There's a Bass in my Art Room!

My primary and intermediate kids have just finished their artwork for either the Jr. Duck Stamp program or the State Fish Art contest. Snow days messed up the scheduling a bit so I had to extend the deadline for some of my 1st-3rd grade students to this week. We have a teacher work day on Friday and the majority of my time will be spent photographing and preparing the artwork to mail in. I felt like I was able to be more thorough in my instruction this year after I learned so much at the Jr. Duck Stamp ambassador workshop in Utah last September. (Read about that here and here.) I was able to add many more reference photos to my collection.

My addition to the fish program was to borrow the Catfish my dad caught when I was 19 months old! Phyl may have a dragon in her art room, but I have a Channel Catfish in mine! There were a couple awkward attempts to explain how taxidermy works, and a few students thought the fish was "gross", but the main reaction was interest and awe. Most of my students have never had the opportunity to go fishing so they haven't seen a real fish outside of a zoo or aquarium. I left the fish out for a couple days but after it got knocked over- twice- and the tail cracked, I realized the students just weren't aware enough to keep their distance. The fish retired to my closet and was just brought out for specific students who were brave enough to draw from it instead of a photo.

I had a table set up with reference photos for each contest, organized by species. The State Fish Art website has cool fact sheets about each species that helps remind students of what would make an appropriate habitat for the background of their artwork and also helped with essays.

Fish photos are pretty easy to keep organized since I only chose the 3 species the students would be most familiar with in our par of Kansas. I have many more duck reference photos and last year simple stacks were too hard for the students to keep organized. This year, I taped labels to the table thinking that if the students couldn't recognize the proper place from their photo, they could read the species name labeled on the back of the photos and match them up. This helped a bit... or maybe after the second class period that I made the students go fix the mess they created, they just started to pay more attention. To help with habitat, I printed a bunch of reference photos I took at the Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge in Utah. Some are "zoomed out" and some are close up photos of wetland vegetation. I also took a cue from the State Fish Art contest and created "bio" sheets for each of the waterfowl species I have photos of. I asked the students to read the bio for their bird before they drew the background to give them clues. Wood ducks nest in tree cavities? Gee, maybe you should draw the duck standing on a fallen tree instead of that rock at the zoo in the photo.

It looks like I forgot to take a picture of my big display on my fancy new classroom bulletin board but it was basically a combination of the displays from last year seen here with some new materials I picked up on my Ambassador trip.

Students are always excited to see artwork I've made so I brought in some examples. Wood Duck watercolor painting on the left, colored pencil Canada Goose I made for an example a few years ago, and a mixed media picture of a hen Mallard and ducklings on the right.

I can't wait to go through and see the results of all the students' hard work. I just wish we had more Art time to devote to the project. I had students waiting to work in the Art room every time I had open slots available for them on my days at the intermediate school. :)

Art of Conservation- Ducks and Fish

This spring I gave my 1st-6th grade students a choice between the Jr. Duck Stamp program and the State Fish Art contest. Both programs have similar aims of connecting kids to nature and teaching conservation through the Arts. They are both integrate science- observational skills, anatomy, and learning about animals' natural habitats. Duck stamps are about conserving the wetlands and the State Fish Art contest educates kids about fish and aquatic habitats. (You can see an earlier post about this here.)

I am so glad that I decided to try the State Fish Art contest! Some of the students who weren't that "in" to waterfowl were very "in" to fish! I had a couple boys in 6th grade who I never even knew were really interested in Art suddenly spending any extra time in our schedule working in my room on their fish, before school and even giving up recess time! For some reason, the students also tended to have an easier time drawing fish than ducks or geese. Of course there were still lots of students excited about Duck Stamps. I think everyone found something they were interested in to work on while learning about conservation through art making. I also gave my intermediate students a few more choices with media this year. In addition to colored pencils, they could use watercolor pencils, watercolor paint, or graphite. Part of me wants to also give the choice of tempera, but I think most of them would become frustrated when they don't have the control to paint small details.

I always stress that the contest is not why we do these projects, it's just an extra part that can be kind of fun. The competition must have been fierce in the Kansas Jr. Duck Stamp contest this year but we did have a 6th grader get an Honorable Mention on her drawing of a Canada Goose.

I was also SO excited to find out that two students received 3rd place in their respective age groups in Kansas for the State Fish Art contest! The photo on the left is a watercolor pencil/watercolor picture of a Channel Catfish made by a 5th grader and on the right, is a 2nd grader's colored pencil drawing of a Bluegill. The K-3rd "Mighty Minnow" age group just turns in their artwork while students in the older age groups have to turn in a one page essay about their fish (description, behavior, habitat) and any conservation efforts for the species.

I have lots and lots of artwork to share so I'm going to do it over several posts. 

Jr. Duck Stamp Program
http://www.fws.gov/juniorduck/
State Fish Art Contest
http://www.wildlifeforever.org/contest

Jr. Duck Stamp Program

5th grade student, Honorable Mention

Ever since I took part in the Jr. Duck Stamp program in high school, I've been a big fan.  I know a lot of teachers don't do the program with their students because it takes so much time but  I had always planned to do it with my students and something the other elementary Art teachers in my district were already doing. (Check out last year's post to see a photo of wetlands in my area and photos of my high school duck stamp drawings.)

If you are not familiar with duck stamps, here's a brief summary, at least as brief as I'm capable of being (if you want a more in-depth look at duck stamps, check out the US Fish and Wildlife Service page.  Federal Migratory Bird Hunting and Conservation Stamps, or "Duck Stamps," are sold by the government to raise money for wetlands conservation.  98 cents out of every dollar generated from duck stamps goes to purchase or lease wetlands.  A lot of people think it's all about hunting because those 16+ who want to hunt waterfowl are required to purchase a duck stamp but they are also bought by stamp collectors and people  who want to use them as a pass to get into National Wildlife Refuges.  Wildlife artists compete each year to try to get their paintings chosen to be printed on the duck stamp.  Jr. Duck stamps have been around since 1989 and the goal of the program is teaching "conservation through the arts." The students create a realistic drawing of an approved duck or goose to show that they have learned about the species and their habitat.  Students can enter their artwork into a contest at the state level.  In Kansas, they choose 3 1st place, 2nd place, and 3rd place winners and I think 12 honorable mentions in each of the 4 age groups.  All the first place winners are put together and the Best of Show is chosen to represent the state at the national level contest.  The national winner is actually printed on a Jr. Duck Stamp and the student gets scholarship opportunities.  I assume that all the states have similar processes.

The Jr. Duck Stamp program is a great way to incorporate science and observational drawing and ties into the curriculum for most grades as you can talk about the animals, their habitat, and environment.  I always start off by assessing prior knowledge of wetlands and habitats.  I then show the students some of the duck stamps my dad has saved for me and explain what they are all about.  I have lots of photos I have taken of ducks and geese printed out for the students to reference and some calendar photos that one of the teachers gave me.  This year I had created a PPT of me making an example drawing with photos of each step since I was gone on maternity leave when my 4-6th grade students had to start the project.  I showed the PPT to my younger students as well since it is a lot quicker than me demonstrating in person.  I did draw a few things up on the board like legs and feet and beaks/bills to point out that they are not stick legs and not plain triangles for the beak.  I told the students when we practice observational drawing we can pretend to be scientists and draw all the important details.  Each student chose a photo to reference when drawing but I encouraged them to change the background or something to make it their own.  I allowed three classes for each grade level to work on this project.  The first class was mostly introduction, passing out paper, labeling information on the back, and filling out an entry form.  I encouraged each student to take home an entry form for the art contest just in case they decided to enter. Some of the classes had a little time to start drawing in the first day.  I had the students draw out all the important details in pencil before starting with color.  This is a good time to talk about composition.  The students have to use 9x12 inch paper (must be horizontal) but the design needs to be appropriate for printing on a smaller stamp.  I tell the students to draw big so we can see the details and to fill the space.  Even if their reference photo has a whole flock of geese, I ask them to focus on drawing one or two.  So far I have just given the students colored pencils to work with but I may let them use paint next year.  I always preferred to use colored pencils when I entered because I felt like I had more control over the media and could be more detailed.  On the last day, I talked about ripples, reflections, and shading.  If any students finished early, I had them write a conservation message which is an additional contest.  Most of the students enjoy this project but a few complain about it being "hard".  I always tell them that just because something is hard doesn't mean they can't do it and that we learn more from challenges than doing things that are easy all the time.  Next year I may give the students a choice of Jr. Duck Stamps or the State Fish Art Contest since the goals for the project are similar.

If I remember correctly, I sent in about 300 entries between my two schools this year.  I ended up having 7 students receive Honorable Mentions and all I can say is that the drawings that placed higher must have been AMAZING because I am so proud of my students!

5th grade student

5th grade student

6th grade student

6th grade student, Honorable Mention

4th grade student, Honorable Mention

4th grade student

1st grade student, Honorable Mention

1st grade student/future Art teacher, Honorable Mention

2nd grade student

3rd grade student, Honorable Mention