Mardi Gras Masks - Gr. 4 or Gr. 5

So this coming week is February vacation week for some school districts but not for others, so for those who will be in school for Mardi Gras I wanted to share this one-day lesson that I evolved from something that I've seen other art teachers do.

This lesson teaches about positive/negative space, symmetry, and precision cutting skills, so I recommend it for either fourth or fifth grade especially if going for more intricate designs.


Step 1: Using a half-sheet of paper draw a half mask design from the edge. This will actually create the entire mask when glued down. Once the design is drawn carefully cut only on the drawn lines. That is the challenging part because if you cut on the paper to get to a line you risk ruining the image.

Step 2: With all pieces cut out, assemble them onto a full sheet of paper. It helps to start with the pieces that are on the edge and work from there. When all pieces are in the correct place glue them down as neatly as possible.

Step 3: This is where I have "evolved" the lesson. I added embellishments with sequin strands, ribbons, feathers, rhinestones, and gold glitter. All of which really glitz things up to bring to mind the celebratory nature of Mardi Gras!

Love Your Neighbor: Community Quilt Levels 3 - 5

Here is the description from the wall label:

Students were asked to remember Jesus’ message “Love one another as I have loved you.” While remembering this message they created their own block of a community quilt. In this at-home assignment they created patterned backgrounds and collaged houses that held a message of neighborly love. And just as we are all one part of the human race, their projects became one part of the class community quilt.

This was an at-home assignment. Students were provided with a project packet containing some materials and the linked instructions.

Love Your Neighbor: Community Quilt

The Gingerbread Man Grade 1

I was also in as a substitute for a first grade classroom teacher who was having a gingerbread-themed day. She knew that I was an art teacher and asked that I come up with a simple little project to go along with the classic Gingerbread Man story.



Using limited classroom supplies like construction paper, special edger scissors, buttons and crayons, I came up with this little lesson.

I began by setting the background scene. Students were given 9x12" light blue paper and shown how to draw the house (no tracers). The house details were added and crayons were used to add color. White copier paper, pre-cut into fourths, was distributed and students tore the paper to make snow for the ground and sky. Glue sticks were used to adhere the torn paper to the larger paper.

The gingerbread men were already printed onto brown construction paper so the students just had to cut them out. Then I handed out all of the pre-cut smaller pieces of paper and taught them how to get two of the same shape eyes by folding the paper, etc. They edger scissors were rotated around the room so everyone got the opportunity to use the different designs. The gingerbread men were glued onto the papers with the houses. Each student could then pick two buttons, which I hot-glued onto their otherwise finished projects.

Here is my example:

Winter Cityscapes Kindergarten

When teaching this lesson, I like to begin by reading a book that has lots of pictures of city buildings. Then, students are asked to name things that make a city, like Boston, different than a suburb or the country. They usually get tall buildings and skyscrapers right at the beginning, but soon add other things like cars, streets, lights, city animals and birds, etc.

I then distribute a large sheet of white paper (12 x 18") and several rectangular tracers to be used to "build" skyscrapers. Students get to work tracing and drawing their city scenes. Then we used crayons to add color and silver peel-and-stick paper to create windows. The same project could be done using collage techniques with construction paper instead of drawing and coloring.






The drawings are cut-out and glued onto dark blue paper (also 12 x 18"). Then the fun part begins. Students come up in pairs to a paint splatter area (a large box big enough to hold the paper). Toothbrushes are used to splatter white tempera snow over the entire paper (especially the sky). This is a messy project and students will get lots of paint on their hands as they learn how to hold the toothbrush in one hand and fleck the paint by running a finger from the other hand over the bristles. They may also end up with some paint on their faces and hair if they are not carefully watched.

Doily Snowmen Grade 2

The second-graders made cute doily snowmen with doilies of three different sizes, snowflake stampers, white tempera paint, iridescent glitter, poms, wiggle eyes, craft sticks, brown markers, and scrap-booking papers. Tracers were used for the hats, but gloves and scarves were cut free-hand from the scraps. Polyester fiber fill was used for the snow along the bottom of the paper. Using lots of Elmer's glue actually works better than hot-glue to attach the snow.

Snow People & Reindeer Grade 1

The first-graders had a great project that combined horizon lines, tree drawings and collaged materials. They began by using green oil pastels to draw a line across the paper then draw pine trees along that line. Next they used white tempera to paint the snow, including some on the trees. While the paint was still wet it was sprinkled with iridescent glitter. This took one art class to complete.

The following week, the students worked with a lot of pre-cut felt pieces to make the reindeer and snowpeople. Snowmen got to wear top hats and snowladies got bows. While the results were very cute, this project required a lot of prep work for me to cut out all the parts and to hot glue some of the assembly because elmer's just wasn't strong enough to hold some of the parts on. The candy canes were thankfully made by the second graders to help me out.

Here is a close up of a snowman and a snowlady and an image of the display at the school:

Halloween Ideas

These were a bit cookie-cutter for my preference in art lessons, but they were cute and a good project to leave for a substitute teacher to do. Pretty much everything had a tracer for the students to work with. The bat on the moon was for Kindergarten and the cat on the pumpkin was for Grade 2. There were some other Halloween projects that I did with the students, but I didn't photograph them. The materials are fairly simple: construction paper, white colored pencils, black sharpies, scissors and glue.

Cut & Fold Paper Art!

In one of my mini-courses students used construction paper and glue to make lots of different art creations!

Flames of the Holy Spirit

by Levels K & 1
In an introduction to Pentecost, students learned that the Holy Spirit is often represented as a flame that gave courage to the disciples after Jesus’ death. They created collaged flames using warm-colored tissue papers that were layered over each other and cut out to create flames which were then mounted onto larger flames to give the collages borders.

Materials:
White Oak Tag
Red & Black Construction Paper
Red, Orange, Yellow Tissue Paper
Watered Down Mod-podge
Gluing Brushes
Elmer's Glue
Scissors