Arts and Crafts

My butterfly and rose. 

This week, Kyla had us make various arts and crafts focusing on spring time.  Kyla had us make butterflies out of tissue paper, plastic bags, and pipe cleaners. Kyla also had us make flowers out of cupcake liners and we also used paint to make flowers from our handprints. 

Mask Making

Krystal's lesson this week was on masks.  Krystal introduced us to lots of different masks and told us the history of masks and their many uses.  We also were required to make masks.  I made a cute little pig and fun doing it.  Krystal taught us a few cool things we could do with paper.  I had no idea you could curl paper like you could curl ribbons!

Notan Collage

My project

This week, Amber, an actual artist, introduced us to notan collage.  This was a slightly complicated project for us education majors to complete.  Although it was a bit more difficult than past projects, I am happy I learned about it and would definitely use it in my future classroom.  The project I created had a birthday theme because we made it the day before my niece's birthday.

Sandpaper Print Making 

Jennie's display

My completed product

My classmate Jennie introduced us to sandpaper print making this week.  This was an interesting process and I will definitely use it in the future.  For this, Jennie had us draw pictures or patterns on sandpaper.  After we colored our pictures in with crayons, we used an iron to iron the design onto white paper.  

Illustrating Gestures

Richards Bulletin Board

Gestures I drew.. not very good!

This week, Richard presented his lesson on making gestures.  The lesson required us to partner up and use transparent paper to draw our partners facial expressions.  We each drew three expressions and then wrote a short sentence describing what caused the expression. 

SILHOUETTE ART

For my final project in the class, I taught a lesson on silhouette art.  For my lesson, I had students use different water color techniques to paint an interesting background.  While their paintings were drying, students used black construction paper to create silhouette objects.  When the background paintings were dry, students attached their silhouette objects to the background to create one cool silhouette image.  My lesson went really well and students seemed to enjoy it!  When everyone was done, I collected the art, graded it, and then created this bulletin board to display it!  

My first example

My second example

ERIC CARLE ART

This week we talked about Eric Carle's art and had the chance to use his techniques to create our own.  To do this, first we used paint to randomly paint and texturize plain white sheets of paper.  Next, we planned and drew out how we wanted our piece of art to look.  Finally, we cut out all of our shapes from our painted sheets of paper and put them together to create one big image. This project was time consuming but the finished product was worth it!  I really enjoyed this project!

Animal Safari

The animal safari project has to be one of my favorite projects.  For this project, Mrs. Preszler had us use a blue crayon to draw an animal on white paper.  Next, we drew shapes and designed over our animal in warm colors.  Once our animals were disguised, we used special glasses and could see the animal!  I would use this project in all subjects!  I would have students make these glasses at the beginning of the semester and use this disguising technique to teach them lots of things! 

There is an elephant hidden in there!

Starry Night Challenge

Vincent Van Gogh - Starry Night

This week, our professor modeled a lesson on Vincent van Gogh that we could one day use in our own K-8 classroom.  Our professor, Mrs, Preszler, gave us a short presentation on the history of Van Gogh and then gave us two art projects that went along with the lesson.

The first project we attempted was a tissue paper collage that was supposed to be a re-creation of Van Gogh's "Starry Night" but with our own twist to it.

Katelynn Lovrien - Oh Holy Night

I decided to create a dreary, blizzarding, night where the only trace of light is coming from one big bright star shining through the darkness.  In the story of Jesus' birth, a bright star led shepherds and wise men to the place where their savior was born.  I wanted my creation to tell a similar story, where one star shines in the darkness to show the way to rest, peace, and forgiveness.

The second project we did was very messy but very fun.  For the second project, Mrs. Preszler asked a room full of college students to roll up their sleeves and do some finger painting.  

Our second creation gave us an opportunity to try to create the same type of strokes and movement with our paint that Van Gogh created with his paint in Starry Nights. 

I decided to create a lovely sunset scene.  This creation required a foreground, middle ground, and background.

Lovely Sunset- Katelynn Lovrien

I would totally use a lesson like this in my classroom because it was educational and fun.  You could really do this with any artist and have the students re-create famous works of art with their own spin on it.  You could also display a piece of art and ask the students to write a story of what happen before the "image" was captured in the piece of art.  For example, I would display Starry Night and ask the students to write a story about the Starry Night village before the sun set and the sky filled with stars.  

The Principals and Elements of Art

Fingal Beach in Australia- This photo is an example of COLOR.  

This was taken here in Aberdeen.  It is an example of MOVEMENT

London Donuts are an example of GEOMETRIC SHAPES

This is a church on the island of Patmos, Greece and illustrates TEXTURE

This is a garden at Hampton Court Palace in London.  This photograph is an examples of LINES.  The lines in the garden create shapes and define spaces.  

Dot Day Project

This week we focused on "Dot Day." After reading a story about a little girl who turned into an artist after she discovered that even her simple little dot was art, we dedicated one whole class period experimenting with different art supplies to create our own dots.  I really enjoyed "playing" in the art room that day but I do wish I had given my end display more thought.  Each project turned out really cool, but I do not like how they all look together.   This was a good lesson for me because now I will always remember to think the project through before even starting.

Overall, this weeks project was a blast.  I would totally use "DOT DAY" in my classroom to give students an opportunity to experiment with lots of different tools and show their creativity in a variety of ways.  You could even have "dots" be the theme in all content areas!  Math with dots, science with dots, language arts with dots, everything with dots!  I am excited to try this in the future!

Welcome to my blog!

Art class as a 26 year old is an interesting thing.  At first I thought, "Agh, I am too old for this!" but now I find myself looking forward to Friday so I can paint, color, cut, and create.  Art is a fabulously therapeutic activity and I think it is the perfect form of therapy to adopt into my life.

This week, we had to trace our foot on construction paper, cut it out, and then decorate it in a way that captures our personality and life journey.  This was a great activity to start class with, but I found myself wishing I had a bigger foot so I could put more on it.  

My Foot

Allow me to explain in more detail:

Background-The left side background on my foot is a picture of a heavily stamped passport to represent my love of traveling.  I have been to 7 different countries in the past 4 years and I cannot imagine my life without travel.  The right side background is a map of the London tube because London is my favorite city to visit.  This past summer I took a trip to London and stayed at a palace for the week.  It was a dream trip and I had the time of my life!

The right side of the foot has a pair of sunglasses, a flower and an airplane ticket.  Those items are there to demonstrate my love of travel.  Next, there is a blue castle to represent the 6 years I spent as a Walt Disney World cast member at the Magic Kingdom.   Next to the castle is a set of hands to represent the years I have spent as a nanny to many families across the country.  The hands also represent my love for children and my choice to become a teacher.  On the other side of my name is an oven mitt and measuring spoons because I love to bake! Finally, along the bottom of my foot is an ocean lined with a beach and an umbrella to represent the fact the I love the ocean!  The ocean was originally made of shaving cream and paint but when that wouldn't dry I decided to try glue, salt, and watercolor painting and it turned out great!

This activity was great because it gave my classmates some insight into who I am and it also helped me get to know them.  In addition to using this project as a way to introduce students to each other, I would also use it for other projects.  If I were doing a unit on the underground railroad, I would focus on individual slaves and the journey they had to take to escape slavery.  I would assign each student a slave and have them do research on the slave and decorate their foot to represent their persons story/journey.