Van Gogh Sunflower mural kindergarten art lesson

Van Gogh sunflower Mural

I was so excited to get to go to Amsterdam over spring break. Of course one of the first things I did was visit the Van Gogh museum! The sunflower painting is amazing! I wish the museum would let visitors take  photos. They did have have this mural where you could have your picture taken. Not the same!

Yes, it was cold in April (thus why I still have my coat on!).
Seeing the sunflower painting made me want to teach my students about Vincent's sunflowers.
I found a  great lesson on the blog by Mr. Giannetto. Here is the link http://youngschoolart.blogspot.com/2014/10/1st-grade-sunflowers-in-progress.html. I just changed it a little.
I first read the book "Camille and the Sunflowers" by Laurence Anholt.

 I showed the students several examples of  his sunflower paintings and then we set to work.

I put paint on paper plates for each table and then we painted a sunflower together on brown construction paper. 

When they were dry, students cut them out and glued them to the vase I had drawn previously. They loved this lesson and they turned out beautifully! 

Wayne Thiebaud model magic lollipops kindergarten art lesson

Wayne Thiebaud model magic lollipops

I've seen this lesson many times on the internet. I actually used http://artinklings.blogspot.com/2015/12/wayne-thiebaud-inspired-lollipops.html idea for  my kindergarteners. 

I showed the students part of the interview of Wayne Thiebaud from CBS morning on Youtube. I think it actually gets the students excited about the project if you can find photographs and videos of the artists working. 

I then demonstrated how to roll the model magic into a ball and then make it into a coil.

 After the students rolled the ball into a coil they swirled it around to make the lollipop. 

I then pushed a craft stick into their lollipop. From my experience, if I had them push it in, they would become frustrated and ruin their lollipop. This project only took about twenty minutes for the lecture and the art making time. 

On the next art day, students painted their lollipops with watercolors.