Winter Snowmen

I love, love, LOVE Art Projects for Kids Blog. I get the majority of art projects from this site. This snowman created with oil pastels was a fun, fast, beautiful project.

Get the instructions HERE, or by clicking on the snowman above, and check out our work below!

Finally!

Well, I'm FINALLY finding the time to get some posts up. It has been a super busy start to the year, but I'm so excited to start sharing some pictures and activities that we've started! We've been engaged in a lot of review activities, goal setting, community building, and nailing down the procedures and expectations for all of our workshops (math, reading, and writing).

This goal setting activity was one of the first things we did in class. I love having my kids set goals for the year. This was a really fun and different way to set goals and integrate some art into it as well.

How great did these turn out? You can find the inspiration for this activity and the template provided for FREE from the amazing Art Projects for Kids blog. I get SO many ideas from her. :)

Tableau

Want to get your kids really engaged in reading comprehension? Tableau is a terrific way to incorporate kinesthetic movement and art into reading. After reading Rueben and the Fire, students broke up into groups and created a tableau of their favorite scene. Other groups had to guess which scene students were choosing to tableau.

Read more about Tableau in the classroom HERE.

Book Making & Harris Burdick

We've been doing a fabulous project in class. In an effort to integrate some art and creative writing, I used prints from The Mysteries of Harris Burdick by Chris Van Allsburg to inspire student stories. I mean, what better images are there to spark ideas? If you haven't seen these images or read this book, click HERE to preview this book at Amazon. I've never had students so excited about writing!

After reading the story and discussing the images, students chose one image to write a story about. To incorporate a fun way of publishing, students are making mini books to write their stories. Fun! Check out our work and resources below.

Have you seen this yet? Well-known authors wrote a story to accompany one of the images from The Mysteries of Harris Burdick. My students loved reading the story from Kate Dicamillo. Check it out HERE.

Anchor Text

Our display of the Harris Burdick images. Students did a silent art walk, and then we discussed each print and read the book.

Students working on their story.

Instructions on making the boxes:

Start with two rectangles, 8 1/2 by 5 1/2. Turn paper so that short edges are on top and bottom. Draw an X with a ruler, connecting diagonal corner to corner.

Find the center of the X. Fold up one edge to the center.

Turn paper and fold up the other edge to center. It should like like this when both edges are folded to the center.

Turn paper so that long edge is now on top and fold up long edge to center. Contine with the other side.

It should look like this once you've done all the folds. You should have four smaller rectangles, made by the folds, in each corner.

Now, make a cut on all four corners on the fold line, up to the top fold line. You'll see my scissors on the left. That's the line you cut on, and also where you end the cut.

Repeat on all four corners. It should like like this when all four corners have been cut.

Now take the two outer flaps that you've created from the cuts. You'll glue these together first.

Add glue to one of the flaps...

And paste the two strips together, so that the box maintains its shape with the fold lines.

Now, take the last piece hanging out, add glue, and fold it up and bend it over the edge of the two tabs.

One more side to go!

Your box is complete!

Repeat with another piece of paper the same size. You have a top and bottom for the box.

Now, for the inside strips. Start with two strips of paper, 11" x 4"

Fold the paper in half.

Now, fold one part of the half toward you, meeting the bottom edge of the fold.

Turn it over and repeat. Pull the remaining half toward you down to the edge of the fold.

This is what it should look like once you've unfolded.

Repeat so that you have two completely folded strips.

Glue the end panel on one of the strips.

Place the ending panel on the other strip on top to seal together.

Completed, glued strip.

Write, draw, etc.

Now, take the top of your box, and add a lot of glue.

Add the first page of your strip, and push to seal.

Take the bottom of the box, and repeat, gluing the last panel of the strip.

Ta Da!

Carefully fold up the strip inside of the box, and place top and bottom together (you'll need to do some "fedangling" to get them to fit together).

Add a title to the top, and cover art if desired. Open at any time to reveal inside of book!

One more image of how students are publishing their stories on their strips.

Finished student books to come!

For Parents: Art Night Extras

Here is a copy of the Art Night flyer if you need an extra. You can also print from this Google Doc Link. I hope you can all make it!

Parade of Objects

For this art activity, students practiced their art criticism skills. We started by just looking at the print, "Parade of Objects" by Jean Debuffet, and responding to what we saw. My favorite response? Lauren said, "It looks like a bunch of robots sitting around the table eating lasagna." :)  Students also commented on color, line, and shape.

 Next, students focused on how it made them feel. Kolby said it made him feel "stressed". Many students agreed with that idea.

To close the lesson, I invited students to see if they could "make" objects out of the shapes in the art print. Students were quickly able to identify several objects including food items, animals, and other items. We discussed how we can easily make identifiable items without intending to.

Students then took this idea back with them to their seats. We started by just drawing a line design over a blank sheet of white construction paper. No pencils, only Sharpies! This had students worrried. They also had to make a continuous line that covered their paper, no stopping. When students completed this step, they were encouraged to find a few spots where they could identify some objects. Students turned their shapes into dogs, fish, people, etc. They finished by incorporating color, a focal point, and lines as Jean Debuffet did in his own print. Fun! Check out our work below.

The Original: Parade of Objects by Jean Debuffet