PAPER SCULPTURE

This is a 5th grade lesson that explores how paper can be used for sculpture. We use white on white to study how sclulptural techniques can show space, value and depth in an artwork. We use one small piece as an accent color. We watch a power point that features techniques as well as artists who have created some really amazing works with white paper sculpture. I will try and post my ppt in a box.net file soon. I encourage students to think outside the boz on this one and get very mechanical in their detail work.

INSPECTING INSECTS

This is a lesson I do with Kindergarten. We talk about how studying a particular subject can help us draw it more accuratley. So we watch a presentation about what it means to be an insect from http://urbanext.illinois.edu/insects/03.html it is actually a 4th grade presentation but the first 10 slides cover the basics like 6 legs, 2-4 wings, antennaes and what they do. Then we play a game I project and image of a group of bugs from google images and in groups they figure out who belongs in our insect bug club (this checks for understanding of previous lesson). Then we create a series of images of insects, one in watercolor, one in marker, and one in chalk or oil pastels. We paste our insect studies on posterboard and show and tell them and do whole group discussion of what we learned. To wrap up we create invented insects out of clay sculptures. This is a great cross curriculum with science.

TRIBAL SHIELDS

This lesson is the 4th grade component to my Native American Unit. I review the native culture. We do a group study of Native American symbols and meanings. Then the students are free to design thiers how they wish. We use an oil pastel and watercolor resist as our medium.

LINE, DESIGN & ILLUSION

This is a lesson I have done with 4th grade. They create an illusion using a combination of lines, shapes and color patterns. The students can opt to use things like letters in their illusion as well. We study Escher and a few other illusion puzzles with this lesson.

MR. PICASSO HEAD

I recently found the website Mr. Picasso Head, which is awesome! I gave a brief history about Pablo Picasso. We had just done a lesson about abstract art so this was a good transition to talk about how cubism relates to abstract art and how it differs. So we compared and contrasted, then we went on the web and using out Intelliboard each student chose a part to create a class picasso head. Next we did out sketchbook connection, we sketched two of Picasso's famous portraits, then the students created two of thier own cubist portraits. We then chose 1 of the four for our final project. We drew it out on large paper, outlined with sharpie, then painted with tempera paints. I think they turned out really neat and the students enjoyed the project. They gained key concepts about art history and art styles while using higher level thinking from past lessons to compare, contrast and create.