A Rainbow of Friends: First Grade

First Grade read A Rainbow of Friends by P.K. Hallinan as a connection to creating our class Social Contract and as an introduction to the color wheel, primary colors, and secondary colors. Each student used various shaped foam stamps to paint shapes in color wheel order. The next week, once the paint was dry, they used multicultural markers to add heads, arms, and legs to the shapes. They then added basic facial features, hair, and shoes to match the shapes.

Mouse Paint: Kindergarten

Kindergarten read Mouse Paint by Ellen Stoll Walsh to learn about primary colors and the secondary colors created by mixing those colors. After reading the book, the students used mouse shaped tracers to draw six mice in a circular shape. They then traced the mice in black markers. They then added eyes and tails with spiral lines. Next the students painted in each mouse in color wheel order with liquid water colors.

Environmental Print Color Wheels: Kinder

Kinder students worked together to create basic color wheels with magazine pictures and words. They sorted the clippings by color and practiced using glue sticks to attach them to paper plates.

Lines That Move: Fifth Grade

Fifth Grade created moving lines using just paper, markers, scissors, and glue. They first drew curved lines in complementary color patterns from two opposite corners. Then, on the back side, they used rulers to measure equal strips of straight lines. They cut the lines apart and then arranged them on black construction paper in a wave. To create the wave, they fanned out the first half of the strips going in one direction and the second half of the strips fanned out in the opposite direction.

Fourth Grade Foil Lines

Fourth Grade students used various art materials to create their low-relief line art. They started with a piece of cardboard and cut slits into the edges. They then weaved yarn through the slits and across the cardboard creating various diagonal lines. They then wrapped the cardboard in foil and smoothed it out over the yarn causing areas of low-relief. They then colored in the low-relief areas with Sharpie Markers. Thank you to PTA for buying these materials for us!

The Line: Third Grade

Third Grade read The Line by Paula Bossio to discuss how various lines form various pictures. We talked about the importance of being able to draw various lines well. The students practiced drawing various lines by creating an eight part foldable. In each section of the foldable, they drew one type of line and repeated it for a total of three lines per section. They then water colored each section. We talked about spacing out the colors to create visual interest. Once the students were finished, they commented that their work kind of looked like quilts.

Lines That Wiggle: First and Second Grade Lines

First and Second Grade read Lines That Wiggle by Candace Whitman to learn about various types of lines. They then drew various lines with black markers and water colored over them. Firs Grade could choose whatever colors they wanted as long as they used a variety of four different colors. Second Grade had a limited selection of primary colors.

Little Green: Kinder Lines

Kindergarten read the book Little Green by Keith Baker to learn about different types of lines. Little Green is about a child who watches a bird fly and paints a picture about the various ways the bird flies. The students drew various lines with crayons and colored in the spaces that were created by those lines.

First Week Mural

For the first week of school, each grade was assigned a specific color. Each student drew a self-portrait using that specific colored marker on an index card. They then water colored over the self-portrait in the same color. The cards were then glued onto bulletin board paper and laminated together as a mural. The colors are in order from Kinder through Fifth Grade so it was interesting to see the progression of drawing skills from one grade to the next. The lesson also served as an intro into the color wheel and color order.

My Art Classroom

Here are some photos of my new art classroom. I love how much storage space is in the room. It helps so much with my constant need to organize. I also love the ceiling tiles that the school's very first art teacher made with some older students. They add so much to the room and are great for referencing particular art pieces.

I'm Back!

Thank you to my fellow teachers who have emailed to see when I will be blogging again. I've taken a hiatus from blogging since mid summer while I transitioned from teaching first grade to elementary art. I am LOVING my new art position! Since I teach over 600 students now, I've decided that the most manageable way to keep up with the blog is to show general photos of student work rather than specific individuals. I will most likely only blog once or twice a nine weeks as and may include some more general education resources I have found to be useful as well.

Keep Calm and Teach Art

After teaching first grade for six years, I have decided to switch gears! Starting this year, I will be teaching Elementary Art at the same school, Moseley Elementary in Grand Prairie. I am very excited about this change but know that I have a lot of learning and work ahead of me. With this change, several people have asked me what I am going to do with this blog. I am still undecided at this point for the future of the blog as far as art is concerned. I am wrapping my brain around the logistics of getting permission to display student created art online for a school of over 600 students. But, at this point, I will continue sharing various ideas for Elementary Education as a whole. I will share ideas I've stumbled upon from other sites, creations I have made for Teachers Pay Teachers, and more. You can also follow me on Pinterest here. I will continue to have boards for first grade as well as new boards for various art topics.