Kindergarten has completed their lesson about Piet Mondrian and this week they will continue to learn about fat lines when they learn about the women of Gees Bend, Alabama. Gees Bend is an isolated island in AL where the women made quilts out of every scrap of fabric they could save. These quilters and their quilts were discovered about ten years ago. Their quilts are amazingly artistic and comtemporary! The children will learn about these ladies and how they saved every scrap they had to be creative. They will use fat, colored, lines to create a quilt block that I will display as a large, paper, quilt.
First grade has completed covering their puppets with paper mache' and they are now painting their puppet heads white to cover up the newspaper and give their colors a nice undercoating. This week they will draw the faces on their puppets and begin painting the face. It will be an exciting week!
Second grade is beginning to finish their tropical birds on their Amate' paper. The final step is adding white accent strokes and dots to their birds. We are talking about "stroke work" when we use our brushes in small strokes rather than as a tool to fill in color. The handle end of the brush is perfect for making small dots! The strokes and dots add beauty to our birds. This is one of my favorite projects I teach!
Third grade has finished warping their looms and they will begin weaving this week. They will be weaving for several days! You can almost feel the excitement as they enter the room. I have found that children absolutely love to weave! It is instant gratification. They immediately see their progress and they end up with a usable item. Weaving is also very relaxing. They talk and weave and talk and weave. Rarely does anyone get into trouble! We love to weave!!!
Fourth grade is going in different directions right now. I have two classes who have finished their self-portraits so they made origami boxes this week. The other two classes will finish their self-portraits this week. We'll begin learning about Ron Burns and his colorful cats and dogs. Ron Burns is an artist who also acts as the spokesperson for the Humane Society. The children will be copying one of his pieces of artwork but they have to enlarge the picture by graphing. They will copy his artwork box by box which allows them to draft an image in an easier way than just trying to copy an imgage on their own. This skill can be used when completing any project they may have in the future. They will add color using oil pastels in a painterly manner.
No comments:
Post a Comment