I hope you are having a good summer. I have spent some time doodling with watercolors, my favorite artsy thing to do. Today I am going to show you how I transform puddles of watercolor to flower doodles. Here is an example of a finished watercolor flower doodle. This step-by-step is fun, summery art project for you or your kids to try. I like to share what is fun and exciting for me, because maybe you will take something from … Read more…
What can you make with patterned tape and wood scraps? This is an open-ended project that is sure to delight your kids. For some reason, colorful patterned tape is very appealing to kids (and many adults.) Materials used: Mat Boards (donated from a frame shop) Scrap wood (donated and picked up from an art supply swap) Colored and patterned Tape The students selected pieces of wood and then wrapped the blocks in colorful tape. These pieces were taped or … Read more…
Several weeks ago I was looking for a monthly planner to use as a Girl Scout leader. Nothing I found had everything I wanted: monthly calendar pages, space for writing notes, attendance roster, contact information list, meeting agenda plans, badge & award trackers… so I decided to make my own! I sent all of my pages to a printer and got mine printed in a spiral bound book. The PDF of this adorable monthly planner is available in my TPT … Read more…
Here is a fun and easy project that I taught to my 2nd graders. We used regular firing clay and gloss glazes. Here is a video I made for my students to demo how to make the wall hangings. This was before I got my new camera so the quality isn’t as great. Cassie Stephens has done a similar wall hanging project with just the initials. Next year, I might try that!
It’s summer time! This wrapped up my 10th year of teaching at my current school and 13 1/2 years teaching total. The good news is that since I was so busy this year, I have a huge backlog of art projects to share with you. I will probably write them all up this summer and then save some of them for the busy times next school year. Doodle patterns are always good for focus and concentration. This project is also … Read more…
I was trying to sit down to write a blog post yesterday and I was thinking about how when the world seems to be in chaos, writing a blog post about kids’ art seems insignificant in the grand scheme of things. I had a post about recent doodling projects my students made in the works, but that didn’t seem quite appropriate after the events on Sunday morning. When something big like the attacks in Orlando, do you go on writing … Read more…
The other art teacher at my school is retiring this year. I wanted to put together a collaborative present by students to honor her. We were both hired here at the school 10 year ago. She loves origami so I knew it had to be something origami-related. I had all of her 7th and 8th grade students learn how to fold origami butterflies. Now, I am terrible at origami, so I wanted it to be relatively easy to figure out … Read more…
Great news! I have been published in the Summer issue of School Arts magazine. I wrote an article about artwork my students made after learning about the art of contemporary artist Justin Vining. You can read the article here. I wrote a blog post last year all about this project: Inspired by Artist Justin Vining. I love Justin’s artwork and you can see pictures of his artwork on his website.
We have some chicks at school. Chicks, like baby chickens. One of the science teachers taught the kids about the life cycle of chickens and the kids watched as the eggs were incubated and hatched. They grow so quickly! With all the excitement of the hatching chicks, the students were thrilled to create some chick artwork. Here is a mural/bulletin board that students in grades 2-3 worked together on. Next, we did a step-by-step project in kindergarten to make a … Read more…
Hi! I recently finished rewriting my K-6 art curriculum plan. We are required to do this every 4 years. You can see my first blog post about organizing curriculum that I wrote a few years back. I use the curriculum plan as a guide for my yearly planning. If students are interested in one area of art more than another, I tend to adapt my plans. If I have a brilliant idea for something new I want to try with … Read more…
Every year our school has a family FUNdraiser with a silent auction portion. My art classes always contribute a few artworks to the auction. This year, I came across an idea on an art teacher Facebook group. The canvas had the words “You are my sunshine” written across the middle. Each student contributed a sunshine drawn with Sharpie markers or paint markers. We used painted white wooden cradled canvases similar to this one. First I did You are My Sunshine … Read more…
For Earth Day, my 4th & 5th grade class drew endangered trees and birds using oil pastels. The entire lesson took about 3-4 class periods to finish. The students each used a picture of their tree or bird to recreate on a piece of 9″x12″ paper. We talked a little bit about layering and blending colors with the oil pastels. We were able to go outside on Earth Day to enjoy the sunshine while drawing. Our Earth Day committee came … Read more…
There is a huge sale in my shop today and tomorrow! Almost everything is 20% off, plus use the code CELEBRATE for additional savings. Happy Teacher Appreciation Day.
My second graders recently learned about simple ways to show depth in an artwork. I gave a demonstration on my new document camera and showed them how rivers and roads that go back in space would be wider in the front and narrower in the back. I demonstrated how things that were far in the distance would be smaller than things in the front. The use of overlap is also a way to show depth. I showed the students this … Read more…
My 3rd and 4th grade class just finished making woven God’s Eyes (Ojos de Dios). Students chose yarn and wrapped the strands around the sticks. Then they were all tied to a large stick I found in my neighbor’s yard. Some kids made multiples so they could take one home right away. I was surprised how almost all of them had never made these before. I guess I went to a lot of summer camps where we made stuff with … Read more…
