Color Projects (A lot of pictures again)

A little late, but here's the update on the color projects that my students at East Meadow School were working on.

The 4th graders created Personalized Color Wheels. We discussed primary, secondary, and tertiary colors and how the primary colors can be mixed to create the secondary and tertiary colors. The students then picked a personal symbol to turn into their color wheel. Once they picked and drew their symbols, we divided the symbol into 12 sections. Each group was only given the primary colors and the students had to mix the secondary and tertiary colors.

The 5th graders created Blue Dog Inspired Animals. We looked at and discussed the work of George Rodrigue especially his Blue Dog series of paintings. Here's a link to his website. We also discussed what complementary colors are. Students could then pick any animal they wanted. We painted the animals using only tints and shades of one pair of complementary colors, either blue and orange, yellow and purple, or red and green. Here's a picture of some paintings in progress and it's followed by some completed student examples.

And finally, the 6th graders created value silhouettes. We discussed value, tints and shades, monochromatic and what a silhouette is. The students painted along with me to get the background started and then completed the background at their own pace.

After the backgrounds were completed the students added in their silhouettes in black paint. When coming up with their ideas for the silhouette, I told students to think about looking up at the moon and what would they would actually see in real life to create their silhouette.

 

Big Update - Lots of Photos

Last time I posted I talked about the first day of school, one day hand project at West Street. Here's what the completed bulletin board looked like.

I also mentioned that all grades at West Street were working on projects that had to do with line. The third graders completed a project where they did contour line drawings of leaves using oil pastels and then exaggerated the outlines to fill up the whole 12"x18" paper. Here's some student examples. Sorry for the glare, they were already hanging up behind the plexiglass.

The 2nd graders looked at the work of Joan Miro and as a group discussed his process of doodling on the canvas before painting. We also looked for what could be in the lines and shapes. Next they scribbled on paper and looked to see what was in their scribbles. After figuring out what was in the scribbles, the students used watercolor paints to paint what they saw in their own scribble. Here's some student in progress photos and some completed ones.

The students at East Meadow have just finished their color projects, so I will be posting those soon.

The Start

The year has started off great! It has been super crazy getting used to my new schedule, but I just have to keep reminding myself to breathe and take it one day at a time.

My students at West Street all decorated a hand with things they like or represent themselves. It was a good first day, one day project. I hung all the hand prints up on the bulletin board outside the art room for Parents Night. I will take a picture of all the hands when I'm there next. However, here's the hand I made.

Students in all grades are working on their first projects. The students at West Street are all working on projects that have to do with line and The students at East Meadow are all working on projects that have to do with color. I will post photos as they finish and hopefully some in progress ones as well. My 7th and 8th graders are working on an abstract project using shading to create movement.

Before I go here's some pictures of two of my classrooms before the kids showed up.

A New Beginning!

With the new school year only days away, I wanted to do something I have been meaning to do for awhile now. So here it is, my brand new blog! I want my blog to be a way for me to share lessons, artwork, my classrooms, how the year is going, upcoming events, etc with colleagues (near and far), parents, and anyone else interested in what is happening in K-8 art in Granby, MA.

I have three classrooms that I have had to prepare for the upcoming school year. My K-3 school (West Street School) and my 4-6 school (East Meadow School) rooms were pretty much set, just putting things back out and unpacking the incoming supply orders. However, at the Jr/Sr High School where I teach 7th and 8th grade art, I had much more set up. For the last five years, I have shared the high school art room and taught during the high school art teacher's prep. This year, the Jr/Sr High School has a new schedule and we will be teaching at the same time. I will be sharing a room with one of the Wellness teachers. The space is large and has sinks and even stoves! It's the old home economics room. The Wellness teacher has been very gracious and has cleaned out two closets and some drawers for me. Still have more set up to do there, but am staying positive that everything will fall into place for when the students come back Thursday.