Pre Art Show Week

This coming Thursday, May 2, we will be having Art Night at the SpringHill Suites! I hope that everyone can come out and see the artworks. EVERY student will be represented at this year's show!!! We had a great time last year and I am hoping this year will be even better :)

With the art show drawing nearer, I have been preparing all this week. This past Tuesday, I laid out each artwork by grade and chose which works would be coming to the show. I have also been busy framing all of the artworks preparing them to be shown off on Thursday night.

This week, I do not have any progress pictures to share with you, however I thought everyone might enjoy seeing a behind the scenes look at art show preparation. The two pictures I am posting today show all of the K4 artworks spread out in the art room awaiting the choosing process.

Finished Art to Share!

This week I have two finished art projects to share from the K4/K5 and the 5th. The 1st grade has also finished their plant observation artworks, however, I was unable to get good quality pictures. I will be posting pictures of this project, but it will be some time next week. Anyway, here are our newest completed artworks! Congrats K4/K5 and 5th!

Singin' in the Art Room

We have had a great week in the art room, so great in fact that in almost every class someone erupted into song. I enjoyed a concert filled with everything from the Dora the Explorer theme song, to original compositions. One original song this week, in particular, brought a smile to my face...

If you mess up

that's okay!

Get your eraser 

hey, hey, hey!

With all the singing and good spirits, a lot of work was accomplished this week. Several grades, including the K4/K5, 1st, and 5th, finished their Art and Science related projects. I will be going to the art room this Tuesday to prepare for the upcoming Art Night (May 2!!!!), so I will be taking a lot of pictures of these artworks to share with you.

The K5 this week was treated with a surprise. After going to several pizza places around town, I was generously given enough pizza boxes for students to have one for their Texture Pizzas. Students were so excited! Their pizza was now "real". They were so proud that their hard work was going to be displayed this way. Not to mention, they look so awesome displayed in an actual box!

Before I include any more pictures in this post, I think that it is important to explain the meh quality of the pics. Last Friday, my camera decided that it would be fun to try free falling. Well, needless to say, my screen busted. Although my husband was able to fix it, I totally forgot to put my memory card back into my camera. So, these pictures are brought to you by my tablet, which I am still not use to taking pictures with.

Anyway, the 2nd grade is continuing to work on their poem illustrations. I really like how these are going so far.

The 5th grade just started a new project on landscapes. In the coming weeks, students are going to be creating three small watercolor landscapes about the different geographical regions of South Carolina. This week, they chose their regions and made some sketches.

The 6th grade project is going well, too. This week, students began the final version of their bone drawings. A lot of students came up with very interesting ideas, and many wanted to include flowers/plants like those they saw in O'Keeffe's paintings. The pictures below are from the artwork of one student, a before and after.

Most of the Art Club Bigs students are finally done creating all of their felt squares for their 8-bit quilts. Many of the students started working on assembling their quilts this week.

The Art Club Littles students are nearing completion on their mola artworks. I love all the colors and patterns they are using.

Again, I apologize for the meh quality pictures. I am able to report that my memory card is back in my camera and ready to go :)

I Love April!

I looked at my calendar yesterday during lunch and noticed that we will not be missing any school during April!!!! Hooray! That means lots of awesome art!!!

I am getting so excited about the upcoming Art Night at the SpringHill Suites. I will be sending out a flyer about it this week. I can see students are getting excited too. They are starting to ask about what art they will be seeing and I am hearing things like "My project is going to look so cool at the art show!" and "We are going to be like real artists!" I hope that everyone will be able to come out and enjoy the students' hard work and creativity!

As for this week, I have some new works-in-progress pics to show. There are several grades that are getting very close to finishing their projects and I can't wait to see what their finished creation will look like :)

First and foremost, the K5 is still hard at work on their Texture Pizzas. I was able to surprise them this week by telling them I am getting actual pizza boxes for their artworks to be displayed in.

 Before Easter break, the 1st grade students began working on the backgrounds for their leaf drawings. During the break, I took a look at them and decided we needed to head in a different direction. I don't know if they are influenced by the warm weather or what, but many of their backgrounds were really busy and really bright. Not that this is a bad thing, I was really happy to see how creative they were. However, the wonderful job they did on their leaf drawing seemed to disappear amongst all the details and colors. We decided that we would try something different...aluminum foil. Students were able to incorporate a lot of their original designs and details to the aluminum foil, but having just a simple silver background really allows their drawings to shine!

The 2nd grade just completed their dioramas. This week they started on their Art and Reading projects, in particular, the work of an illustrator. We first read the book "There's a Wocket in my Pocket", by Dr. Seuss. The first time I read it, I did not show them the pictures. The second time, they were able to see the pictures. We discussed what the purpose of an illustration was, why they are included, and how they are made. After a great discussion, students chose a poem from the book "Where the Sidewalk Ends", by Shel Silverstein. After reading the poem carefully, they are now working on an illustration for it.

The 3rd grade is continuing to work on their Chinese Zodiac puppets. Many students finished the head of their puppet this week and are now starting to work on the body.

The 4th grade started on their final advertisement artwork. These are turning out great so far! They have really come up with some really creative stuff!

 The 5th grade finished their paeloart artworks! Next week will be starting something new. I will be posting pics of their collages next week.

The 6th grade started practicing for their Georgia O'Keeffe inspired bone drawings. It was really exciting to see them working with the chalk. There was surprise, excitement, and some confusion that you could use chalk on something other than a chalk board...a great experience overall. We also discussed how you can create value using just the chalk and an eraser. Next week, they will be starting their final drawings.

The Art Club Bigs students are still working hard on creating felt squares for their quilts. However, we did have one person this week start to assemble their quilt and a few more should be starting next week.

The Art Club Littles students started adding details and color to their molas. I am totally excited about these molas. The kids are too! There were so many smiles and kids shouting for me to come and see what they were doing. I was so proud! They are looking so wonderful! Below is an example from one student from K5, 1st, 2nd, and 3rd.

 In fact, I was so excited about the students' molas that I decided to make one too :)

Not posted, but not forgotten

As I told you before Easter break, I had taken  some pictures of our wire sculptures that I was not very happy with. In addtion to taking some much better pics of those artworks, I also have for you the finish 2nd grade dioramas :) Enjoy!!!