Autumnal Leaves by Kindergarten

What a beautiful and sophisticated combination of drawing, painting and collage - all achieved by my favorite people to teach - the Kindergartners!!! 

Day One:

The first step in this multi-media project was for each kinder to draw a large leaf on 11"x 14" paper - before class, I pre-drew a spine vertically down the middle of each paper to help students achieve the right size. Then I showed them how to draw two big rainbows above the spine to create the edges of the leaf. They set about adding ribs as they chose and tried to keep track of how many they drew on each side to make them symmetrical as leaves are in nature. Everything was traced in Sharpie marker and then they used unwrapped crayons to add texture to the leaf.

Day Two:
I gave the kids magenta, orange and yellow tempera cakes and allowed them to paint freely after a quick demonstration on proper brush care and painting etiquette.

Day Three:

We began working on the backgrounds for the leaves. Each student received a piece of 12"x 16" piece of art paper and we talked about creating movement in our artwork - specifically, using spirals and dashes. I referenced Vincent van Gogh's, Starry Night. The kids used autumnal colored paint sticks to make a variety of spirals and dashes. Then they cut out their leaf from the previous week and used regular white glue to affix it to their background paper. 

Day Four:

I pre-cut three different types of leaves for the kids - a combination of die cuts from the office and my own scissor work. Students were shown how to take one of each each and use a glue stick to affix them anywhere to the composition. They used black crayons on top of these three leaves to create texture and emphasis. The crowning jewel here is gold tempera paint which I passed out at the end of class - the kids went bananas over it!!!! I allowed them to use the gold to their heart's content :) 

1st grade Fall Landscape Collage

This is a great two-day lesson that features texture, line and shape, plus you can work in concepts like overlapping and depth. I found the inspiration for this project from Kathy at Art Projects for Kids blog.

Day One:

Students used unwrapped crayons to texturize a piece of 9"x 12" paper to their liking. Then we wiggled scissors across the long edge of a piece of 3.5"x 9" green paper to create the ground. I handed out small yellow squares near the end of the class for the kids to cut out circles for the sun. We used glue sticks to hold all the pieces in place. 

Day Two:

Each table received a tray that contained a various assortment of paper squares between 3" to 4" in red, orange and yellow, plus Sharpies, scissors and glue sticks. I demonstrated how to cut organic circles and ovals for tree tops and how to glue them down. We talked briefly about how things in the distance appear smaller, while things close to us would appear large. Then I showed the kids a few ideas for making tree trunks, sky/grass details and of course patterns for the trees. It was fun to see how they could expand on the few simple ideas I offered. 

Kindergarten Letter Owls

These letter owls were created over a two-week time period by my kindergartners. The key vocabulary terms were texture, shape, overlap, and collage. We practiced using paints, crayons, scissors and glue. The bodies are made from a letter U, the wings from D's and the eyes are B's with O's glued on top. Each one turned out successfully and they "owl" have their own personalities, just like the kids who made them!  

End of the year: Kindergarten

Oh, the end of the school year - it never fails to get blurry with the frenzy of activity! Unfortunately, my picture taking and blogging go on the back burner as well......but over the next few days (since it has settled down with the beginning of summer vacation), I will post the last assignments each of my grade levels worked on before we said goodbye to the 2014-2015 school year.

Kindergarten made vegetable garden collages! These were really adorable and what I really liked was linking in some science connections to the works of art. Plus, the underground view is so intriguing! These pieces measure 12x16 and were made over a 2-week period. Each vegetable was drawn onto colored construction paper using black crayon. We added roots and stem details too. Then we cut, glued and painted the backgrounds!

Our very last art project was a still-life featuring a flower vase - a variation on a piece we did last year but without the weaving aspect. If I am not mistaken, these measure 10x18. The kids used construction paper crayons to add patterns to the kraft paper "tabletops" that I pre-glued to the art paper before they arrived. Rubbing plates made a nice textured background for the hand-drawn flowers to sit atop. 

2nd grade Seascape Collage

These seascape collages made by my 2nd graders are so texturally rich - what a fun way to build a seascape! We tried several different methods for the "sky" paper, my favorite being the texture rubbings with watercolor resist. All the painted paper for this project was made on the first day. On the second day, we chopped up the "ocean" paper and glued it into place. We also made the hulls of the boats using neutral colored paper, making sure to include a small, medium and large size to convey depth. On the third day, we made the sails, added some clouds and a sun all cut from paper. Pretty wonderful I think!

Kindergarten Bubblegum Machines & Seascapes

I have an affinity for teaching Kindergarten. I remember a time when I panicked at the thought of teaching 5 year olds.....but that has changed. At this point, after nine years of teaching art, I can truly say I am addicted to teaching Art to Kindergartners. It is so magical to me! Of course, there are always challenges, but I enjoy coming up with fun ideas for them! Here are two projects we tried out recently, both measuring in at 12x18 (yes, I like working BIG with them ).


The collage method has really worked out well this year with this group of Kinders, so I have been incorporating a lot of paper and paint into our projects! Please feel free to ask specifics about these assignments.

Oh, and I found that a 1.5" circle punch from Michael's comes in super handy for making lots of gumballs - I double up 2" wide paper strips and cut as many as I can across the paper strip (about 6 or 7 for a total of 12 or 14)......

Coming up next: Japanese Koi fish ponds and vegetable garden collages........

Kindergarten Snowpeople....

This is an assignment I enjoy doing with the littles each year. I normally have the kids work on 12x18 paper and paint the snowpeople, but this year, we built them from paper using the collage method and glued everything to 9x12 paper.The snow drops were stamped using Q-tips and the colorful details were added with oil pastels. I love winter themed projects......but I am ready for spring! 

2nd grade Robots

Robots have always been a surefire hit with my students and this assignment proved to be a winner this year as well. Each school year, I do it just a bit differently. Last year, we made them GINORMOUS, and the year before that, we made the robots with really funky painted backgrounds, so this year, I thought we would put a little rainbow spin to them. On day one, we talked about color mixing and rainbow order while the kids painted a piece of 11x14 paper. On day two, we got busy with the drawing. Students were encouraged to draw as largely as possible on a piece of 9x12 art paper. I had a sheet of robot visuals to inspire, but most of my students just took off using their imagination. We spent most of day three finishing the drawings, tracing and coloring the robots. The final day was assembly - first we added patterns to the rainbow papers using oil pastels and then the robots were cut and glued.