recycled sea turtles

I love doing paper-making activities with my kids to teach them about recycling and repurposing "unwanted" scraps. This also comes with a heavy (messy) price, but my kids have fun nonetheless!Materials needed: Light green and dark green paper pulp for each table/group *I added glue to the pulp also* Glad Cling Wrap Paper Bowls LOTS of paper towels! Paper, eyeballs, background for Day 2. I gave each child a paper bowl and some Glad Cling Wrap (trust me!). They turned the bowl over and wrapped the bowl with plastic wrap. They then used their hands to scoop out paper pulp and put it on the top and side of their bowl. Water was running everywhere, but my second graders had a BLAST! We used sponges to soak out the excess water and allowed them to dry in the sun for 5-7 days.

On Day 2 we popped the bowl out, carefully took off the plastic wrap, and made them look more like sea turtles. I gave each of them a blue piece of paper to create a "habitat" for the turtle to swim in. *Honestly this "habitat" isn't the greatest, but it was the ONLY picture I remembered to take!

A fun take on papermaking, and a "different" method of creating sculpture!

winner winner!

For the third year in a row, my student has received top honors in the CVS/Caremark "All Kids Can....CREATE" art show in the state of Florida! Last year we had a student win and he made the trek up to Washington, DC to participate in the show opening!

We got word today that my fifth grade student, Meredith, has created an artwork which is one of two finalists headed to Washington, DC to be judged by CVS and the VSA. Meredith has overcome many obstacles, is an amazing artist, and I couldn't be any more proud of her! Congratulations, Meredith!

britto hearts

I was tired of doing Jim Dine hearts this February. While he is a wonderful artist who truly visually depicts love in his paintings, I wanted to mix it up a bit this year. My third, fourth, and fifth graders were learning about the art of Miami-based artist Romero Britto and his use of bold color and pattern in his paintings.

We used 18x24 sheets of paper, 2 9x12 colored sheets of paper, and painted four patterned pieces of paper. We traced hearts and glued them on. A little twist on all things Valentines...and the boys didn't even seem to mind!

My fifth graders did some wonderful Britto vases. You can check them out here.

hot glass!

I wrote a grant this year to the Education Foundation of Sarasota County entitled "Voice Your View: Making the Connection between Art and Life" which was to focus on art in our community. We are lucky to live in a wonderful area which supports the Arts tremendously, and has a rich artistic and cultural influence. There are an abundance of galleries, museums, art centers, art shows, and murals which adorn our little town. We are indeed lucky that our children have 55-minutes of Art per week in Elementary School.

I wanted my fifth graders to be aware of our artistic surroundings. I wanted to expose them to art that is literally around the corner from us. Last week we went to the Ringling Museum and viewed their beautiful collection of Baroque and Modern Art. This week we were lucky to have two artists from Firebug Studios (thank you Ms. Leanna and Ms. Lois!) teach us the art of glass fusing!

The students learned about glass and how it is "made", how to use glass cutting tools, and how to create these fabulous funky faces!

(Ms. Leanna helping Kristin cutting a piece of glass)

(Ready for transport for firing!)

Using local artists is a great way to advocate for your program, drum up business for their program, and to promote the Arts in general! I was so happy that the students learned about art experiences that were local, and that their excitement trickled down to their parents (I've received numerous phone calls about how much FUN they had!), how the excitement has trickled down to other grade levels ("when are WE going to do THAT?!"), and all the compliments from staff members on the beautiful display we have going in the display case.

And in case you're wondering...is this SAFE? Absolutely! Glass cutters are not sharp. I told the kids the only way they will get cut is if they misuse or mishandle the glass. We DID have some major glass carnage today, however, as one shelf in the display case crashed on top of another shelf and we "lost" 6 sculptures. They will be replaced, but always remembered!

I hope to post more pictures of the finished display very soon!

reflective monets

We're totally on a Monet kick in Kindergarten and the kids LOVE it! This week we talked about reflection and how reflections are opposites. For this project we used 12x18 turquoise paper, oil pastel, and tempera paints. There are other supplies we needed, like sponge daubers (sponges clipped into clothespins) as well as q-tips. More on that later!

Beginning with a pre-folded paper, the kids drew "water" in oil pastel below the fold. We used blue, green, purple, and white. They also drew the footbridge above the water, and then we talked about how to make it reflective below the horizon line as well.

Using my magical "sponge daubers" (cut sponge in clothespins!) the students sponge-painted bushes along the horizon line and mossy trees along the sides of the papers.

They used yellow for a little accent to blend with the green, to make it look like the sun was shining on the leaves. We also talked about how Monet would paint at different times of the day to achieve different results. The kids decided this was painted during "lunchtime because the sun is really hot then and it's bright".

The students then used q-tips to add orange and pink flowers to the bushes. We used oil pastel to reflect these, as well, in the pond.

As you can see, Monet's garden has made quite an impression on my Kindergartners!

romero britto flower vases

I was first introduced to the artwork of Romero Britto as I was hanging a bulletin board for our P.E. teacher here at school. She had a cool poster about your heart, done with funky patterns and bold black lines. She told me she got it at her P.E. Conference and I was smitten from that moment! Her daughter lived and went to school in Boca Raton, FL and was pretty familiar with Britto's work as well.

Why didn't I know about Britto?!

I have worked on Britto projects with my third, fourth and fifth grade classes. Inspired by the print above (perfect for Spring!), my fifth graders made these beautiful patterned vases with simple patterned flowers inside.

We kept it simple, painting some of the petals solids and some patterned. I'm afraid if we filled everything with patterns it might have gotten really messy!

The outlining was done with liquid black ink applied with a small paintbrush.

So in case YOU weren't familiar with the art of Romero Britto, now you can be inspired to learn more!

I will share some Britto projects from my third and fourth graders soon!

mini monets

I found a new love this week, and I'm not ashamed to admit it. Self, meet liquid watercolor. Self, why haven't you heeded the advice of others for the last 10 years and bought this stuff before?!

This week my Kindergarten and First graders are reading the book "Philippe in Monet's Garden". It's a lovely story about a frog who is being bullied and makes a safe haven in Monet's garden. We're at a crossroads here at my school with bullying and name-calling, so it fit in very nicely! (And who says Art doesn't encompass multiple disciplines?!)

We looked at the Waterlilies series pretty closely. We talked about the different animals and insects that might call waterlilies home. The kids had to draw (at least) 8 waterlilies in pink, yellow, and white oil pastels. They used green to draw some lilly pads for the flowers to sit on.

Then enter "my new love": the liquid watercolor. Oh my. It paints like buttah, without the mess of water, watercolor sets, etc. The best part is that I diluted enough for all my kids to use today and tomorrow as well...without the waste!

This project will be the first of a few focusing on Claude Monet for my little guys. They were really "impressed" with their own results!