My favorite day of this lesson by far was practicing different watercolor techniques. Students tried out salt effects, oil pastel resist, overlapping wet on dry paint, dabbing (with a paper towel) and value. Using salt was clearly the big winner in every class. They loved it! I had them use masking tape to section off their paper and label each technique. Peeling the tape off the following week came in a close second.
Every year I teach my fifth graders linear perspective by learning one-point perspective. I always change up the medium, so this year we practiced our watercolor skills using liquid watercolors. I absolutely love the bright hues that come from liquid watercolors. Plus, I get to make a super lesson out of it by providing small containers to make their own colors. My favorite day of this lesson by far was practicing different watercolor techniques. Students tried out salt effects, oil pastel resist, overlapping wet on dry paint, dabbing (with a paper towel) and value. Using salt was clearly the big winner in every class. They loved it! I had them use masking tape to section off their paper and label each technique. Peeling the tape off the following week came in a close second.
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![]() This year our school had an Egyptian themed book fair that got our kids really inspired. When it came time to study facial proportions they were delighted to turn their faces into Egyptian Pharaohs. Students also practiced their skills in creating symmetry and pattern. A new app/website I've been really digging this year is ShowMe. It is very similar to Educreations, but I prefer ShowMe because it allows me more time to demonstrate drawings. Once you create a video demonstration you can show it in class whenever, however you need to. I love that it frees me up to walk around the room to give one-on-one instruction to those who need it. Plus, if there's a student absent you can get them the exact same lesson as everyone else. One day I was out sick and simply sent my substitute the link to play for students. The learning opportunities for this app are endless. Check it out below! (I have to give credit to Kathy Barbro and her post'How to Draw King Tut' for my ShowMe creation). Using the ShowMe, 12" x 18" heavy weight paper, mirrors and pencils, students created self-portraits as Egyptian Pharaohs. They outlined their drawing with black before filling in the rest with colored oil pastels. I made sure to demonstrate blending techniques using oil pastels before they began. As for the background, students had choices. Some chose to paint it in using metallic colored paint while others chose to cut their portrait out and glue to a new color of construction paper. We finished these beauties up in about three 45-minute class periods. My fourth graders and I tapped into our inner-super-hero this year to create these awesome flying self-portraits. Even though these kids are superb chapter-book readers, they still love being read to (what kid doesn't?). I shared with them one of my favorite picture books, Tar Beach by Faith Ringgold. This helped us to tap into the big idea of Dreams, and where we dream of going in our lives. Thanks to Tricia Fuglestad's resources on her website found here, we used her figure template to study human proportions when flying. Students soon had their gesture drawings transformed into self-portraits with capes, pajamas, super-hero costumes and more. After a class period of practicing students used sharpies to draw their self-portrait onto a 4" x 6" piece of white tag board, and colored in using markers. The backgrounds were collaged using construction paper and other drawings on paper using markers and crayons (I highly recommend Crayola's Construction Paper Crayons - nice vibrant colors without the smearing effects of cray-pas or oil pastels). I like to cut construction paper into 4" x 12" strips to make layered backgrounds. Students select three to four different colors. Beginning with the sky or top, students lay the first color down onto a 9" x 12" piece of construction paper. They then move downwards, drawing and cutting a line for the background (clouds, mountains, sun, etc.), then repeating the step for the middle ground below it (buildings, water, etc.), and finally again at the bottom for the foreground (road, houses, grass, etc.). My fourth grade students are familiar with creating space by overlapping in art so I usually don't spend a whole lot of time going over this method, just a few reminders and they are off! The final step was to cut out their flying portrait to glue to their background. Their details are what really made these inspiring artworks. This would be a great lesson to tie in writing as well; If I Could Fly.... 2013 was an artful year, both at school and in the community. Here are some of my favorite projects completed by students.
This year I decided to try out Prezi instead of my stand-by PowerPoint to introduce students to me and the art room. They really enjoyed it! They loved how the presentation moved around and zoomed in and out. They caught on quick as they were soon asking me to further zoom in on pictures they wanted a close-up of. This will be great for art history presentations and critics. There are many templates to choose from as a starting point, and lots of freedom to customize things just the way you want them. I'm looking forward to making many more this year!
When I saw a picture of Piano Stair created in Valparaiso, Chile, I knew I had to recreate something similar for my school's set of stairs that leads up to our music room. Not only is it a great example of an optical illusion, but our music teacher is eager to use it as a tool for some Whole Brain Learning. I can't wait to see what the kids think on the first day of school!
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