Scrapbooking

This was a lesson on scrapbooking.  We learned the history of scrapbooking and than we were given a bunch of supplies to create our own scrapbook page.  The more color and the designs on your page the better it will look.  I had a lot of fun doing this. 

Extension - Student could create differnt scrapbooks for subjects they are learning about.  For example they could create a Native American scrapbook with pictures, songs, artwork, ect..  Or they could create their own creative writing scrapbook with pictures to go along with it.

Sketch Books

In class we got to create our own sketch books.  First we made our own paper by painting plain white paper with colors of our choice. I chose to do some blending with yellow, green and pink and than splatted chunks of paint on top.  We put this paper over pieces of card board to create a cover. Than we put paper in between the two covers and sewed the book together.  This is a cheap and creative way to make your own books or journals.

As an extension students could create one of these for daily journal entries for language arts class.  These actually could be used for any class: social studies - journal as if you were with Lewis and Clark on their exhibition; Math - students could have different rules, theories, and definitions and math problems in here to help them study; Science - students could figure out different equations in here or write different formulas you may need to know.

Four Seasons Window

In this kindergarten through 2nd grade lesson we got to create our very own four season’s window. The lesson started with a discussion on the four different seasons (winter, summer, fall, and spring) and different things we relate to these seasons. Example: snow with winter; flowers with spring, leaves with fall, and sun with summer. We were than given four different pieces of an empty tree. We got to use water color to paint the background in colors that reminded us of each season. Than we could use different medias to add to the different seasons such as crayons, markers, paper, paint, cotton balls, glitter, ect…) We used scrunched up paper to create buds on the trees and red paint to create apples. Cotton balls were used to represent the snow and little pieces of paper to represent fall leaves. This was a fun project and the final project I was very pleased with.

Extension: For science class you could have a discussion on the different seasons and changes that occur in each one. Discuss how snow is formed or what creates rain. This could also be used for a creative writing assignment for Language Arts. Students could write a story for each season and possible even create a book.

Pastels

This 4th grade art lesson was based on the use of pastels. We were taught the proper techniques of blending and shading pastel colors. First we were to pick a shape and have a light source shining somewhere on the shape. This gave it a three dimensional image. Than we learned about landscapes and got to select a picture of a landscape. We than started with the sky and worked our way downward blending and shading to create our landscape. If you want to make a shade of a color you add black and white to create a tint. The blending of dark and light colors gave the landscape a depth perception. I had a lot of fun creating my landscape.

As an extension students can learn about the different mountain ranges around the United States in geography class. Than they can take different photos of those mountain ranges and use the pastels to draw a huge map shading and blending the different mountain ranges.

Stepping Stones

In this lesson students were asked to, "Step into art."  They got to create their own personal stepping stones using media of their choice (beads, rocks, pictures, leafs, yarn, ect..).  They first learned the history of a form of stepping stones - mosaic.  Then they got to use their creativity to create their own stepping stone.  Kindergarteners would have a lot of fun with project and could give the final stepping stone away as a gift or keep it for themselves. 

Extension: Students will share their stepping stone with the class during circle time and maybe share who they would like to give it to and why.  This could also be used during science class while talking about rocks and formation for the older classes.

Holidays

This lesson began with a discussion on holidays and certain symbols that may bring about the holiday spirit.  Then it went on to talk about the history of print making.  I thought this was a creative idea to incorporate art.  We each got to sketch our own holiday symbol into a piece of styrofoam.  The places we sketched in were going to be the white spots on our print.  Than we chose a color of ink and rolled it all over out print.  We than placed it onto a piece of construction paper, folded into a card, and rolled the image onto the paper create our own holiday card. 

Extension: Students could write cards to people of their choice to give away as gifts.  This could be used while talking about various different subjects and could be used to make math cards or vocabulary cards.

Vanishing Points

For this project we learned how to create designs using vanishing points.  I thought this was a very neat idea and was really neat once I got the hang of it.  After learning the technique we got to create our own sketch of buildings in a downtown area.  It was neat how all the lines came together.

Extension: A good extension for this project would be using math. Examples: measuring lines, drawing 3-D images, using a ruler, and also a protractor could be incorporated.  Students could also create a story behind their drawings to be used as a writing assignment.