Cute Little Bird

Thanks to Pinterest, I found this, thanks to Joy Sikorski:

How cute is he/she!!
My first graders had fun making their little birds.

Tweet-tweet, NCCS 1st Graders!

Mobile Fun in 1st Grade

First Graders made a class mobile and the pictures don't do it justice.  It really is special hanging from the ceiling in the classroom. (I didn't get a pic of that, but you can trust me:)
Materials:
2- 5"x5" pieces of white construction paper for ea. student.
markers, glue
one piece of wire for each student approx. 14" long
one large piece of wire bent into a wobbly circle shape & 2 pieces of wire attached to it to make a hanging hook, for the mobile base
hole punches to share
Steps:
Share some info. about Alexander Calder.  Here's the book I used "Getting to Know the World's Great Artists - Alexander Calder".
Demonstrate drawing 2 abstract shapes on each piece of paper then gluing them back sides together, and hole punching, adding the wire in hole, and attaching to mobile base.
Warn students about treating wire VERY carefully, show that it can poke eyes and fingers and all need to be careful.  Get students to pinky-swear they'll be careful then set them loose on project.

Way to go NCCS 1st Graders!!

Negative shapes in art

Oops, where did I see this one?  Thinking it was MaryAnn Kohl, but I could be wrong?
Anywho, loved the lesson and the kids did too.  (Of course they did, can't say I've ever loved a lesson that the kids didn't like.)
I did this one with both Kinder and 2nd grade, not at the same time though.
After giving brief info. on the difference between positive and negative space in art, students were given 2 strips of blue tape approx. 6" long each.
Step one: kids tore tape and placed it on their paper
Step two: kinder kids drew many lines on their paper using colored markers, 2nd graders painted over tape and paper w/ watercolors.
Step three: peel off the tape.  ( I told kids to pretend they were slowly peeling off a band-aid from their best friend's knee and they needed to take it off slowly and carefully so it wouldn't hurt.)

Edible Sculptures

Thanks Pinterest!  Saw this idea on Pinterest and the original artist is Judith G. Klausner.  Yes, sculpting Oreo Cookie cream filling on a Friday afternoon works out just great in a high school art class.  Students figured out that the toothpick carved much "cleaner" lines when it was kept wet by licking it in between carvings.
(No one minded having to do this often :)

Fairy/Troll Houses

This lesson was for my friend's daughter's 6th Birthday Party.  The theme was "Fairies", so we drew mushroom houses for Fairies (the boys' mushroom houses were for Trolls).  Next to the mushroom, was drawn a really BIG flower to give the perspective of a tiny mushroom house. 

Drawings were in pastel, watercolor on top.

Drawings were in pastel, watercolor on top.