This is a very large canvas we painted during our summer camp! A family donated some big canvases that they decided not to use at home. This canvas is about 5 feet tall! This was available for the kids to work on throughout the week during summer camp when kids wanted to take a break from the other proejcts they were doing. It is now proudly hanging in our stairwell.
My 1st graders are working on these fun boats now to go along with their explorer unit. Okay, I know they are not really explorer ships, but we can pretend, right? And they are so fun and cute. The kids love them! How to Make a Boat:  Gather empty milk cartons from the lunch room. Wash and wash again to get rid of all those icky germs. Let dry overnight.  Use a utility knife to cut the milk carton down … Read more…
At the end of the year last school year, I passed out Summer Art Challenge sheets. Each of the students who participated received a certificate and a prize or two or three depending on how much of the challenge they completed. Visit this past blog post to read about the challenge activities. Here is the certificate I passed out. I blocked off my name and the school name/year, so you can use this award sheet and just add your name … Read more…
This summer I taught a one week art workshop called Artsy Animals. The camp had kids going in to grades 1-4 and it took place for 3 hours every day. Now camp was much more laid back than regular art class, so we did not accomplish *as much* as 3 hours of school time, but I think the kids had a really good time. We made Shrinky Dink necklaces! Each student got one sheet of Shrinky Dinks Crystal Clear paper. … Read more…
I have more pictures to show you from the Lego Brickworld Convention that was held in Schaumburg, IL this summer. If you love Legos, be sure to check out my first post about this convention. I know some art teachers make mosaics with their students, so I decided to group all of the photos I took of the Lego mosaic art that was at this convention. At the bottom of this post, I have a few links to some ways … Read more…
Are you a fan of Legos? Did you know there is a new documentary film coming out July 31 called Beyond the Brick: A Lego Brickumentary? You can see the official trailer here. Have you heard of the Lego Brickworld Convention? In June, I went to the Lego Brickworld Convention in Schaumburg, IL. My husband went for the entire 4 day convention as an exhibitor with his Lego User Group. I attended with my kids for the afternoon on the … Read more…
Summer is the perfect time to create art with your child. Nature provides endless inspiration for art. Here are three fun art activities using leaves that you can do with kids or just on your own! This post was created as part of the Elmer’s Crafty Bloggers team. Learning Activity Topic: Using nature to inspire art Educational Foundation: 1. Identifying and sorting items from nature 2. Using shapes and variety to create a composition 3. Learning about negative and positive … Read more…
My third graders ended the school year learning a little about the symbolism of the sun in Mexican pottery. The sun has been used as a symbol of the life-giving energy and of good luck. Cassie Stephens has a very good Prezi here about Metepec, Mexico. To make these colorful, sunny pictures we started by tracing a circle shape for the face of the sun. Then we designed our faces with unique facial expressions, rays and other designs. We talked … Read more…
I am going to introduce this summer art challenge to my students next week. I did this summer art challenge a couple of years ago and we had a lovely display in the fall. The parents of the kids who participated thanked me for the ideas. Whenever their kids said they were bored, they told them to pick something from the list. It’s been awhile since I updated the list of challenges, so I went over it today to freshen … Read more…
Our last summer art workshop was a fun one! We decoupaged tissue paper on to glass vases. The cylindrical ones could be candle holders. We tore and cut tissue paper and adhered them to the glasses with Matte Medium. I hate the smell of mod-podge, so I rarely use it. I get headaches from it, does anyone else? I figure if I get headaches from it, it probably is not good for the kids to inhale. This Blick Matte Medium … Read more…
I am teaching 3 summer art sessions. Each session is two hours long with one or two art projects. For this session, I had 2 students going into 4/5th grade, 2 students who just finished kindergarten, and one student going into kindergarten. It was a small class, which was perfect for this project, since the pictures were LARGE. To start, we traced our bodies on large butcher paper. Then, we outlined them with markers and used collage materials (magazine images, … Read more…
 Another fun activity we did at art summer camp was blowing ink with straws. First, squirt out a bit of liquid watercolor (we did not dilute it at all). Then, take a straw and hold it right above the ink and BLOW! See what happens! You can embellish them with writing, drawing or more paint. We also used paint dabbers to add circles. Fun Fun Fun!  Some of the kids also worked with calligraphy pens and inks during this time. … Read more…
box of stickers This was a super fun art project that I forgot to blog about earlier. We did this at the summer art class I taught at my school. Tape and sticker pictures. I wrote about tape and sticker pictures earlier which I love to do with my 20 month old daughter. The above picture is a box of stickers I made. I took some sticky address labels, and color photocopied some patterned paper onto the sticky labels. Then, … Read more…
I am teaching 2 days of art camp in the afternoons this week. On Monday, one of the projects we made were sun tiles. I picked up some glossy ceramic tiles from the hardware store. They looked at a few pictures of Mexican clay suns and they sketched their sun idea on a piece of paper. Then, using pencil and sharpie markers, they drew their sun on the tile. On the back of the tile I superglued a picture hanger. … Read more…
