3-D Heart Lesson

My theme this year is 'Use What I have' so for my Art to Remember project this year I decided to use some oil pastel, bright and bold scrapbook paper, and some fun techniques I was reminded of this summer after spending time with Lauralee Chambers or you might know her as @2art.chambers. 

Mrs. Chambers is a genius.  I went to her website to be inspired and sure enough, I ran across this post.  It was perfect. While at the Tennessee Arts Academy this summer Lauralee showed her 'students' how to do a tissue paper bleed. That is what you see in the background of these works of art. I did that for my 3rd grade, but then for my 2nd grade we did another technique inspired by Lauralee as well in her guest blogging lesson 'Alphabet Soup'. I used here marker bleeds for the background with my 2nd grade.

Examples of the Marker Bleed

Examples of the Tissue Paper Bleed

For my 3rd-grade I asked them to do a practice in their sketchbook. The video below is the lesson they did with me. 

The next time they came into class they had the following sketchnote on the smartboard to help guide them through the process. They also are just learning how to keep a sketchbook, so if they completed their final project, they then drew these process steps into their own sketchbook. 

I was trying to give the 3rd-grade students more independence in the Art Studio. I'm still asking them to create a prescribed work in a prescribed way, but they have to go through the process, know where to find resources, and find supplies within the classroom with little help from me.

For the 2nd grade there was a little more step by step and easy completion. This was the video that we used for the 2nd grade. 

Brushes Redux Ornament

For the last week, I have been teaching my 2nd through 5th graders an introduction to an App Called Brushes Redux. It's my favourite free drawing app by far. I love putting this app in my student's hands so if they want to download it at home, there is no charge. 

This lesson was very focused on a couple of technology systems.  I believe you don't teach an App, you teach the systems the app uses. In this case, the BIG one is using layers.  Layers will be found in any Art based program such as illustrator, photoshop, and so on... if students as young as 8 can start learning the power of layers, they can have higher success later in their education career when they are in classes such as media and TechEd in our district. 

The lesson above is what was taught to the kids. It will most certainly have to be paused if used, I go through the information fast.  Every student was amazed and focused during. When you listen to the way I taught, think of what other subjects you could create with your students as the school year continues. Trust me, your kids will love this app (and so will you).

Family Portrait Lesson Plan

Today I am presenting at The Art of Education, #ArtEdNow, an online conference for Art Educators featuring Artist and Art Educators. It's specific PD for Arts Education. That is why I love it, it's presenting to my TRIBE!! 

This conference I will be presenting on family portraits.  This lesson is an opening for a big question, What is Family?  It became more than just a pretty picture and more of a conversation between my students identifying the fact that EVERY family looks different. It was a powerful lesson.

If you are attending the conference today, I'm sure your head is swimming with ideas from all the amazing presenters.  I gave you lot's of tips and tricks that worked well in my classroom for this lesson. Most often when I present, teachers want to get ahold of the resources I used.  In this case, one resource is the Hair Reference Sheet. Because we were drawing Dad's in some of the family portraits, we had to talk about how to draw beards. Also, there are so many more hairstyles than what we see in the classroom, so I designed a sheet focused on different ways to create hair. I also spent a lot of time customizing my instruction to individual instruction with this lesson. I have provided this resource sheet on Teachers Pay Teacher if you are interested, click here for the Hair Reference Sheets. 

I also created the lesson itself. Take a look at the following video to get a short overview of what this lesson looks like.

Most of my lessons are in slide format so you are ready to present this via projection. In this case, I have some slides for students and others for teachers. The blue slides are tips, tricks, and things to consider when you are preparing and teaching this lesson. The white slides are instructions for students, prompts for them, students samples to discuss and the steps to create this final product. I took the time to make this lesson great because it's one that I will be teaching over and over for many years to come... it's that powerful.  I don't often repeat lessons, but I will need to for this one. It's a treasure. If you are interested in this lesson plan, please click here for the Family Portrait Lesson Plan.

If you want both, I have created my very first bundle. This is both the Family Portrait Lesson Plan and Hair Reference Sheets for a reduced price. Click here to go to the bundle. 

Clay Lilly Pads

It is really hard to pick a favorite with these awesome projects this year... this is just another amazing project from Tracy Hare and our 3rd grade, our Visiting Artist for the 2018 clay week, feel free to see all the projects from this year by clicking here. I'm not going to get into how this clay project was created due to the fact that I wasn't there, and it's Tracy's lesson... Let these images be an inspiration for you rather than a lesson plan. What I can share about is our finishing techniques.

We looked at some images of Monet's waterlilies to show that he doesn't always use just green when creating his painting and it would be OK if we used more colors than just green as well for our creations.

Again, we used tempera cakes, explained in the K's, 1st and 2nd-grade lessons from this year (click here). I thought it was interesting how the students used this little lily pad to express a mini ecosystem. Some just had a flower on the pad, but others placed frogs, snails, snakes, and one even had an American flag on it.  It created a lot more work for the painting, so for this project, the decorating took the whole hour.

When finished, I placed them in the mixture of 3 parts water and 1 part pearl medium. See video. 

Take a look at some of their work... 

Clay Week 2018- Tracy Hare

Clay week 2018 was a success! In the next couple of days, I will be sharing the events of the week and the finished products of Clay Week 2018. As some of you know, I'm allergic to clay. I miss working with it so badly, and perhaps I could with just a little itchiness... and slightly puffy eyes. But when I work with class after class in an Art Education way... My eyes swell shut and I have respiratory issues. The last couple of years I have exchanged with another teacher in my district (see previous posts). This year, I invited a fellow Art Teacher into my class as an Artist in Residence!

Tracy Hare is an experienced Art Teacher at Becker Middle School in Becker Minnesota. I have known Tracy professionally and admired her work for years. As I took the job at Prairie View Elementary and Middle School, I learned that I was going to be teaching her kids. How exciting! Mrs. Hare took a year off to pursue other avenues in her life, but it gave her a flexible schedule this year. I proposed a Visiting Artist situation and she excepted... and I'm so glad that she did. 

Tracy visited my classroom for a 6-day rotation working with the elementary students. Because our Middle School portion runs on a quarterly schedule. I was not able to offer them the clay experience.   She worked with K-5th grade and did a different project with every grade level. I can't wait to share the 6 lessons that she did with the kids and a few tips and tricks on the finishing on the projects. 

Monday, May 14th: Kindergarten, Pinch Pots

Wednesday, May 16th: 1st-Grade, Pinch Pot Pets

Friday, May 18th: 2nd-Grade, Clay Succulents

Sunday, May 20th: 3rd-Grade, Clay Lily Pads

Tuesday, May 22nd: 4th-Grade, Underwater Clay Sculptures

Thursday, May 24th: 5th-Grade, Clay Coil Design

They All Saw A Cat- Two Way to Create

I'm catching up with a couple of things from this school year that I just haven't had the opportunity to celebrate. These cats were created earlier this year by the 2nd and 3rd graders.  We did them for our Art to Remember Fundraiser. They turned out wonderful and was a hit with our parents who purchased the products. 

I created this lesson last year and shared it with Art to Remember who has the entire lesson and all the downloads on their website (click here).

I started by reading a book called, They All Saw a Cat by Brendan Wenzel. It's a great book about perception. If you don't have this one, you should think about getting it.  It's beautiful, both in concept and in imagery.

I have taught this lesson many different ways. I have done a very structured version the Art to Remember lesson plan because I wanted the final project to be universally successful. In the past, however, I have taught my students in a more choice based way. This plays into the book a bit better because we can talk about perception a bit more. Both ways were successful and fun for the students.

For the Art to Remember projects, I used tempera cakes and construction paper crayons. These mediums made for a bold image on the ordered products. 

These cats were wonderful and I have heard the excitement from parents over and over.  I heard student exclaim, "This is my favorite Art Project I have ever made." Yes!! That is music to this Art Teachers ears!

Snowman Family - Covering Tints and Overlapping

Tints and Shades are part of the curriculum in 3rd grade.  I have explored this concept so many different ways.  I typically start out with this basic background creating tints from a white circle outwards. I have used this base for a number of things and will continue to repurpose this base again I'm sure. So I created this video just explaining the background of the snowman family project. That way I can use it again for other subjects in the future. 

I also really like the kids explaining what a Tint is in the video.  I tell them to give is a lot of attitudes when they are doing it. Third grade loves this! Gosh, I have fun with my job :) 

The classes start to create their tints. I give each table a different base color. That way we have a  variety of colors in the final display.

In short, I give the table white paint.  They are instructed to make a white circle. Then tablemate number 1 pulls a little color with their brush and mixes it into the white. When fully mixed the whole table adds one ring around the white circle. Then tablemate number 2 pulls a little color and mixes it.  The whole table again adds to the growing circle. This continues until the paper is filled. With clean up, this completes day one of this lesson. 

The second day we learn about overlapping. We practice snowmen in their sketchbooks as shown above.  We do the lesson together the first time, then independently a second time.

Day three of this lesson we hit the ground running.  Students recreate their snowman using the slideshow above and their sketchbooks. This time it's on a white sheet of paper half the size of the painted paper. The students draw, outline in sharpie, and color with colored pencil in using shading. Then we cut and paste it on. Not going to lie, this is a rush to get through in one hour. If possible, try to get the pencil drawing for the snowmen on the final paper on the same day as the sketchbook drawings (that is more for a note for me next time I do this lesson else :)) 

One tip I will share is to make sure the arms of the snowman are under the horizon line. That will make for an easier cutout. 

The end result is so 'kid'... so cute! I love that the kids can show me the concepts covered as well as give their Snowman Family some personalized details.