1st grade Circus Drawings

My elementary school chooses a theme each year and this year's theme was circus! I like to kick off the school year having students create artwork with some choices within a theme and/or medium to ease into things so using the school's theme works perfectly. My 2nd graders looked at Marc Chagall's circus art and 1st graders looked at examples of Chagall's and others' artwork. If I ever need to find a variety of artworks based on a theme, I start with wikiart.org and just search for the keyword. That usually give me lots of options so I can show a bunch of different styles, time periods, cultures, etc.

After looking at the artwork, I asked the students to think about what kind of act they might like to do if they were in the circus. They thought of clowns, tightrope walkers, horse riders, and more.

The students sketched their ideas in pencil first then added color with marker. I'm usually not a big fan of markers and honesty considered just recycling my old markers because students tend to be sloppy with them, but then I received a box of Sargent Art supplies when one of my students got 1st place in the Kansas Sargent Art Contest last year. Included in the box was a class set of 12 count brush tip markers and I decided to let the students try them. You guys, they were SO CAREFUL with the "fancy" markers! I got out the broad tip markers we already had for big areas, but they did a great job using the finer brush tip markers for little details. 

Students starting to add color to their drawings

When the drawings were finished we put them up in the display case across from the 1st grade classrooms. I used butcher paper to make the display case look like a circus tent.

Crayola ColorCycle

Have you heard about Crayola's ColorCycle program? Someone told me about it last week and I just got both my schools signed up. Similar to the Elmer's Glue Crew program I described here, you just set up a collection bin at your school and when your box is full, the company will pay for shipping to collect the waste. From their website,

Crayola ColorCycle - Turn Crayola Markers Into Energy!

Crayola and schools across North America are banding together to help kids understand the importance of their role in protecting the environment. That’s why we are launching Crayola ColorCycle. Through this initiative, students in K-12 schools across the continental United States and parts of Canada can collect used markers and send them to a conversion facility where they will be transformed into clean-burning fuel.

How cool is that? The FAQ section states that they will accept other brands' markers, not just Crayola. They even accept dry erase markers and highlighters. Your school doesn't earn any money for this program, but it's still a great thing to do and a fun way to teach students about recycling. I've just got to make a cool box to hold the dried up markers now! Will you join me in recycling? I hope so!

Japanese Family Crests

Japanese Family Crests are similar in concept to a Western Coat of Arms. They were the inspiration for my 6th grade East Asian lesson for Cultural Heritage Week. If my internet sources are correct, Mon means "crest" and Ka-Mon means "family crest". 

I introduced the lesson with a PowerPoint, we discussed, and then I gave a quick demo. We focused on crests starting with a circle since many examples we saw have radial designs. When I was researching, I drew parallels between design elements in the crests and Yin-Yang. I found that Yin-Yang started in China but was used in Japan. That seems to be a trend in Japanese Art- adapting things that began in China. I don't know if any experts would mention Yin-Yang and Mon, but it made me feel like an Art Historian to see a possible connection and research it. :)

Japanese Crests Ka-Mon

The students found the center of their paper by using their paper to connect diagonal corners (the center of the resulting "X" is the center of the paper) and used that dot as the center point for drawing a circle with a compass. I always suggest that the students hold the compass steady and swivel the paper. That seems to work better for most of us than trying to rotate the compass without adjusting the size. After the circle was created, the students had tons of freedom as far as how to create their crests. I just ask them to try to achieve a balance of positive and negative space (we talked about how patterns are a good way to do this.) If the students didn't know where to start, I suggested they think of something that represents them or their family and simply that into a symbol or look through the examples for inspiration. Example: One student is really into Boy Scouts so he used a canoe paddle as the central image in his design. I found a great PDF with a lot of examples* that was easy to print off enough copies for each table. The PDF was a great resource for the students. After our quick reminder discussion about inspiration vs. copying prior to starting, everyone did a great job. This website also has a lot of images and this one has history and compares Japanese Crests to Coat of Arms.

*It's a small world! One of my students was really excited that he found his family crest in the PDF. He said his mother is half Japanese. I've seen a wide range of estimates about the number of Family Crests that exist and 10,000 seems to be middle of the road. What are the chances that I just happened to print off a PDF with a very small sample of Japanese crests and one of my students in Kansas found HIS family's crest? Pretty cool!

The first day was reserved just for drawing with pencil. Most students needed the majority of the second day to finish planning. I asked them to lightly mark with pencil which areas would be filled in black and to let me check it before they started with marker. I told them it's always good to have another set of eyes check to see if your patterns make sense. After getting their plans checked, the students set to work filling in the designated areas with black permanent marker.

3rd Grade Funny Fish

I taught a similar lesson to last year's 3rd grade using dried up markers to "paint" underwater scenes.  This year I started thinking about all the cool fish names I had heard before and wondered what other names would work for the idea I had forming... I found a list of common fish names on Wikipedia and narrowed down the list to names that could be used to make funny illustrations.  I told the students I didn't want them to draw what the fish really looks like, I wanted them to draw what the name made it sound like it should look.  It was hard to describe with words exactly what I had in mind, so I drew out a name and demonstrated.  

My example- Trumpet Fish

I printed out my narrowed down list and cut the names apart.  I put all the names in a tub and asked the students to draw out a name.  I didn't just let them pick because I wanted to get some variety and avoid a whole grade's worth of hammerhead sharks and clownfish.  There were actually enough fish with good names on the list that we didn't have any repeats.  I did let the students trade fish names with a classmate if they wanted and if they really didn't like the name they drew the first time, I let them draw out one more then they could use the new name or the original.  Some students didn't understand why the fish name was funny so I explained it if I could and realized that some names were beyond a third grader's understanding! :)

The rest of the first day was spent making a line drawing of their funny fish.  I asked them to draw the fish first then work on the background.  I also stuck with my suggestion of drawing the size of your hand to fill the space.  On day two, the students dipped the dried up markers we had been collecting in water to "paint" with them.  They also brushed water over the marker pigment to help spread it more.  I'm not sure why the marker painting didn't seem to go as well this year.  I had some students who just couldn't break out of trying to make it look like a marker drawing instead of a painting.  We did get some cool results but I'm thinking this idea would actually work better with older students.  A lot of the projects could have been improved if the students had made color choices that went with the name of their fish instead of just their favorite colors.  All in all, I'd say it was a decent project, but not great.  If I do a marker painting next year, I won't do funny fish again.

Lady Fish

Mustache Triggerfish

Lamp Fish

Mosquito Fish

Jewelfish

Finger Fish

Sleeper Shark

Mullet Fish!

Walleye

3rd Grade Line Landscapes

For the beginning of the year "line" project, third grade students made landscapes filled in with lines instead of solid blocks of color.  We looked at some of Vincent van Gogh's landscape paintings and saw how he let his brush strokes show which creates lines and texture.  We talked about what a landscape is and what could go in one (I said that a small house or barn would be ok, but land should still be the focus).  I saved a calendar from last year that had cool, very colorful, landscape photos from around the world and used those photos to talk about overlapping planes to show space in artwork.  I showed the students how they can start by making a few "swoopy" lines as I like to call them, to indicate hills and create space.  I had the students lay out their landscapes pressing very lightly with pencil so the pencil marks could be erased later.  Ok, I asked them to press lightly but I suppose that means something different to everyone. :)  

In the second class period, or end of the first if they were speedy, the students started using markers to fill in the space with lines.  We talked about putting the lines close together but leaving a gap.  I finally started referencing mosaics for an example: the lines are like the tiles and the gaps are like the grout.  It really helps the students if you can convince them to work in one area at a time, putting lines close together, instead of jumping around.  If they jump around with their lines, they usually left big gaps and had to go back to fill in with more lines which takes longer even though it seems faster to them at first.  We also spent some time talking about the length, thickness, and direction of the lines.  

Length- we came up with the guideline of not making lines longer than the end of your pinky (whatever the name of that phalange would be).

Thickness- made sure the students knew that the angle at which they hold the markers affects the thickness of the line produced.

Direction- we talked about paying attention to the shape and which direction the lines are put down, like using curved lines to make something like hay bales look round.

Some students finished in two class periods but almost all needed the third 40-minute class period to finish.  If students finished early, they wrote an artist statement!  I thought about doing artist statements with the students last year but I guess never got around to it.  I thought of it again when Artsonia started publishing the statements this year so now it's the first thing the students (besides Kinders) do when they are finished with artwork.  I have the students write their statements in pencil on the back of their artwork and I type them up after I photograph the work so I can enter them on Artsonia.  It's more work, but I figure it's important to get students to think about their artwork, practice writing skills, and let their parents and teachers see what they are learning in Art class instead of just what they are making.

I can't find my picture of the artwork that went with this statement, it just cracked me up!  Some of the students use the artist statements as a chance to do some creative writing... 

"It is only 5:00 in the morning. All is silent. None of the people dare to breathe. Then BOOM! They are now awake. BOOM!"

"I used different colors and lines to draw a tree, a field, and a fence."

 

Underwater Marker Paintings

I like the visual of making marker paintings under water but the project was really about marker paintings of underwater scenes!  I read about "marker painting" as a way to sort of recycle dried out markers.  All you need to do is dip the marker tips in water cups and start spreading the pigment on the paper.  I had the students start by making a pencil drawing and tracing over their lines with sharpie- any permanent marker will work.

Along with dipping the markers in water cups, I also gave the students paint brushes.  The paint brushes can be used to spread out the "paint" created from the markers.  If the markers are not dried out, a brush and water can be used even more easily to spread the marker pigment.  I don't know if students everywhere are this excited about ocean projects, or if my students are extra excited since Kansas is pretty far from the nearest ocean, but this project was a big hit!

I raided the library for books about fish and other ocean animals so the students could use the images for reference.  One of the students told me that dolphins are a type of whale and I didn't believe him until I looked it up!  I couldn't believe that after all the books I read when I was little and random trivia I know, I had never heard that before!  I required the students to have at least one animal and something in the foreground- either sand, rocks, seaweed, reef, etc.  Some students also included treasure chests, sunken ships, and scuba divers.

I was surprised at my 3rd grade student's Beatles reference and he was equally surprised that I got it!