Gearing up for Dr. Seuss's Birthday and Read Across America, the 2nd graders were enthusiastic to make Seuss-ical fish! The students worked on this lesson for two days. The first day, the book One Fish Two Fish, Red Fish Blue Fish was read and the students were interested in the style of drawing used by Dr. Seuss. After the book was read, students were reminded (from the book) "not one thing will look like another" which was my motto for the lesson! Students were given a Sharpie and asked to draw one large fish, it could be swimming or walking, old or young, hairy or bald, their choice!
The second day, students painted horizontal lines for the background and had the option to add glitter (which most did). Our use of color was using the three primary colors because Dr. Seuss focused on primary colors often. Students cut out their fish and added details using oil pastels. We glued the fish down in the center of the page and hung them up!

Arty On!

In the spirit of Valentine's Day, the 2nd graders worked with images from Cincinnati artist Jim Dine as inspiration! Jim Dine was known well for his paintings of hearts, said to be done because he loved his wife so much! The lesson began with a discussion of Jim Dine and his use of color, our emphasis was on warm and cool colors. Each student was given one piece of cardboard. On the cardboard, students drew a heart using a Sharpie, and outlined it with glue and laid a piece of yarn on top. The students then put a large piece of aluminum foil on top of it all, able to feel the yarn, giving the work an embossed feeling. Students use a black Sharpie to divide the spaces using strong art lines (straight, curvy, curly and zig zag which is prior knowledge to them). The foreground (inside of the heart) is completed using warm colored Sharpies, where the background (outside of the heart) is completed using cool colored Sharpies. What a fun way to incorporate a local artist, holiday and new mediums for the little artists!

Arty On!

As I began my student teaching, the 2nd grade class was working on a Vincent Van Gogh unit. They studied his paintings of sunflowers and recreated them. Before I got there, they had drawn them, painted the orange and yellow bright sunflowers and the blue crisp backgrounds. When I got there, we continued by making frames from newspaper and decorated them with a variety of dry noodles. After this, we used gold paint to paint the frame, making it appear to look old and 3-D like vintage frames in the art museums.

Arty On!