Free Art Day!!!

Students look so forward to their well earned Free Art Day! Once classes have gone all the way around on the behavior board, they reach the Free Art Day space!!

The most popular station is Junk Sculpture where students make creations from our "Junk Trunk" (where we save all materials that are spent or otherwise not needed). 

Each table has a different station including, Free Draw, Painting, Junk Sculpture, Card Making, Clay Make don't Take, and one more that changes based on our materials. What fun we have creating and designing with our imaginations!!!

Kindergarten artists use Pattern to get ready for the Easter Bunny!

Kindergarten artists get ready for Easter in their latest project. We talked about using more than just 2 items in our patterns and trying to make longer "1st grade" patterns with at least 4 items in the color pattern! Use then used shapes to help us draw our Easter bunnies! What fun we had!

3rd Grade Heather Galler Folk Art Snowmen

3rd Grade artists are learning about the contemporary artist Heather Galler who is a folk artist (meaning that she is self-taught!). She loved using lots of patterns and chose topics to paint that were important in her life.

Since we are in the thick of winter and many of us are enjoying making snowmen outside. So, we created this adorable snowmen with watercolor paint, sticks, twine, glitter, and even pine cones!

Learning Goals:
Students will learn about the life and art of Heather Galler
Students will be able to retell what a folk artist is
Students will practice with tying a knot
Students will use various patterns in their snowmen
Students will design a unique snowman with it's own personality

Download Heather Galler Slide Show: Click Here!

2nd Grade Native American Totem Poles

2nd Grade artists added to their knowledge of Native American Art and Culture when they looked at why certain tribes make Totem Poles, how they create them, and what significance they have/had. We discussed a totem pole slide show, sketched some totem pole ideas, read a fiction book about totem poles (Called "Totem Tale"), and created our own 3D Form totem poles.

Download Native American Overview Slide Show Here

Download Native American Totem Pole Slide Show Here

Learning Goals:
Students will be able to discuss why Native Americans used Totem Poles
Students will sketch multiple ideas for a totem pole of their own
Students will create their own totem pole

5th Grade Native American Dream Catchers

5th grade artists are learning about Native American life and culture in their classrooms. We added to this by learning about their art as well. Below are two links to slide shows that we used.

Download Native American Overview Slide Show Here

Download Native American Dream Catchers Slide Show Here

We learned about why Native Americans use Dream Catchers - to catch the good dreams and let the bad dreams evaporate with the morning dew. We created our own dreamcatchers out of paper plates, yarn, beads and feathers.

Learning Goals:
Students will be able to discuss why Native Americans used Dream Catchers
Students will use Native American pictographs and traditional designs to decorate the rim of their dream catcher
Students will create their own dream catcher and weave string for the inside of the design

4th Grade Native American Clay Hide Stories with Pictographs

4th Grade artists had a blast learning about Native American Art and culture. Below is a link to the slide show we used to learn about Native American art in general. We learned about how they used pictographs to write down their stories and how they didn't have paper and paint like we do. Sometimes, they used buffalo hides to draw on (and for many other purposes!). We created our own stretched hides out of model magic clay, painted them with watercolor paint, drew with permanent marker, and colored with markers or crayons using warm and neutral colors.  We made a hanger out of twine, beads and found sticks.

Download Native American Overview Slide Show Here

Learning Goals:
Students will be able to discuss why Native Americans used buffalo hides and pictographs
Students will use pictographs to tell their own story
Students will create their story on a clay "hide"

5th Grade Roy Lichtenstein Pop Art Words

Download Roy Lichtenstein Slide Show Here

Learning Goals:

Students will learn about the life and art of Roy Lichtenstein

Students will learn about Pop Art

Students will create an artwork that uses a word that expresses its meaning like a visual onomatopoeia = (it will show its meaning visually)

Students will show their knowledge of color schemes