Dot Day Mural

Our first project this year was a collaborative mural using coffee filters and washable markers for Dot Day. We viewed The Dot on YouTube, which is a story by Peter H. Reynolds. 

Then we learned about analogous colors. Students colored a coffee filter using analogous washable markers. After we colored the coffee filters, we sprayed them with water. 

We watched this video about diffusion and discussed how our colors demonstrated diffusion. Not crazy about the stereotype at the end of the video, but it does a good job explaining diffusion and it's art-related, so you pick your battles, right? -_-

Students loved using the stage in our room to become the teacher as they reviewed each other on our vocabulary words: analogous and diffusion. 

Then all the dots were hung together as one huge artwork! This week we are using that mural as the first picture we upload to our Artsonia portfolios. So many amazing things happening in the art room this year, we are off to a great start! 

Check out the how-to video below if you want to try this on your own! ^_^

Dinosaur Week at Camp STEM

Just sharing a few favorite art projects from Dinosaur Week at Camp STEM. 

We made paper mache dino eggs! Love the colors and patterns they used!

Origami dinos were WAY harder than we anticipated, but these guys are hard workers. 

We plaster-casted and painted our own volcanoes that we later set off with baking soda and vinegar.

Using sponges, we cut dino footprints to make footprint fossil artworks.

2 more camp weeks to go this summer!

Magritte's Birds

This is no original art project. We've all seen this lesson in elementary art before. For this lesson in 1st grade, I wanted to emphasize the elements of Magritte's bird paintings that are sometimes overlooked; the clouds and stars. Specifically, I wanted them to be realistic. 

We spent the first day drawing and paints two pieces of paper to collage; a day time picture and a night time picture. I gave them handouts of cloud types and constellations to reference. It also helps to make this lesson a little more STEAM-y. It's never too early to learn about stars! 

Clouds Handout Here

 Constellations Handout Here