Kindergarten Sunflower Drawings

Whoops! This one got away from me. This lesson was from waaaay back in January. It seems so long ago now that teachers report back to school in a little over a week! Kansas Day is January 29th so I had planned a Kansas-themed project for each K-3rd grade in January. My plan for Kindergarten was to integrate some more Art History by making Kandinsky-inspired concentric circles to use as the center of drawn sunflowers. The concentric circles turned out too cool to cut, so I changed it into two lessons and. The students learned about Vincent van Gogh and his sunflower series, as well as how a sunflower grows. We even watched a time lapse video of some dwarf sunflowers growing, then because the students had lots of energy that day, each found his/her own spot on the floor and acted out a sunflower's life cycle from seed to wilting.

Source: youtube.com via Katie on Pinterest

My inside-the-classroom bulletin boards were full, and honestly, they're kind of hard for big groups to see, so I made a portable van Gogh display that I could hold while the students sat on the floor around me for our talk. I wrapped a skinny box I had saved in yellow butcher paper then just stapled in some of the van Gogh sunflower prints I had recently been given as well as some labels- his name and dates, the word "sunflowers" and the word "series" with the definition, "several works based on one idea".

The first class period was spent talking about sunflowers and Vincent van Gogh, and getting pencil drawings laid out on black construction paper. Some students finished drawing early and were excited to recognize one of the sunflower prints they had just learned about in a book.

The next class period was spent adding color to the drawings with construction paper crayons. Admittedly, it was a struggle to get the students to cover all the black paper. Most got the point where I decided it was as solid as it was gonna get. Now that I ordered some better tempera paint, I might try having the Kinders paint on black construction paper instead of coloring.

Yes, this is the same photo from above... I wanted a drawing to be the first photo that showed up but I also wanted you to see this drawing next to the other two. I was so impressed by this 6 year-old's drawing!

ATC Swap with Mrs.Knight's Smartest Artists

A while back (like, way back I just can't remember when) I saw a post on Mrs.Knight's Smartest Artists looking for schools to swap ATCs with. I love ATCs and my students do, too, so I jumped at the chance and emailed her. My 3rd and 4th grade students made Fall or Sunflower themed Artist Trading Cards to send to 3rd and 4th grade students in Georgia. They were pumped to be sending something to students in another state.  Each student created a series of 3 ATCs- 1 to keep, 1 to trade with a student in their class, and 1 to send to Georgia. I encouraged them to send their best card to Mrs.Knight's students, something they would be excited to receive. The students got to choose and use several techniques including regular drawing with crayons or markers, collage, wax resist, or regular watercolor. Here are some results!  

I thought this was cute.

"This is a pumpkin and it is orange and it is going to gorgia. From Giavonni."

I wanted to put the work on Artsonia but not photograph 3 times as many projects as usual. To solve the problem, I took a piece of white paper big enough for 3 cards to fit on top, arranged their series of ATCs on top, and only took one photograph.

Here are the super cool cards we got in return! 

Thank you, Hope!

Sunflower State

This time of year, it's easy to see why Kansas is called the Sunflower State.  Sunflowers happen to be one of my favorite flowers- they're just so darn optimistic!  I enjoy the native sunflowers growing in my back yard and along the roads, as do all the butterflies and other insects.  Last year I took some sunflowers to school for the students to observe and draw.  The timing won't work out right this year since we are jumping right into some Southern African projects for Multi Cultural Heritage Week, more on that later!  In the mean time, I hope you enjoy some of my photos.