Hi, friends! I mightah told y'all that we're on a bit of a Rousseau-tiger-y kick at my school these days. If you follow me here, I've shared tons of photos of my young artists tiger-tastic work. Last week I shared the relief sculpture tiger pieces created by my fourth graders. I'll be certain to share all the deets on the other projects as well but for today, I thought I'd start with y'all the biggest hit: The First Grade Henri Rousseau Jungle Mural!
A lil back story: we have our school Open House after the first month of school. I try my hardest to have a work of art hung by each student for the occasion. The last couple of years, we've done Dot Day. This year, I decided to opt for a different theme: Henri Rousseau's jungle paintings. I chose this for a couple of reasons. I'm emphasizing that Art is an Adventure and that artists are too! Also, the tigers are our school mascot so it looks fab-o and school-spirit-esque to see them plastered on the walls of our school. Having an over-arching theme for all grade levels really helps me keep my learning targets in line (5 different art lessons is enough! You add 5 different themes/topics/cultures/etc. and my lil mind is blown). So, Rouseau-inspired tigers it was!
And first grade totally nailed it. To start, we began the school year by painting and texturing papers. The first grade was allowed to pick from a variety of warm colored pieces of construction paper. They added white, yellow and red to these papers in any way they decided. These were used as the basis for our tiger drawings. To better explain the process, I created a video! This video is in kid-friendly format so feel free to share in your art room with your students.
I'd love to hear your thoughts on the video! I created this just for y'all...so please let me know what you like, what you'd like to see more of and if you'd like me to pretty please stop. By the way, sometimes my videos go up on my youtube channel before they debut here. If you subscribe to my channel, you'll be the first to view...lucky you!
In case you can't stand the sound of my voice, I've got snaps of the drawing steps. I drew with the children while they sat on the floor with their papers and oil pastels in front of them. We emphasized each element of art as we drew. This was a great way to introduce the elements of art by demonstrating them in our drawings!
When using oil pastels, I always emphasize that we are not to wipe the oil pastels as they'll smear. My fave oil pastel brands are Sakura but I do love Gallery's fluorescent oil pastels. That's what's used on the eyes and the nose. So bright and the viscosity is very smooth.
We used black last because it can be the most disastrous as far as smearing goes. The kids were really excited to use black as suddenly their drawings came together.
I love the sweet personality of each tiger! Once the drawing was done, we used our green painted papers to create leaves for our tigers. These were added either in front or behind our tigers.
From there, we added a tail and glued that to the back of our tigers.
We used some scrap paper to create the tails.
For the tail, we talked about line and the kids drew any kind of line they wanted. Then they created a parallel line to follow the first. Then zigzag stripes were added.
Once the tigers were complete, the mural was ready to be created. We spent one 30 minute class painting huge sheets of bulletin board paper green. The kids loved it! They called it a Painting Party and attacked those large sheets of paper with a ton of energy.
The following class, we dialed it way down and talked about pattern. I started an organic leafy design on each paper that was green and a star pattern on each paper that was blue. The kids were given small brushes and asked to create a pattern of the original design.
The next morning, I got to school about an hour before it started, got super jacked up on coffee and busted that mural out. I laid 12' sheets of paper on the floor, one for each class.
I started by gluing down the night sky papers with my high temp glue gun. Then the land papers were added. To finish, I went over each land form in either black or white paint.
HOWEVER, once the tigers were added, they completely vanished into the busy background! I was so sad! So I decided to outline each of the tigers in black paint. Again, this took no time because I had injected coffee straight into my eyeballs. Turns out you can run laps around the universe if you do that, who knew?!
Lil known fact: Halloween is the most celebrated holiday at Casa de Cassie. Not cuz we decorate all crazy-like (although the hubs' secret dream is to operate his own haunted house. Dream job goals, y'all. We all got 'em!). No, it's because we absolutely love going to haunted housing events with our fave being Universal Studios' Halloween Horror Nights.
Opening weekend was this past weekend and we were extra stoked because this year is the 25th year they've been running Halloween Horror Nights outta Orlando. Which could only mean one thing: tons more scariness. This year did not disappoint with nine haunted houses, most based on Universal flicks: The Purge, Insidious, Freddy vs. Jason, American Werewolf in London and others based on the Walking Dead and other spooky themes. Between walking from one haunted house to the next, there are themed areas called scare zones. So, in short, you are constantly being chased by scary chainsaw wielding maniacs. For example...
Mitch (the hubs) was all, "Hey! You need photos for your blog. Just stand riiiiiiiight there and smile."
Me: Are you done yet? Pretty sure that's enough photos. For realz. WHY ARE YOU STILL TAKING PHOTOS, WHAT'S BEHIND ME?
This lovely new friend of mine was just one of the awesome scare actors in the Shady Acres scare zone where the concept was inmates from the local asylum had escaped. Turns out she just wanted to show off her chain saw handling skillz...on my face.
Just a short clip to give you more of an idea. No videos or photos are allowed in the haunted houses...after all, you're there to "enjoy" them, not film 'em. But take my word for it, they were super scary.
After that super scary night, we went to Disney's Not-So-Scary event. Now, I might be a lil biased because I'm kinda bananaz for Disney but this event was so great! Families get all dressed up and trick or treat at the various treat-giving locations. Also, ALL of the characters are out for you to get your photo with. What that meant for us was that most folks were so busy with the candy and the photo ops that they weren't in line for the rides. We had a 5 minute wait on Space Mountain, Thunder Mountain and The Haunted Mansion which, if you've ever been to any Disney, you know that's unheard of.
The maids of the Haunted Mansion (my absolute favorite-est ride with It's a Small World coming in at a close second) were decked out and so fun to chat with. I love how they immediately snapped into character when they realized Mitch was snapping photos!
Boom! Nailed it!
They also had tons of scare-actors out and about! There was this fabulous ghost story teller outside of the Haunted Mansion that was a total riot. And a traveling troupe of Civil War ghosts who sang western tunes acapella. But the parade and the fireworks were my fave.
But the best thing was getting to eat at Be Our Guest. Y'all. It's like Mission Impossible to get a reservation here. But right before we left our hotel, Mitch decided to all them on a whim and ask if they had anything available. The hostess informed us that they'd just had one spot open up! I enjoyed dining in there so much that I didn't even think to snap a single photo but you can see more of the place here.
Oh, look! Mitch and I posing in front of obnoxiously phallic tikis! Thank you for letting me blabber on about our lil scary-cation and show off my Zombie print dress. Y'all are the best.
Currently, my eyeballs feel like they are made of broken glass and are just barely staying open. However, I'm thrilled to say that pulling those close to 12 hour days at school this week has paid off: All of my students 400 Henri Rousseau-inspired masterpieces are up and on display for our Open House! Whew! If you follow me here, you've seen my students progress. We've all learned about the artist and created a tiger-tastic work of art (side note: our school mascot is also a tiger and we have a Tiger Run coming up next month. So now the halls are decked out for that occasion as well!). I'll be sharing each of the projects here over the next coupla weeks so stay tuned! Today, I present to you the work of my fourth grade artists!
To conquer this Jungle-tastic Project, we used the following supplies: * Model Magic by Crayola * Sax Versa Temp paint * Chalk pastels * Oil pastels * 9" X 12" painted construction paper * 9" X 12" poster board to back the construction paper
This project began on the very first day of art when, after covering the rules and such, we set about making painted paper. This idea of painting paper on the very first day came from my good friend and art teacherin' genius Laura Lohmann.
My Monday and Tuesday classes painted a variety of green papers for our jungle-y projects (used mucho by my third graders for their project, details to come) while my Wednesday and Thursday kids painted orange papers. My fourth graders ended up using these as the background for their collages.
We painted, we scraped with texture combs, we tried out different paint application techniques.
We pulled prints which we thought was just about the coolest thing ever and that was it for our first day! On our second day of art, we learned more about the artist Henri Rousseau and studied his jungle paintings. I even created a Jungle Lounge in my art room for the occasion!
Complete with Clean Up Gong, of course. Over the next two art classes, the students were allowed access to a ton of books featuring photos of tigers and information about their habitats and eating habits. With that in mind, they were given about golf ball size of Model Magic to create their tiger. I did show them some simple basics but really encouraged them to experiment, look at the visuals and come up with a creation of their own. The following art class, those were painted. I thought the students would spend about thirty minutes painting but they were so excited to do detailed work on their tigers that they ended up using the entire 60 minutes to paint!
They might have been a lil influenced by this guy hanging out in the Jungle Lounge.
The kids have been spending the first 5-7 minutes of each class in the lounge sketching in their newly created sketchbooks! They love this area. I can't wait to create some more seating for them.
Creating the background took the kids another 60 minutes. They were allowed to pick any of the textured and painted papers they created on that first day to serve as their background. Then they could use either all warm or all cool colored chalk for their sky. Once the sky was complete, the kids could create the land portion of their work with any colors they liked.
We talked a lot about the habitats of tigers and again studied the visuals. The kids created lakes, rivers, jungles, mountain ranges, you get the idea. I was so impressed with their diverse ideas.
I mean, check out this: I was informed by the artist that her tiger was jumping from a rock to the top of a tree. This is her ariel view.
Once the chalk portion was complete, the kids were allowed to add more plants with oil pastels. They also used some remnants of the painted paper to create plants, trees, suns or moons and whatever else they could dream up.
Once both the background and the tiger were complete, the kids brought their tigers to me and told me where to hot glue them to the work. I also hot glued their work to a pieces of poster board as the construction paper was not strong enough to support the weight of their tiger. It was a little bit of added work on my part but I didn't mind. We were just so happy with the end result! Have y'all used Model Magic before? I'd love to hear about your projects, I'm always looking to steal, er, borrow new ideas!
Well, y'all, the results of the What the Art Teacher(s) Wore//Back to Art Teacherin' Contest are in! Thank you so much to all of you who entered and took the time to vote! Without further ado, I present to you our winners: First Place with 994 votes, Katie Romanic! Her hand painted zentangle-inspired dress, bow and shoes were adorable. Katie will not only be featured in School Arts Magazine but also receive a free year's subscription. Congrats, Katie!
Second Place with 934 votes, David Meade! It was a seriously close race between David and Katie. David also created his colorful look by crocheting his beret and making his mustache. He also wears that apron everyday to teach art! David will also be featured in School Arts Magazine. Congrats to you, buddy!
Third Place winner is Cheryl Buchett! Cheryl's hand sewn dress in that super cute art teacher print was definitely a hit! You'll be seeing Cheryl in School Arts Magazine as well! Congrats, friend!
Fourth Place winner is Dorie Mishael! Everyone was just smitten with Dorie's hair, handmade skirt and Kandinsky-inspired rug! Her colorful personality shines through in her clothing and her classroom environment! You'll also find Dorie featured in School Arts soon! Congrats, Dorie!
