Winter Regattas - Part 1

If our students walk 7 blocks west of our school, this is what they see:

Now imagine hundreds of sailboats in this seascape and you have one of the many regattas (sailboat races) that grace our shores during the mid-winter. So, this week 3rd graders prepared the background for their multi-media regatta collage that we will finish up next week. I experimented with this during the summer and posted my work here, however, as we all know, once you start working with kids, you learn all sorts of things that you hadn't planned for when putting the idea together!!

First there was the set-up. We were painting 2 different pieces: the sky and sand with watercolor on illustration board, and the ocean with watered down tempera on plain copy paper. I had the watercolor pan, paper towel and a small water container next to each other at each place. I used this as an opportunity to reinforce that artists usually keep their water right next to their paint to avoid unintended drips on their paper. I have found that this is NOT instinctive to young painters!!! When I was giving directions, I had painters who hold their brush in their left hands switch the paint and water to the other side of their board.

You may notice that I pre-marked one side of the copy paper with permanent black marker. After this paper is painted as the ocean, we are going to tear it into strips and I discovered that the paper I am using at school has a grain that makes tearing from one side easy and straight, but if you start from the other side you have a crooked mess! Good thing I found this out before we all got to the tearing stage!!!

In the center of the table was a round plate with watercolor brushes and small pieces of foam core that students used to elevate the top of their board so that the paint would run down and have movement. I also had a larger container of water dedicated to final cleaning of brushes.

On a counter near each table I had the tempera, flat brushes and small sponges ready to swap out when the watercolor phase was finished.

We started with a short Smartboard slideshow of sailboats, ocean, sky, etc. (noticing that the sky is a lighter tint of blue near the horizon.) I loved that one student actually used the word "tint" in her comment! YEAH!! Then I demonstrated how to do a wet-on wet application for the sky, including how to make a little "swimming pool" of water in the lid of the watercolor pan and add pigment to it. They actually did this before starting the sky. First, they quickly washed the top of their paper with clear water, leaving white spaces of paper if they wanted clouds. Then, just a quickly, with a full side-to-side brush strokes, added the blue from their "swimming pool."

The student above decided to use a paper towel to mark where the sky would meet the land -- pretty clever! You can also see how he raised the top of his board off the desk using the small piece of foam core. After completing the sky we learned how to use that dry paper towel to sop up all the blue in their paint pan lid and wipe it clean (a new skill for many!!)

While kids were cleaning their lids, I traded the watercolor brushes for flat brushes so we could paint the water. This involved quickly brushing side-to-side with either the blue or green tempera and then adding strokes of the alternate color on top -- mixing the two colors together right on the paper. Then, while some kids were sponge painting watercolor on the bottom of their boards for sand, groups of 8 or 9 at a time came back to me at a table near the sink to roll on white tempera for whitecaps.

So, now everything is drying on the racks and next week we'll tear, glue, make and add sailboats and spattered paint and hopefully all will be beautiful!!

3rd Grade Ghost-Eye Trees

This week we are finishing our tints and shades lesson using The Ghost-Eye Tree as inspiration. Last week we painted our concentric circles (working on tints, shades and turning the brush as we painted) here.

It was interesting to watch kids try to visualize the trunk of the tree (looking like a capital "Y") as they cut. You learn so much about students' perceptual skills!

They used their scraps to add branches (hopefully with natural, organic shapes). Some chose to cut silhouettes of a fence to add detail.

We also talked about how some artists add a little surprise element to their art. The example I used was Miro's "People and Dog in the Sun" with its little spot of yellow near the center. I had the kids use the skills they learned last year to make a cylinder look 3-dimensional, only applying the concept of light source to a pumpkin sphere. They were asked to glue that little pumpkin somewhere in their scene as the only element that was NOT silhouetted.

Kids were "happy as clams" as they watched their scene take form. I heard a lot of conversation about "making the branches go in a certain direction so it would look windy" and "contrast between the lighter tints and the black silhouettes" and "thinner branches look kind of like spider webs."

The bonus of this project is that 1) EVERYBODY is successful and 2) the hallways have a subtle touch of Halloween flavor without being ghoulish!!!

Passing Thoughts

Last week as I was facing this sink full of mess,

I thought, "Wouldn't it be great to have an automatic dishwasher that would rinse all of this in 5 minutes and get it ready for the next group?" Maybe someday . . .
Instead, I finally pulled a chair over to that little bitty sink and sat while I rinsed. Helped my back immeasurably!! I don't know why I didn't think of it years ago!!

FINALLY I Get to Start Teaching Classes!!!!

Our District started early this year -- before Labor Day -- but I didn't adjust my schedule forward and have been regretting it since September as I watched everybody else start teaching with kids. Granted, I had a lot of preparation time, but I was DEFINITELY ready to start this week!!!!

3rd graders started with a slightly tweaked lesson that I did last year based on Bill Martin Jr. and John Archembault's The Ghost Eye Tree. Last year I did this with a small group of kids who had finished another project early while others finished up another piece. Of course, everyone else wanted to do this one too!!

I started reading the book with the kids. Then we talked about sky colors and silhouettes, with a short Smartboard slideshow of night skies (and how the color varies from the moon outward) and spooky looking silhouettes of trees.

Before hitting the tempera paints, we did a little brush practice with kids focusing on how to hold a flat brush, how to turn one's brush as you turn corners, how to focus your eye on the side of the brush to get a "clean" line, and how/when to reload paint. I used very watered down watercolor for this instead of the tempera. I blogged about this a few weeks ago here. Again, SO interesting to see how hard it was for some to turn the brush and paint at the same time!

When the practicing was done it was on to mixing tints and shades to paint concentric circles. The center circle is supposed to be the moon in Martin's scary story. Before students painted I had them draw a circle, using a bottle lid as a template, so that the moon didn't get painted away once they started the circles (that happened to some last year).

Drying on the drying racks

Mixing shades in some colors provided good fodder for conversations about color mixing. Some were quite surprised to find they were getting brown when mixing black into their orange paint!

Another interesting side conversation was the differences between good-natured teasing between siblings and bullying (we have a new bullying program in our school so that is a "hot topic.")

I had foolishly contemplated doing the painting, and cutting/gluing the tree all in one session -- WHAT WAS I THINKING??!!  It was my first day back with classes; it was the first rainy day of the year; and kids were on a different schedule because of the rain. So, we did the painting (which everyone pretty much got the hang of) and put it aside to dry. Next week we'll get to creating our "ghost-eye tree" and all the little details to add to the background. Check back for the final results later.

Experiment with Color - Roden and Hundertwasser

Last year I discovered Pasadena artist, Steve Roden, when he had a show at a local museum.  I think his series, "the silent world" (taken from the the title of Jaques Cousteau's first book) makes for a great comparison with Hundertwasser. Click here for Roden's work. While you are at his site, check out the images section for other paintings. I used him as inspiration for a project last year, too. See lesson here.   Click here for Hundertwasser's spiral. ( I am never sure whether I would be infringing on copyright to post artists actual work or I would place their examples here -- so you'll have to click above to see their work, sorry!)

I am considering having a class experiment with circles, using a color system for their spirals. Roden explains on his site that he painted his silent world series using a system where he visually translated the phrase, "the silent world" having each letter of the alphabet equal a certain measurement of line (ie. a = 1 inch, b = 2 inch, etc). I am not exactly sure how he did it, but I think that using a self-imposed system sounds intriguing.

I am thinking of having kids start with center of pie shapes and then draw circles around that. Children will determine their own system using the color wheel. This one started with warm colors in the center. Then I used complementary colors for the first circle (blue-green first, encircled with the complement, red-orange).

Each circle followed that same pattern as the piece grew.

Here I was experimenting with complementary colors on two of the diagonals, and warm/cool colors on the other two diagonals. All of these are done with plain crayon and a watercolor wash. I actually like the look of the warm/cool circles best, although I thought kids could also experiment with primary/secondary, analogous, tints/shades, etc.

Recycled Lines

Two of my favorite things to include in an art lesson are: recycled materials and decision making!! I think this project touches on both.

Aside from the obvious ecological benefit, recycling offers art materials at home that kids may not realize are available to them. For children who may not have a wealth of art materials at home, the cereal boxes and junk mail at their fingertips can be a bonanza!! I like for kids to know that they don't always need special materials found at school to make art.

I also like projects that are not all about following step-by-step directions to achieve an end where all the art looks the same. Artist are all about experimenting and making discoveries, so when I can have kids trying different options and deciding on a look that they like, I'm a happy camper. In this case, we'll be experimenting with line (particularly direction of line). I got the idea for this project from another project I saw on the blog, "a faithful attempt" here, but I had to tweak it quite a bit to avoid using x-acto knives with little kids. I also am often inspired by The Artroom @ Briargrove, which uses a LOT of recycled materials. There are a couple of sites from this school, that, if you haven't visited, are worth a click of your mouse, here.

We are starting with a carton from the kitchen (any box will do) -- this was the front side of a cookie box. Of course, the back of the box can be used for another piece of art. Next, using a piece of regular copy paper, cut it into narrow strips (or maybe fat and narrow strips).

I used Mod Podge (but white glue or even a glue stick would work) and spread an even layer on the carton using another piece of cardboard from the box. Then I placed the white strips on the box, leaving spaces of color between the white. I left the ends of the white hanging off the colored board because I liked that look -- this is one of those decisions that kids can make (like an artist).

So that the kids don't just cut a bunch of small sections, the rule here was to cut 5 sections with each cut being a "straight line" cut, going from one side across and straight off the board.

Finally, kids choose a background color of construction paper or cardstock and start "playing with the pieces" to decide on a pleasing arrangement. At this point they will be making lots of decisions based on considerations of line direction, positive/negative space, definition of space, etc.  I will have the rule that each piece must touch another piece (or pieces) so that we don't end up with 5 floating pieces. As I worked with my sample I wanted white lines going in a variety of directions; I wanted balance, and I wanted some lines to meet to form angles and some pieces to run "off the page";  I didn't want any piece to match up to the piece that was right next to it originally. Since I changed my mind many times as I moved pieces around thinking about the composition, I will be sure to allow plenty of time for kids to experiment and consult with their desk partners before deciding how to finally glue down their five pieces.

I think this will look good mounted on a larger piece of construction paper, although I haven't tried that yet.

Little Things #4 - Brush Work

In the past I have written about the "little things" that artists do almost instinctively that not all children do without instruction. I have noticed that using a paintbrush effectively is one of those "little things."

I was thinking the other day that we often design art projects for kids to practice various skills without giving them an opportunity to practice before applying the skill to their "real art." However, as a kid, I remember often thinking, "I wish I could do this over now that I have practiced ....  I could do it so much better." So, before we get into painting concentric circles with tints and shades, I thought I would have 3rd graders do a little warm up with their flat brushes. I want them to experience turning the brush as they paint, and following the line made by one side of the brush.

How many times have you asked students to paint a circle with a flat brush and they sort of swipe the brush in a circular motion, ending up with something like this (or worse)?

See the ragged edges on the right?? This is sort of like when right handed kids try to cut on the left side of a line and wonder why there is a big space between the cut and the line. (See my scissor post from last year here.)

So I decided to have kids do a short warm-up lesson on "using the brush." First, using a Sharpie permanent marker, they'll draw 2 straight lines, a curved line and an angled line on a practice paper (I just used copy paper from the computer because I have a lot of it!)

Next comes the directed lesson: right handers paint, following the line, trying to get the left side of their flat brush right along the line. Left handers will do the same, only their eye should be focused on getting the right side of the brush even with the line. I think it is a skill for painters to follow the line created by the side of the brush, rather than the whole, thick paint line.

Left handers

After that, we'll try following the 2 lines of an angled line, practicing picking up and turning the brush when the line changes directions.

Since our art project includes painting concentric circles, the last practice line is the circle, where kids have to actually turn the flat side of the brush (or the paper) as they progress around their drawn circle.

I am anxious to see if this little warm-up exercise makes a difference in kids' dexterity  in using their paintbrushes in our project. (I'll post more about the actual project soon.)