Initial Art - First Grade

We started off the school year in 1st grade with this very cool initial art made using warm and cool colors. 

The first step was to figure out what our "initial" is!  This was the main vocabulary word for the day! This was a little tricky for first graders, and so some of them had to try again, but we  think everyone finally figured it out!  We painted our initial in with yellow tempera, and then decorated it with orange.  While our initials were drying, we learned about cool colors and abstract art as we created this decidedly cool background.  I gave the children creative freedom with this. The only rule was that I wanted them to use all the available cool colors and they were to fill their page with color.

After we were done painting the background, we cut out our large "warm" initial and glued it down on the paper.  This was the hardest part.  Some of the children struggled a bit with cutting, but if they made a mistake, we just glued all the parts down and it worked out great!

Back in the classroom the teachers helped the children write about the project to reinforce the sounds that were in their name, and what exactly an "initial" is.   The next week, we came back to art and created name art using all the letters in their name.  While most of the children know their letter sounds, these lessons were designed to provide some reinforcement and help for the lower students who have not quite mastered these skills.

Kindergarten: The wind is cool. The sun is warm.

If you have walked down the hall by the art room lately, you will have noticed these captivating art prints created by the Kindergarten children at East Elementary. We learned about the wind and the sun as we read the book "Dona Flor" by Pat Mora. We finger-painted spirals and curvy lines on white boards using either warm or cool colors and then we made “prints” of our spirals by putting paper on top of our paint. The children were amazing as they learned this very early form of printing. When we left class we "became the wind" as we floated quietly down the hall. The children loved this activity and the resulting artwork is just beautiful.

Core Tie-in: Literacy

Art Concepts: Cool Colors and Warm Colors

Vocabulary: Cool, Warm, Texture

Kindergarten Snow Crystals

As part of this lesson we studied the painting "Snow Queen" by Lee Bennion. We painted a beautiful watercolor sky using the cool colors blue and violet. When we were finished painting we sprinkled salt on our pictures to see if we could make tiny little snowflakes where the salt landed. We read the book Snowflake Bentley and looked at beautiful pictures of real snowflakes while our paintings were drying. Finally, we walked around the room and looked at each others pictures to see the little salty snowflakes that magically appeared on our pictures.