Here Comes the Sun!

First Grade Sketchbook - Sun and Moon Art

Simply Amazing!

At the beginning of each lesson I have the children come into the room and start drawing in their sketchbook as a self-start activity. Then we turn to the back of the book and draw little sketches together for a few minutes.  I use this time to help the children practice drawing and also to help them understand important things about lesson.  This is the first year I have done sketchbook with 1st grade students and I have found that our sketchbook activity has really helped the children gain confidence int their artistic abilities.  I am amazed at how well each child is doing.  At the end of each sketching assignment I try to go around the room and stamp each child's book with a fun rubber stamp that matches the lesson.  This offers an instant reward for the child, but it also gives me the chance to check each child's work to actually see how they are doing and also to give them positive encouragement.

In the first part of the lesson we were learning about the sun and the moon as we reviewed important elements of the science core and math core as we were creating art.   We learned that sometimes the earth casts a shadow on the moon and that the moon changes during the month.  We talked about folk art and we looked at different ways the sun and moon are portrayed in art, some with triangle shaped rays, and some with curvy lines.  Then we each created our own sun and moon art using oil pastels in warm and cool colors.

The next week we came back and painted our pictures with warm and cool colors.  This is such a fun activity for children and the artwork is just beautiful!

We made a giant color wheel hall for our art show and we posted some of the pictures on the warm end of the hall and some on the cool end!  It was fun for the children to walk down the hall... starting with fire and ending in ice!

1st and 2nd Grade Texture Pumpkins

The 2nd graders studied the life cycle of the pumpkin to tie in with both a story in their reading book and also the 2nd grade science core.

One of my favorite things about the Fall season is drawing pumpkins. It is our first real lesson in observational drawing. As part of the lesson I bought seven real pumpkins so that each group of children would have a pumpkin close enough to enable each child to be able to touch and explore the pumpkin. We find the blossom end, and feel the stems, the ribs and bumps. We look for interesting details on each pumpkin that might be fun to draw. We had fun learning how to draw with a fine permanent marker. If the student makes a mistake, they have to figure out a way to incorporate it into the overall picture. Once we drew the basic pumpkin, we added some fun pattern to mimic shading and add texture to our design. Some of the children added faces by drawing simple shapes and then filling the shapes with pattern. After the children finished drawing their pumpkin, they painted them with watercolors. This a a charming project and one of our favorites!

While the 2nd graders were using sharpies, the 1st grade classes were doing a similar project with oil pastels. This project is really fun! I used to do it with kindergarten classes, but I feel like it lends itself a little better to first grade, so I took a few years off and reintroduced it this year. In this lesson we talked about line, shape, texture, pattern and color!

We drew the basic outline of the pumpkin and then colored each section a different color and added pattern and texture. The tendency for this age group is to draw a symbolic pumpkin with a circle and a square little stem so our main goal for this project was to create pumpkins with interesting shapes and realistic looking stems! The pumpkin on the upper left was drawn by Mrs. Rutledge and all of the other pumpkins were created by 1st grade students.

The following pictures show two books that are great resources when teaching this lesson.

This book is a beautiful book with stunning photography showing the life cycle of the pumpkin. It is perfect for teaching with a scientific approach.

This book has whimsical illustrations showing beautiful artistic pumpkins throughout the entire book! I love this book and it ties in beautifully with this lesson.

3rd Grade Paper Pottery

The 3rd graders have have fun this week making paper pottery. This has been one of the most popular projects we have completed this year. First, the students created basic shapes of pottery with construction paper and then decorated their pottery with organic and geometric designs. Then we overlapped our pottery and drew a horizon line to create an illusion of our pottery sitting on a table. Finally, we added highlights and shadows to create beautiful depth to our pictures. If you walk down the 3rd grade hall, you will be amazed by the variety and quality of these pictures.

Vocabulary words for this lesson: Organic, Geometric, Shape, Overlap, Highlight, Shadow

Curriculum Tie-In: Social Studies: South West Indian Culture and Art, Math: Patterns and Line

3rd Grade Halloween Silhouette Pictures

The 3rd graders had a fun time this week creating these very cute halloween silhouette "haunted" pictures. We used markers and then created basic shapes to make a haunted tree, dancing skeletons, spooky cats, spiders, bats, pumpkins and owls. We painted swirly clouds in the sky and finally we added white eyes to make our spooky creatures "jump" off the page! This has been a very fun project!

Parents: This would be a great project to do at home! We used black Crayola washable markers. Eyes were added with simple "paper punch" circles! Encourage your children to focus on the SHAPES of the creepy creatures.

2nd Grade Pattern Pumpkins

The 2nd grade classes had a fun time pushing their drawing skills one step further this week by creating these darling pattern pumpkins. First, we looked at real pumpkins and studied the shape and color. We touched the pumpkins, looked for scars and studied the stem. Then we used sharpies to draw a practice pumpkin in our sketchbook. We drew organic "bumpy" lines with the sharpie and then we added structure lines. Finally we added shading with organic and geometric design. Then we drew our final artwork on bigger paper. We shaded the features of our pumpkins with tiny pattern and design. As a final step, we painted our pumpkins with watercolor. This has been one of our favorite projects.