E2 Channels Calder

  Whale 

Fish

Bird

Owl

Second graders sculpted animals out of wire after looking at Alexander Calder's work and process. We also looked at Picasso's "One Liners", which are a collection of his continuous contour drawings, because it helped students make the connection between drawing with a pencil and drawing with wire.  After they were comfortable drawing an animal in one continuous line, they took a piece of wire and basically traced around their drawing, using tape to hold it in place. When they ran out of wire, I demonstrated how to twist two pieces of wire together in a neat, tight coil instead of a messy braid-like twist. The trick is to make a "+" sign with the two wires and wrap vertically, as opposed to making an "x".

Second Grade's Starry Night

                                     

Second graders painted a master study of Van Gogh's Starry Night. We first analyzed his thick use of paint and expressive brushstrokes that seem to swirl and dance around the picture. They looked carefully at his painting and tried to replicate his vibrant blues and yellows and greens.  We listened to Don McLean's Starry Starry Night while painting and Josh Groban's rendition. I'm such a sap! Above is my Van Gogh bulletin board along with first grade's Sunflowers that you can see here.  What a beautiful mind Van Gogh had to paint this scene, and to think he considered it a failure! 

First-Third: Topographic Models

Third grade

First grade- "I want mine to look like a heart!"

Third grade

Second grade

Second grade 

Elementary students were learning about landforms in their classroom so I thought a fun way to tie in art was to make topographic models. I showed them a slideshow of topographic maps and models and we discussed how the repetition of contour lines progressively becoming smaller or wider creates the illusion of depth and height. Topographers can also use color to show change in the features. To begin, students drew a contour of an imagined organic form, cut it out, traced it onto another sheet of paper and drew a smaller version, continuing this method until they until they went as high as they wanted.  I got a lot of help from Small Hands Big heart!  I think I'm going to have students make a name for their island or mountain and write it on a mini flag. 

Second Grade: Agates

Second graders just learned about rocks in their classroom, including agates. I was asked to incorporate a rock lesson into my class and I chose agates because first- they're stunning, and painting all those skinny layers (of liquid deposits, I learned) encourages focus and sensitivity with the brush.  I first read them the gorgeous book, A Rock is Lively, and then students drew an organic shape on their watercolor paper and another organic shape inside for their crystal. They chose multiple liquid watercolors and started off by painting around the outer inside edge of their agate. They completed one lap with one color before switching to a different color and painted right underneath the first line and so forth. I told the students to be cautious about using too much water because the colors could bleed, which is a beautiful effect, but too much and the layers get all mixed up. Still looks beautiful though! I had students stop when they reached their crystal so the paint could dry before moving on. For the next class, students painted inside their crystal and immediately lay saran wrap on top and scrunched it to get that jagged crystallized effect. Students can also paint another layer of glitter paint so it sparkles like crystals, but it requires another drying time. 

In progress.

All of elementary collaborated in a Louise Nevelson-inspired assemblage. Using found objects that they collected from home, students glued together their assemblage and painted them in our school color- blue. I can't wait to see this hanging up on the wall!

Second Grade: Fox in the Dark

Second graders read The Fox in the Dark and drew a fox of their own with soft pastels. Since the story takes place in the woods, they made leaves out of styrofoam and stamped them around their border. 

2nd Grader's Interpretation of Kandinsky's Houses in Munich

Second graders painted houses inspired by Kandinsky's Houses in Munich. I love how they turned out and the students had a lot of fun being bold with their color choices and brushstrokes and mixing multiple colors to create more interesting variations.  We drew the houses first in pencil, traced it in black crayon, and painted them in with tempera. Once dry, they used a flat brush to add windows. After the windows were dry, they outlined everything with black tempera. It's important to note that when outlining in such a strong color like black, students really need to paint with the tip of their brush and hold it straight up so as to create a thinner line. Adding just a hint of water also helps make the line smooth, otherwise the black will overpower their beautiful colors. That, of course, is challenging for second graders! Maybe next time I'll have students trace with black oil pastel so at least the line quality will be more consistent.

2nd Grade: Positive and Negative Leaf Prints

                                                               

Positive and Negative prints

I borrowed this fantastic idea from the fantastic Cassie Stephens! It's a great lesson- completely student lead and very successful and so satisfying; lifting up that sheet with the printed image never gets old! The night before the lesson I made gelatin (for the first time! Yay!) and by morning it was nice and firm and ready to go.

In the above photo, a student first inked the gelatin with black water soluble printing ink and then arranged her plants on top. 

When she was done, she placed a sheet of paper on top and rubbed it with her hands. We used drawing paper. 

Here she's gently pulling the paper off the gelatin. The gelatin is rubbery so the paper picks up the ink really well leaving a perfect silhouette of the plants. 

Making the negative print was already cool, but Cassie Stephens  had the awesome idea to make a positive image of the leaves as well! As you can see, when the students lifted off the leaves, there was a delightfully beautiful and detailed print of it. 

So purty!!

Other lovely examples.

Students also printed with flowers by pressing them face down on the ink and stamping them onto their paper. 

Art Gala 2014

 Dale Chihuly sculpture made out of plastic bottles in honor of Earth Day. 

 The downstairs hallway was transformed into a prehistoric cave art exhibit. Students had drawn animals on brown paper and made torches with lights inside. As viewers walked through the dark cave, they held their torches up to the wall and paintings of horses, bison, mammoths, and deers were illuminated. 

Kindergarten's paper mache mushrooms.

First grade's studies on Rene Magritte, Aboriginal Handprints, Edgar Degas, Gustav Klimt, and flowers.

 All of Elementary learned about the Terracotta army and each student sculpted a warrior out of terracotta clay. 

Fourth and fifth grade's Lichtenstein inspired self-portraits, value drawings, and Frank Stella paper sculptures.