Ready for a NEW YEAR!

I am very excited for the start of a new school year in just a few short weeks. It's very bittersweet for me because it means the end of my "maternity leave" with my new baby. It's been a wonderful summer full of lazy days enjoying one another! My desk will be full of pictures of my baby boy and his dad!

Unpacking my classroom and organizing new supplies is such an exciting time. Here are a few pictures of the finished product. There's always more to do, but I think it's a good start!

The picture above is where the children gather when they come in to hear stories, talk about art, see demonstrations, and share their work. My "Share Chair" is a big deal to the kids-they all want the chance to sit there and have a captive audience! As you can see, I love using literature in the classroom. My library is much larger than this, but I like to keep my favorite books close at hand!

Music is a MUST in my Art class. I love to play music while the kids are working and they remind me to put it on if I happen to forget! They are so much calmer when music fills the air. I also found a large map to display because we often talk about cultures and different places around the world.

We have lots of wires for artwork criss-crossing our room. This year I took scrapbook paper and folded it to make a line of patterned flags. I also used patterns on my bulletin boards. I covered them with fabric instead of bulletin board paper and used painted paper scraps from last year for the borders.

This bulletin board has wide, glittery ribbon for the border. Needless to say, I was once again the "glitter queen" after this board was put up! And of course, we have to have lots of drying racks ready to be filled.

New to the art room this year is a smartboard. I am very excited, yet very nervous at the same time. I really could use some advice from any other teachers with smartboards, especially art teachers. How do you use them in your classrooms?

Class sizes for Art are large-most classes have 30-32, even Kindergarten! Hopefully the kiddos will be as excited about the Art room as I am!

Happy Summer!

As I wrap up my year, I am so thankful that I started a blog! I was able to connect with so many wonderful educators in my profession and share ideas! I have loved every minute of blogging and look forward to continue in the 2011-12 school year. As for now, I am 38 weeks pregnant and busy preparing for the arrival of my own little boy. I hope you all have a wonderful summer and I will look forward to reconnecting and sharing in September!

Romero Britto Pop Art Pyramids

Third graders just learned completed a project that combined Math and Art! We began by looking at the art of Pop artist, Romero Britto, and his Pyramid Project in London.

http://www.pyramidproject.co.uk/overview.php

Students sketched four sides (faces) for their own pyramids, incorporating Egyptian symbols into each side as Britto did in his art. They also combined patterns and either warm or cool colors with black outlines.

Finally, we cut out our pyramid patterns and assembled them. We were able to count and discuss vertices, edges, and faces in our 3D shapes-a concept third grade teachers asked me to incorporate!

Banyan Trees

This project was taken from the book Dynamic Art Projects for Children by Denise M. Logan. Like many of the projects in the book, the children really enjoyed it and the results were impressive!

Students began by learning about the Banyan tree, which originates in India. This tree has many trunks because the branches are constantly sending roots to anchor in the soil. For this project, we talked about positive and negative space. We blended colors that were next to one another on the color wheel to fill the negative space around our trees! Fourth graders did a great job on this project.

Spring Chickens

First graders had so much fun making their "spring chickens." First they created colorful paper using tissue paper prints. They saved the tissue and used it again for the fluffy feathers. They practiced drawing and cutting shapes to create the eyes, beak, wings, legs, and feet for their birds.

The Very Hungry Caterpillar

I love the art of Eric Carle. I introduced his style to the Kindergartners with this fun and easy project. On the first day they used texture plates and oil pastel to fill their papers. Then they painted over the textures they created with watercolors. For the next class period, they cut out all of the parts of the caterpillar and assembled them!

Marc Chagall

Second graders recently studied the work of Marc Chagall. His paintings often included farm animals like cows, goats, and roosters, as well as memories of life in his village. We began by mixing tints and shades of blue for the background, drew many houses, and added silly goats playing violins with painted paper. Students really enjoyed the dream-like paintings of Chagall!