Scratch Art Snowmen with Albrecht Dürer

     Before the 4th grade artists began their snowmen (where we relied completely on lines to create our images), they enjoyed looking at some of the incredible drawings and prints of Albrecht Dürer.  We were all amazed by the depth and value he was able to create with line.  After creating a plan drawing on regular drawing paper, the students began scratching their snowman ideas onto Scratch Art paper.  They were challenged to show at least three different values by creating different kinds of scratches or marks.

      For the paper behind their snowmen, the students mixed lots of cool colored paints and really enjoyed making abstract paintings.  They also had glitter glue, glitter liquid watercolors, and acrylic glitter medium to mix in with their paint if they wanted.  When the paintings were dry, they attached the snowmen with 3D Dots.

     These Scratch Art snowmen were inspired by the wonderful Totem Pumpkins from the Fun Art 4 Kids blog by Lori in Montrose, PA!  Thank you Lori!

The Tooth Fairy...According to Kindergartners!

     As a follow up to the step-by-step self-portraits our kindergartners previously made, they were challenged to use what they learned about drawing the human body, and they drew the mysterious and rarely seen tooth fairy.  I asked the students to draw the tooth fairy the way she (or he) really looks and to also show us where the tooth fairy lives.  I took some dictation from each student about their artworks, and as you can imagine, the students have some fascinating theories about their tooth fairies! 



My tooth fairy is smiling.  At night, she gets all the teeth and she brings them to her little house.  When she gets home she puts them in a pile of shiny teeth.  And then at the morning time, the teeth go in a palace.  That’s it!



She has her wings and she's carrying a tooth with her.  She forgot to go to the other kid's house, but now she's off work.  She's flying to the busy fairy.  It's night time.  Then she went to her house and she slept and woke up and there was all kinds of things in her house that she didn't know.  That's the end of my story.

My tooth fairy is going outside.  She is going to find a tooth.  She puts the teeth in her house.  During the day, she goes outside and finds more teeth.  She finds them on the ground.  She has a family.  She has a sister.  They like to play checkers.

My tooth fairy likes teeth and she likes to pick flowers.  She likes to go to people’s houses and get their teeth.  She likes the stars.  She uses her wand to get to people’s houses.  She sneaks the teeth out from under their pillows.  She likes her family.  She likes to read books to them.

My tooth fairy lives in a school.  There is a bubble coming out of the school.  She takes the teeth into the school and the moon shines on it and the stars.  She likes to collect teeth.  She has a lot of wings so she can fly better.  The flags wave when somebody lost a tooth, and that's how she knows.  She has a mask on just in case the teeth are smelly.  There is a big tooth that she accidentally dropped.

He can fly.  I don't know why I made him a boy.  He has short sleeves and it's night time.  He keeps the teeth in a basket.  Then he puts them in his house.  He keeps them in a drawer.  He doesn't have a family and he doesn't need friends. 

I like my tooth fairy because the sun rises in the morning, like right now.  I like my tooth fairy because the castle is pink and purple.  I like my tooth fairy castle because it has flags on it.  She gets teeth and then she turns them into presents and then gives them to the kids.  I like my tooth fairy because her house has orange windows.

     The kids colored the small shapes in their drawings with glitter crayons, and then they painted with regular and metallic watercolor paints.

Wild Things!

     The Wild Things are one of my absolute favorite art lessons to do.  I've done this project every year and I am always thrilled with the amazing wild things the kids create.  This year is no exception!  We start out by reading Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak, and we talk about what a neat job he has as an author illustrator.  We also talk about the wild things and how they are similar and different from other living things.  When the kids created their wild things drawings, they were sure to include the details that living things need (eyes, nose/beak, mouth, tummy, etc.).  They also included at least two patterns on their creatures, and then created environments for them with a background.

      I won a Young Audiences of Northeast Ohio lesson plan contest with this lesson my first year.  You can find the lesson here!

    
     We also had "wild rumpuses" in each 1st grade class!  We chose physical movements and repeated them like patterns to music.  I took some really great photos of the kids, and Mrs. Baker is helping me create a Photostory with them...so check back for that soon!

Expressive Portrait Paintings

     I am so excited about the work our fifth graders did with these expressive portraits!  The kids worked really hard at the new strategy of drawing with a grid, and I couldn't believe how well they did with it.  For these artworks, we looked at the portrait works of Roy Lichtenstein and Norman Rockwell, and particularly looked at how expressive the subjects are in those works.  I then photographed each student making an expression, we gridded them, and the students got to work.  We cropped the photos (like Lichtenstein) so that the viewer would really focus on the great expressions.

     The students used tempera paints to make these artworks so vibrant.  Each student mixed colors and tried to match the colors from their photos.  We also experimented with using water to make colors more translucent.

     When their paintings were finished, the students completed Venn Diagrams comparing and contrasting Roy Lichtenstein and Norman Rockwell in support of our district-wide effort to use Marzano-inspired teaching strategies.