1st grade scarecrows art lesson

 1st Grade scarecrow art lesson 

This lesson was inspired by the book "The Scarecrow" by Beth Ferry. There are so many books available about scarecrows so take your pick! I saw this lesson on Elementary Art Fun blog and changed it a bit. 

I provided a pattern for the scarecrows face. Providing a pattern for the face helps this age have a starting point on how big to make their scarecrow. 

My 1st graders were encouraged to draw a hat and decorate the scarecrows clothes. Many of the students added crows and corn to their drawings. They were then to outline their drawings with a black marker and color it with oil pastels. 

We discussed how to blend the colors using a small rolled up piece of paper towel. 

Students colored the sky with liquid watercolors. 

I found some old shredded paper so students used it as straw and glued it around their scarecrow's sleeves and hat. Pretty good for 1st graders!!!

5th grade Yayoi Kusama Pumpkins

 5th Grade Yayoi Kusama Pumpkins 

This is a great lesson for 5th grade. Yayoi Kusama is a contemporary artist from Japan who is known as the princess of polka dots. I found a lot of resources on line for kids. There are also several children books available as well. 

I taught the children how to draw a pumpkin on day one of the lesson. They could draw a typical round pumpkin or an oblong pumpkin. They were then to fill in the pumpkin with dots. For each section of the pumpkin the center had large dots and then on each side of the large dots were medium size dots and then on the end were tiny dots. The blogger Britt Curley actually had a great way to explain it. You can find her post here https://artroombritt.blogspot.com/2018/11/kusama-dot-pumpkins.html

While they were working on their pumpkins I called about six or seven students at a time and they were to pick a complementary color 12" x 9" piece of construction paper to stencil their back ground at

 another table in the art room. We used black tempera paint, sponge brushes and stencils that I had purchased from the company Temu. 

This took 50 minutes. On the next day students finished making their dots, cut out their pumpkin and glued it to their background. 

They loved them! 

2nd grade Fall Reflections

 2nd Grade Fall Reflection Painting

My second graders had so much fun creating this art project. They painted a 12" x 18" piece of multi media paper with watered down blue tempera paint. Blue construction paper was to dark and I found this process had better results. The next art class they folded their paper in half vertically and drew tree trunks and branches on half of their paper starting on the fold. They folded it back over and used the side of a ruler to rub to make an impression on the other side of the paper. I had to remind them that this was just a reflection so we didn't want it to dark. 

After the trunks and branches were finished they used fall colors to paint leaves on the trees and some land. Each time they painted leaves on a tree they had to fold their paper back over and rub. They used their hands to rub this time since paint was easy to transfer to the other side. 

They were so happy with this lesson! 

5th grade square 1 art patterned flowers

 5th grade square 1 art patterned flowers

I found the inspiration for this lesson on the blog Newton Bateman Art Department. I'm not sure what they were teaching but I changed it to fit the needs of my lesson. Thanks for the inspiration! 

We studied the art of Romero Britto and his bright colors and patterns and then got to work. 

Students could free hand or  use a lid to trace the middle of their flower. They then added the petals and drew patterns on it with a sharpie. 

I found some pattern ideas on line for those students who needed an inspiration. 

Students used crayons to color the flower and then the last step was to paint the entire drawing with liquid watercolors. They did an amazing job!