In the Art Room: Art Show 2017, 3-D Displays

Welcome to the 3-Dimensional display of the Johnson Elementary Art Show! Our annual art show showcases all of the artwork that each of our young artists create throughout the school year. In this blog post, I'll be sharing all of the 3-D work that was displayed in my room...but stay tuned! A post about the incredible 2-D display is up next. This art show is a HUGE undertaking as we share all of the efforts of every student. An art show like this would not be possible without the help of some truly AMAZING moms that spend more hours than you could imagine making the art show a memorable one for our artists. I cannot thank them enough...y'all are truly incredible!

All of the projects you'll see here are ones that were created by my students while viewing the how-to videos I created for them. I'll be adding those videos for you here. Feel free to use them in your art room! I'll be adding more videos like these over the summer so you might want to subscribe to stay tuned. But enough about that, let's take a tour of the Johnson Elementary Art Show 2017, 3-D Displays!

I hope you liked the tour. If you have any questions, feel free to leave them in the comments! 

This project was a hit with the kids...and one that my current third graders are asking if they will get to do next year. I had several kiddos sewing at home and bringing in the pillows and monsters they had created there. It was so fun to teach them this life skill. Here is the video they viewed:

Their creativity really blew me away. By the way, if you teach a fourth grader how to make a pom-pom, it can be a dangerous thing.

By the way, y'all know that big bunned monster is my #lifegoals, right?!

This display is one of my faves. It showcased the sculptural work of my kindergarten, second and third grade students. My kindergarten kids created the monarch butterflies:

That was a one-day project that the kids really enjoyed. 

 My P.E. buddy Ali Starkweather painted the rainforest backdrop that you see. Isn't it amazing? It went so well with the theme of our exotic birds and reptiles! 

 Let's talk about these clay projects. The third graders created these clay chameleons which were one of my faves. 

We used a combo of Mayco's Stroke and Coat glazes and their Jungle Gems for a speckled look. 

 I really stressed a three coat minimum for glazing and I think that's why the kids were so successful in having such beautifully glazed pieces. They take so much pride in their clay work that I usually don't have to ask them to redo...they are dedicated to making them awesome!

Also on display were these birds. Y'all, these were the comedic hit at the show, they are so fun and funny. They really came to life when the kids painted them and added the feathers and beads. Here is the video lesson:

A couple of my kindergarten classes had extra days with clay so we made a second clay project: these turtles! Their other project was hung in the hallway, I'll be sure to share that with you in the following blog post. 

Those turtles were super fun to create...I loved seeing the glaze effects on the texture. 

The first graders created the most incredible fish so they needed a sweet display to show them off. The kids created the painted bubble paper hat covered the tables. 

 For these, the fish were glazed but the bases were painted with metallic watercolor. Here's the lesson video:

My second graders had just completed their ceiling tile project and had traced templates for that project. I had 65 templates...so, instead of throwing them away, I had the kids paint them as their last project.  

We hung them above the first grade fish! Here's the video used for the ceiling tile project:

These might be my favorite ceiling tiles to date! 

For the fourth grade bobble heads, these were displayed on my counter. I covered my cabinets with white paper and works of art by both kindergarten and second grade. 

Um, that one has a top hat, a bowtie and a monocle. Perfection. Video here:

This is another project I think my younger kids are gonna wanna create. These were so fun! 

I love all the extra cat bowls for this one!

On the cabinets, the kinders created the Arlo Needs Glasses paintings and the second graders did the black glue and chalk fish. Here are the videos:

The kids loved this project!

Sandra Silberzweig is a favorite artist of mine...and my students. 

On another set of tables covered in pink, my fourth graders had their plaster candy hearts on display. 

Also featured on the pink paper were the plaster candies that my third graders created...they really looked good enough to eat!

 Puffy paint for the win, y'all. 

The days following the art show, I invite the classroom teachers to bring their students during my planning time. Together, we teachers work in an assembly line wrapping clay projects, stuffing them into the bags and stapling the labels on top while the kids wait on the floor. It usually takes about 7 minutes to get a class done. The kids then take their 3-D work home safely. 

Stay tuned for the what's up next: a post and video of our 2-D work...until then, here's a tour of last year's 3-D display, enjoy!

2019 Art Show: 2-D Work!

 Serving up the final installment of our 2019 art show for y'all today! This here is the 2D portion of our art show where every work of art that every kiddo has created all year long is on display! You can check out our Glow Gallery Tour and our Pirate Gallery Tour here! 

In this blog post, I thought I would share a link to each and every one of these lessons you see! This will give you an idea of what projects I teach (2D, that is) throughout the year. If you are interested in details on this art show: how it's hung, who does the hangin', how it's taken down and sent home, then you might want to watch this tour I created to answer those questions for you:

Please feel free to leave any questions about what you see here or on my YouTube channel and I'll be sure to answer them.

 Let's take a tour of theses projects! We'll start with kindergarten. My kindergarteners always have the biggest amount of artwork because their lessons are shorter. I started the beginning of the year with my lessons on line. Those projects did not make it to the art show as they were sent home at the start of the school year. From there, we did the rainbow lesson and Mouse Paint project. 

 One of the more popular lessons for kindergarten on my blog is this one. This lesson is always followed by my Chicka Chicka Boom Boom project which you can find here.  

 Our snowmen were a lot of fun to create this year too. We learned all about the cold colors and painting spiral lines. 

 A new lesson I came up with this year were the heart prints. We were able to get many prints created and used our two favorites for our work of art. 

With our printing plates, we created these beauties! Super fun and stunning!

 The kindergarten gallery is almost always my favorite! 

 Although first grade sure does take a close second. Let's talk about their projects. One of my favorites this year were our Mad Scientists! 

 A classic that we've done many years in a row are our Royal Self-Portraits. I love that we have two selfies in this art show: one as royalty and one as kid-genius. Perfect for my kids!

We also did those heart weavings that you see with the stitched edge. With the heart we cut out from our construction paper for the weaving, we created these Romero Britto inspired pieces. You can see a variation of that lesson here. 

All of the artwork and the kids who created them make me this happy. 

The big penguins you see were created from this lesson here. 

 Let's move on down to second grade! These kids had many works of art both in the Glow and Pirate Gallery that their wall seems a little empty. Don't let that fool you: we are always crankin' out some art!

 Our Super Hero Selfies can be found here while our Chris Uphues Hearts are here. 

 This printmaking lesson is one of our favorites. We seem to improve up on it each year! 

 And this lesson is from my String and Stitch Lab for Kids book! Check it out! 

It's a pretty colorful hallway!

Speaking of, let's move on down to third grade! You'll notice these kids also did the Chris Uphues lesson...in fact, all of my students did as it was a sub plan. 

One lesson of mine that was especially popular was the landscape project! I had run out of paper (omg, an art teacher without PAPER, hello!) and had a lot of cardboard pizza rounds...so we improvised! 

The kids also created those amazing Sandra Silberzweig-inspired self portraits!

 My students did two kinds of weaving, tree weaving and circle weaving. Two kid favorites. These are also featured in my new book! 

 One lesson that I'll be sharing soon is this one! If you can't wait, then check out this blog post as this lesson is a variation. 

 

 This is another lesson that I'm excited to share with you soon! 

 This third grade display brings me so much happiness!

 My fourth graders spent the start of their school year making pillows! We made pizza, donut and emoji pillows, all of which are in my sewing book. 

 One of my favorite lessons this year was our Snow Globe project!

 While planning our snow globes, we made tiny paintings that we later used for our marble still life lesson. 

 Our Fauve-style self portraits were a lot of fun to create too. 

I hope you enjoyed this art show tour! Be sure and check out the other posts to see all the other works of art these artists created. 

In the Art Room: Walk Like an Egyptian

Our amazing second grade singing and dancing to a rewrite of the Bangles hit "Walk Like an Egyptian."

 Well, here it is, folks, the final installment of The Art Show. It seems like a million years ago that I shared  Part 1 and Part 2 of our school wide art show with you. I decided to save my favorite part of the art show for last: the second grade production "Walk Like an Egyptian."

This year, in the art room, our theme was Ancient Egypt. I chose that theme because of an amazing exhibit at The Frist Center for Visual Arts. Not only did my second through fourth grade students visit this exhibit, but the entire school studied Egypt throughout the year. My first graders created Egyptian Landscapes and Nile Crocodile puppets. The third graders created a life-sized sarcophagus. Egyptian god portraits were created by my fourth grade students. And the second grade created Egyptian collar necklaces and gave this magical performance.

 I wrote this short and silly play set up just like the game show "Jeopardy". The program began with the two hosts (shown on the left) kicking off with the song "Walk like an Egyptian" Our fabulous music teacher rewrote the lyrics to The Bangles song (you know, because that little bit about "smoking on a hookah pipe" just might not go over well) and taught the kids the lyrics. One of our incredible second grade teachers taught the kids some sweet dance moves.

After that intro, King Tut (our friend in the middle) comes out as the Alex Trebek of the show. He lobbed questions, as well as some jokes, at the contestants: Cleopatra, a Mummy and Queen Nefertiti. The kids sang a rewrite of Steve Martin's "King Tut" ("he's my favorite honkey" didn't seem like the best thing for the kids to be singing, 'specially since dude was Egyptian). The show ended with the mummy busting free of her bandage strips (er, toilet paper) and stealing the show as well as winning the prize of 100 shabti (shown on the right).

After the production, the kids were all smiles, even the toothless variety.

 The play was a ton of fun and a huge hit, especially with the performers. They lit up the stage with their excitement and enthusiasm. It was such a delight to work with the incredible music, P.E., second grade and many other teachers in the school to make this play possible.

Egyptian collar necklaces are now the latest in second grade fashion.

 My part in preparing the kids for the program was the costuming. I knew I wanted to keep it simple for the parents, so I asked the kids wear over sized t-shirts, shorts and sandals on the day of the performance. During art class, we studied the history of Egyptian jewelry with a focus on Egyptian collar necklaces and scarab beetle jewelry.

Okay, I'm not a macaroni-art kind of teacher but I will admit, this was kind of fun. If you do this, do not use the textured pasta as it cracks when it dries.

 One group of kids was given a wide variety of colorful pasta that they glued onto their gold-painted cardboard collars. We chatted about patterning and design.

 Once the glue dried, we added designs to our necklaces by printing. The kids used cardboard, q-tips and marker caps dipped in gold paint to create their unique designs.

 Knowing that they were going to be wearing their creations in their performance, the kids really worked hard on crafting beautiful necklaces.

The little actor that played King Tut is the son of one sweet mama. She came up with the pipe cleaner idea as a way to hold the necklaces on. She simply hole punched, fed the pipe cleaner through one side and twisted to keep it in place. The other side she left like a hook. This way the kids could take their necklaces on and off on their own.

 Some of my other classes created these scarab beetle necklaces. For these, the kids used cardboard to cut out the shape of wings. These cardboard shapes were then wrapped in tin foil and then colored with sharpie. Can you guess what the beetle's body is...? One of the many uses for bottle caps in the art room!

Two proud Egyptians showing off their necklaces.

I love the anch design, don't you?

 This program was such fun and a great way to kick off the art show. However, having an art show AND a performance on the same day most certainly gave me some new gray hairs. So, while I'd love to work with these amazing kids and teacher on another production again...let's just say I might pick a less insanely busy day. Thanks for dropping by.