As school is starting soon, I thought I would start a new series of blog posts about some of my favorite fabulous things. I LOVE art books and have so many of them. Our school library also has a great collection of books I can use. Here is a list (in no particular order) of books that I refer to frequently when I need a boost of inspiration. There are many more exciting books for art teachers, but here … Read more…
In honor of the new school year I am giving away two books to ONE lucky person! To enter, leave a comment on this blog post. I LOVE Sark. So inspirational, colorful and fun! The first book is called “Juicy Pens, Thirsty Paper” which is about writing. I picked this up from a library sale, so it is a discarded library book with a little bit of water damage. I personally don’t care if a book has a bit of … Read more…
I never posted about these fabric collages that we finished at the end of the year last year. The third and fourth graders made these. We worked together to paint fabrics! We painted with acrylic paints on muslin fabric. We sprayed the fabric with water to allow the paint to spread more easily. We made graffiti fabrics! We had lots of painted fabrics at the end. We even painted over ugly patterned fabrics. Then, we chose our pieces and cut … Read more…
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to be a teacher? My mom gave me this old gem written by Yours Truly when I was in 3rd grade. (My 3rd grade teacher had the initials ABC which everyone thought was really cool.) Lessons learned: It is very important to let your students write in pen. Make sure you have “neat” ways of doing things. Your students should use Trapper Keepers. Let your students go to the bathroom in … Read more…
Thank you for following my blog. I checked today and saw that I now have 500 followers.. holy cow! I hope you are having a fantastic summer. School starts in 2 weeks, so I will have lots of new art projects to show you. And here is a reminder for you:
At the end of the school year, we made more PAPER PULP PICTURES. This is such a fun project. I wrote all the step-by-step details on my blog last year. You can see the tutorial HERE. this girl made a 3-d paper pulp sculpture of a cat!
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’m trying to clear out some of my inventory in my Etsy Shop for the end of this cycle of goods. Would you be interested in some vintage ephemera? Or maybe a collage pack? Or maybe you would be interested in some of my ACEOs? To receive 35% off your order, type in coupon code: JulySpecial at the checkout! There won’t be another sale like this until Black Friday.
Thank you to Mrs. Jahnig for this wonderful idea. I had pinned this monoprinting technique on my Pinterest board, but now it appears the link to her blog is gone. Are you out there Mrs. Jahnig? Anyways, today was another one of my summer art workshops with kids at school. We did monoprinting with markers. 1. Draw on a piece of plexi-glass with washable markers. In progress design. 2. Spray your paper with water, two or three sprays. Then, flip … Read more…
This was another fun project at the end of the year. The 5th/6th grade students marked off a one inch grid on their white paper. Then, they chose a photo to enlarge and draw. It could be a person (some chose a parent, others chose famous people) or it could be an animal. I photocopied grids on to transparencies and these were taped on top of their photo. Then, they drew their picture square by square. There are many resources, … 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…
This was one of my FAVORITE lessons this year. I just loved how each and every one of them turned out. They are so expressive and colorful. This is a new spin on a Starry Night lesson. I started by introducing Vincent Van Gogh’s art by showing prints of his art and by showing a movie: Then, the students drew swirls, dashed and dots to create MOVEMENT using markers. I told that this would be their night sky, so they … Read more…
What are you reading this summer? Check out my personal art blog for a new series called “What’s on Your Bookshelf?” Here you can read my book reviews and add your own review.
Did you know I have an art teacher blog directory on my blog? There are over 240 art teacher blogs added. If you have not added yours, you should do so! This is probably my most viewed page on all my blog, so I know a lot of people check it out for new blog reading. I hope you are having a GREAT summer and finding time to do artsy things. My latest project is making a scrapbook of … Read more…
