Kindergarten poppies

Kindergarten poppies

Here is another great idea I found from another  art teacher, Suzanne Tiedemann who teaches at Brunswick Elementary School. I just adapted it a bit to fit the needs of my kindergartners. 

We discussed the beautiful poppy paintings by Georgia O'Keeffe as well as viewing a clip of The Wizard of Oz, where Dorothy and the rest of the characters are walking in a field of poppies. Boy were they excited to see this short video clip! You can find it on YouTube. 

Students drew short, medium and long stems with oil pastels onto a 12" x 18" piece of navy or blue construction paper. In the original  idea, Ms. Tiedemann used black paper. I chose navy and blue because I was pretty low on black paper.  I then provided a paper plate with red, white and black paint for them to paint their flowers. 

Easy lesson and this was done in one, fifty minute class period. 

1st grade Matisse still life collages

Matisse Still Life Collages

Children love Henri Matisse. His vibrant colors and cut paper collages are beautiful and kid friendly. I found this great idea from https://wilderpaintsplatters.wordpress.com/2011/11/08/marvelous-matisse-cut-outs/. It was a lot of work for my 1st graders but they had fun creating it. This art project is based on his painting titled "The Goldfish".

On the first day students painted a 12" x 18" piece of multi-media paper with three colors of tempera paint. We used rulers to mark off the room.

On the second day students painted a 6" x 9" piece of multi-media paper with liquid watercolors and then quickly placed a piece of plastic wrap on top to create the watery texture. This would be the paper they used for the fish bowl.  My first group of students used a 12" x 9" piece of paper but I found it to be to big for their fish bowls. Students need to do this part of the project quickly before the paint dries.

 Since I have fifty minute class periods students had time to create the paper cut-outs for their room. We discussed organic shapes and I taught them how to cut spirals. They loved this!

On the last day I taught students how to fold their watercolor papers in half and draw half of a fish bowl. I provided patterns for them to trace for their table and scraps of paper for goldfish and leaves.

And the finished products!! 

1st grade Eric Carle Spiders

1st grade Eric Carle Spiders

Don't you just love Eric Carle?

My demonstration video.

This art lesson was based on his book "The Very Busy Spider". I found a great video on Mister Rogers' Neighbor where Eric Carle is showing Fred Rogers  how he makes the painted papers. You can find the episode on the PBS website. It's only about five minutes if you cut out the rest of the episode.
Students were allowed to paint two or three 6" x 9" pieces of multi-media papers with tempera paint. They could use paint combs, clay rollers, bottle stoppers or the top of their paintbrushes. They really loved this part!

On the next art class I taught students how to draw an egg shape for the body and a circle for the head. Some students chose to trace old lids for the heads.
Students glued the body on a 12" x 9" piece of black paper and added eight legs. I offered to cut their legs on the paper cutter or they could cut their own (most of them wanted me to cut them). 

The last step was to add the details. So cute!!!!