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I currently work at Davenport A+ Elementary School in Lenoir, NC.

Tuesday, May 6, 2025

4th Grade Roy Lichtenstein self portraits

 4th Grade Roy Lichtenstein Self Portraits



I found inspiration for this lesson from Sara Gutkind. I just changed it a bit to fit the needs of my classroom. There are tons of videos for kids on Roy Lichtenstein on YouTube. I used the one on Safe Tv for this lesson. 
Students used a 12" x 9" piece of multimedia paper and drew a self portrait. Remind them to sketch lightly!! 
My 4th graders could use a stencil with circles to add the dots or draw them free hand themselves with markers. The last steps were to trace them with a black marker and color the background with crayons. They did such an amazing job!! 
























Friday, May 2, 2025

Kindergarten Jasper John's alphabet collages

 

Kindergarten Jasper John's alphabet collages

I found this great idea from Cassie Stephens art blog. You can find the original post here cassiestephens.blogspot. I always like to include artists so we discussed the art of Jasper Johns and viewed his alphabet collages. 

I provided each student with a 12" x 18" multi media paper with 28 boxes copied onto them. They used rubbing plates and neon construction paper crayons to create textures into each box. Lastly, they used neon tempera cakes to paint over each box. I had to really rush my kindergarteners so they could put the letters on the art during their next art class. If you don't have rubbing plates you can use cardboard squares and draw designs on them with glue. Cassie shows you how to make them on her blog. 



On day two I provided copies of the alphabet for students to copy the letters onto their papers with the paint daubers. I was so surprised on how well they did! They were careful and really enjoyed this process! Yeah! Just remind them to not squeeze the bottles. 
Thanks Cassie for the idea! 










Wednesday, April 30, 2025

Matisse paper sculptures

 Henri Matisse Paper Sculptures


I found this idea on the blog https://www.limerickeducatetogether.com/third-class-artists/ and revised it a bit. 

Taking inspiration from Henri Matisse's paper cut outs students created paper sculptures using construction paper, glue and water and a balloon. 
On day one students cut out organic and swirl shapes from 6" x 6" construction paper rectangles. They needed about 12 pieces to cover their balloons. 
                                         
 


      
On day two students covered their balloons with a glue mixture and their cut papers. Don't let them overlap to much or their papers will become to heavy and pop their balloon. This was really messy but the kids had a great time! It was hard for them to balance them on a cup so they just constructed them on the tables and then laid them on the art shelves to dry. 

                                                         



                                                      

                                                       

They loved the results! 

















Pete the Cat kindergarten art lesson

 Pete the Cat kindergarten color mixing lesson 

                                                        
The "Pete the Cat" book series are great books for early childhood readers and the illustrations are bright and engaging. I was looking for a new way to introduce coloring mixing and came up with the idea of "Pete the Cat: I Love My White Shoes" by Eric Litwin, James Dean and Kimberly Dean. I found clip art of tennis shoes and copied them onto multimedia art paper (make sure you have two shoes going in the opposite direction). We used tempera paint to mix the primary colors into secondary colors. 




On the next art class I provided blue 12" x 18" construction paper, patterns for the head and body, glue, scissors and construction paper crayons to complete the drawing. 







They didn't need to color his head and tail since we used blue paper! I know many art teachers don't like to use patterns in art but these were only ovals and rectangles for them to trace. 
Everyone did a great job!