Gelli Prints

I took a professional development class this year from one of our district's awesome high school art teachers. The class was over Gelli Printing. I had never heard of this technique before but found it very interesting and so did my students. I used a recipe I found online to make more permanent Gelli Plates although you can buy them. I could not find where I had written down the recipe we were given at the professional development session. The recipe I used just called for gelatin, glycerine, and rubbing alcohol. I made several plates over Spring Break in various sized casserole dishes. My principal approved the purchase of a small refrigerator to keep in the art room for Gelli Plate storage. Here are some prints my students from Kinder all the way through Fifth Grade made. They used whatever colors of tempera they wanted and a variety of texture tools. I'll post later some of the finished projects they turned their prints into.

Wayne Thiebaud: Collaborative Projects

The students typically work on collaborative projects each Friday once their individual projects are completed. During our study of Wayne Thiebaud, the students created large scale drawings, paintings, and collages of cupcakes and cakes. Some of the cakes were painted with water colors. Some of the collages were made with torn and cut pieces of paper. Other collages were created with magazine pictures in a color blocking style. These were displayed in our cafeteria on three new display panels our school was able to purchase this year. We use the panels as backgrounds for music programs and to display art throughout the year.

Wayne Thiebaud: Fifth Grade Donuts

During a study over artist Wayne Thiebaud, fifth grade drew and cut out their own template of a donut. They then used their template to draw repeating and overlapping donuts to fill an entire picture plane. They added various details to their donuts. Their work was displayed in the hallways at Open House.

Wayne Thiebaud: Fifth Grade Three Tier Cakes

Fifth graders learned how to draw their tier cakes as a part of an artist study over Wayne Thiebaud. After drawing their cakes with white colored pencils on black paper, they colored them white with oil pastels. They then chose to colors to add shadows on the sides of the cake. These cakes were displayed outside the art room for Open House.

Spirit of Service

Our district recently had their annual "Spirit of Service" Art Show and Contest honoring the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Here are the three entries from my campus. One student drew a silhouette of herself with symbols of a service job, a nurse. Another drew a still life of vegetable cans to symbolize donating to a food drive. Another drew a picture of himself now with a reflection of him in the future performing a service job. I loved them!

Dale Chihuly: 3D to 2D

I challenged some of my fifth graders to create a 2D representation of some of Dale Chihuly's 3D glass work. They used liquid water colors and fabric paints for their artwork. Their pieces were hung up as a collection at our district's Education Center for a few months.

Dale Chihuly Sculptures

While looking at some pictures of Dale Chihuly's glass sculptures, I got an idea on how to make some simple sculptures with my third, fourth, and fifth graders using recycled materials common household materials. The students worked together to wrap the cardboard tubes from lamination rolls and covered them in foil. They twisted the ends of the foil at one end to make a point. They then spread out sheets of tissue paper on the tables and sprayed them with Elmer's Spray Adhesive. They then rolled the foil covered tubes on them to create the color. The bases are just small pieces of scrap wood with dowel rods nailed/glued on. Our PE Coach helped me make the bases during our conference period one day. Yay for great teammates! This was super easy but cool. We still have them displayed in the back hallway where you can see them from the inside or outside.

Dale Chihuly: Third, Fourth, and Fifth Grades

As a part of our school wide artist study over Dale Chihuly, the third through fifth graders explored how heat can change an object. I try to incorporate as many general education connections into art as possible. To recreate a kid friendly, safe version of Chihuly's glass art, the students used permanent markers to design a clear plastic cup. After the students were done designing, we went to the Kindergarten kitchen to experiment. The cups were placed on parchment paper on top of cookie sheets and placed in the oven at 350 degrees. The students took turns watching the changes in the cups. Once they were cooled, the students were able to take their "glass" sculptures home.

Grand Prairie ISD Experience

Our district is an open choice district where families and students can apply for a school of their choice. To showcase different options within our district, they hold Grand Prairie ISD Experience each year. As a part of the experience, each school was able to show one piece of student artwork. Below is work that one of my fifth graders created. He drew the landscape and painted it with colors he mixed himself. He added baking soda to the white tempera paint to add texture and a more realistic look to the snow scene.

Noun Neighborhhood

This is a lesson I always did when I taught first grade. Now that I'm in art, I extended it to a collaborative project for Kinder through Third Grade. Each student drew their favorite restaurant, their favorite store, and their home. They created roads, grass, trees, clouds, and various vehicles. After all classes had a chance to do this, they worked over the next few weeks to create a giant collage mural out of them. Once completed, their art project covered almost half of our back hallway which is pretty long. As they worked, we talked about what nouns were and how each thing they were creating was a noun. We talked about the role of different parts of a community to tie in Social Studies.

Empty Bowls Project

In December, my fourth and fifth graders made various small bowls made out of air-dry clay to sell for our district's Empty Bowls Project. The money raised from the sale of the bowls goes to a local charity that services our community's families. We sold the bowls on our campus and raised a few hundred dollars for the cause. Hopefully next year, we do even more! (Sorry, I don't have any pictures of the finished projects.)

 

Fifth Grade Birch Trees

To experiment with color mixing and tape resist, the fifth grade students created birch trees. They first added three strips of painters tape to white construction paper. They then started with blue tempera paint and painted the middle section of the paper horizontally. They then added white to create a tint for the lower third of the paper. They added black to the blue tempera paint to create a darker shade for the top third. They then pulled off the tape to reveal the white. They added small details in blue to the birch trees to show texture.