students, kinder-town through 4th-grade-land, are participating in International Dot Day. I know several of you art teacherin' peeps are doing the same, amiright? I have absolutely loved dreaming up projects that I hope (fingers and toes crossed) have been artistic, creative, unique and inspiring (our feature Word(s) of the Week for these first four weeks of school). I'll give you a sneak peak of all our projects at the end of the week with complete lessons to come. In the meantime, lemme introduce you to my favorite dot lesson to date, the String-Stitched Dot!
Dude. After seeing this 4th grader's stitched design I've decided I wanna create a stitched color wheel! Doesn't this one totally remind you of that? I love his pattern.
I gave the kids three design options to choose from with the freedom to play with those ideas, change 'em and make them their own. I love how this artist used symmetry and color to create a sunset-esque stitch.
One of the ideas the kids could stitch was one we called "rotating squares". This was not an easy design to stitch but once you got the hang of it, it went by in a flash. None of the kids wanted to stop stitching so many of them thought of ways to enhance that design idea. I liked how Tony found a way to stitch a circle around this squares.
For this lesson, we used the following:
* 10" X 10" cardboard (I did a lil dumpster diving for those)
* Paint and brushes (because the cardboard looked like, well, cardboard. We had to jazz it up.)
* Florescent yarn (because this here art teacher is currently on an '80's kick, can ya tell?)
* Tapestry needles (what big eyes you have! The better to thread you with, my dear.)
* Stitching template (so we all end up with the same 16 evenly spaced lines)
* Masking tape
On our very first day of art, after covering all this biznatch, the kids painted their pieces of cardboard, "thickly and quickly". Meaning, since they had the option of using texture combs, they needed to make sure the paint was thick and wet as the comb can only rake the surface and create super cool textures when it is. Then I gave the kids of using florescent paint to add some splatters as, let's be honest, splatter painting is super rad. AND makes the first day of art just about the best thing everrrrr.
On our second day of art, after our Word of the Week/Artist Inspiration routine, we had to prep our board for stitching. For that, I gave the kids these old coffee container lids with 16 evenly spaced notches drawn with silver Sharpie. The kids were to make sure the circle was placed 2" from the top/bottom and sides (well, hello thar, math connection!) before tracing it and drawing tick marks for the notches.
Once done with that, the kids were given such dangerous art supplies as push pins and needles.
With the push pins, the kids put the initial holes in their boards where the notches were drawn. Because they'd be stitching with thick tapestry needles, I then had them go back and push the needles through the board to make the notches even bigger. From there, the kids had to start plotting their design...
For this, they got a worksheet. Yay, worksheets! They had to complete the directions of each design ("even if I don't want the other designs?!" YES. DO. IT. RIGHT. MEOW.) They were also given the option to come up with their own ideas, or mix and match the ones I suggested, on the right.
To best explain this process, I created a lil video clip. There are several steps so I hope I'm making some sort of sense. I showed the kids the steps to stitching ALL three of these designs that way they could feel free to pick and choose/mix and match once they were on their own.
And now! For a Totally Inappropriate Short Story!
Gather 'round friends, this one's a gem:
So, on that very first day of stitching, when I'm walking the kids through the steps, I thought it might be less confusing for them if I referred each of the 16 holes in their stitching board as a letter. This way they could remember stuff like, "I stitch from A to B, from A to C, back to A then to D", for 'zample. However, whilst in the midst of teaching, I may or may not have mistakenly said this several times (unbeknownst to my innocent babies!):
"You first start at the A-hole. Then you go to the B-hole. Return to the A-hole. REMEMBER! If you are doing a radiating design, you always return to the A-hole."
And I think it was the phrase always return to the A-hole that actually stopped me mid-breath and caused a rash of red to creep over my face. My mind started racing: did I just say the words A-hole to my kids, not once but several times, and neither me nor the kids noticed?! If I don't call it A-hole, what DO I call it? The "A-Spot"? What happens when we get to the letter G?! OMGeee, what am I gonna do?!
And it was then that we began to refer to the notches as numbers. And all was A-hole-free in art land. WHEW.
I gotta say, the kids loved this project. Especially my boys. Which I don't find that surprising as they are always the ones that love any weaving projects we do. It's that working-with-my-hands/math-mind that makes them adore these types of things. Is that sexist? Maybe. Is it true? Yes.
A coupla kids found ways to incorporate their initial in the design. This one kills me ask it looks like the symbol for Anarchy...and this sweet child is the furthest thing from a punky-Anarchist.
I love how this artist played with our school colors to create her design.
And there you have it! A String-Stitched Dot for Dot Day! Do you think this is a project that you'd give a go in your art room? I do believe your kids would dig it.
For our display, I decided to connect the boards together with a coupla paperclips. I love how they look as a group...ready for Dot Day!
And what are you up to for Dot Day? I'd love to know what your kids are creating so puh-lease share, y'all!
