Still Working on the Kaleidoscope Designs

The students are at various stages of the project. Most are in the filling in detail stage. After seeing how elaborate the designs are the students and I decided collectively that it would make more sense to show case their designs in the display case for June and put the mural up on the bulletin board in the hallway. The students were asked to add value into their work to make it pop more. These will be exciting to see up soon. 

Teacher Example: Reach for the Stars

 The students in 4th and 5th grade are ready to paint! What could be more inspiring finishing out the last part of the school year with an illustration asking for a creative way to reach for the stars? This is the teacher example for the lesson where I used a variety of materials to illustrate the question. I traced my hand, designed it, and painted the overall picture.  The students will have colored pencils, markers, crayons, paint, and construction paper to help them illustrate their ideas.

Teacher Example Time: Koinobori Inspired Fish

The students will continue with practicing folding, cutting, and symmetry by creating their own Koinobori Inspired fish. I wanted the students to be creative so I went with a non traditional approach. The students are using the pipe cleaners to let the fish move. I made a cat fish that would help the students to see that they can use a limited color palette, glue different papers and things to their work, and also that it does not have to be completely symmetrical.

Teacher Example Time: Word Kaleidoscopes

Here is the teacher example I am working on for the word kaleidoscope artwork the seventh grade students are working on. This is a popular project for middle school art. It provides the students with a lot of room for creative expression. I'm giving them the option for painting on this project. 

Lizards and More Lizards

The last lesson students were mostly learning the form of the lizards. Now that they know the form they can really get creative with them. This first grade student added a person sitting on top of her "checker board" lizard. Many students added wings and other things to their lizard. 

The older students were working on moveable lizards. This lizard was found on another education blog. I wanted the students to be able to create something a little more advanced then just the regular symmetrical lizard. This lesson was DIFFICULT. The hardest part for the students was folding the sides down and then returning back to the original fold. I feel like if I were going to teach it again all of the students would have to do this step at the same time and go more slowly. The precision of the folds and cuts is so important to the success of the lizard moving. The lizards that could not move still turned out awesome because they had texture. The example below is from a fourth grade student. 

Another fourth grade student used tape for legs and stuck it to the wall. 

A couple of students asked if they could take photos of their lizards in action. This is the photo they took. They said this project would be cool if they could extend it into an animation video. 

Update on Mural

The mural is coming along but we are trying into issues with how it is piecing together. The lizards have to be so precise in order for the tessellation to work but I'm finding that some of the students glued on the lizards wonky. We are going to decide how the lizards will be glued on once it starts colliding too much. The students are excited to see the mural coming together. 

Water for Flint: Water Conservation Posters

The students are conducting several activities around water conservation as project based learning. In art class, the seventh grade students created illustrated posters promoting water conservation that will be placed around the building. The students chose a fact and had a phlethora of materials to choose from for creating their posters. Many students chose a combination of cut paper and dry art materials for their posters. 

M C Escher Lizard Mural

The students are looking into Tessellations right now. I wanted to take a different approach to the Tessellations so the students could do a collaboration and also because this method of the Tessellations was sort of a mystery for them. I found lizards online that I thought were perfect for the mural and the students were told to give them personality. They were also practicing their cutting craftsmanship because I'm finding more students need to work on that. It was a perfect opportunity for the students to use some of the new scissors donated from Donorschoose. The mural will go up in the hallway once it is complete. 

Leaping Lizards: 3-D paper lizards

Students in Kindergarten through 3rd grade have been practicing symmetry by cutting out lizard paper crafts. I demonstrated how to draw half a lizard in varying difficulty for the students to construct their own lizard and then cut out. The project was inspired by a this post where they use scraps as a the decorations but I thought the lizards would have more personal meaning with crayons, markers, and colored pencils. Some students bent the legs to make the lizard stand better. Other students put the lizards on their arms or on their shoulders acting as if it were their real pet. It is such a fun and engaging assignment.