September: Welcome back to Art!

Welcome back to school everyone!  I had a great summer! I went to visit the Omaha Zoo and I did a lot of camping. Camping was wonderful, except for the bugs.

                             

We are back into the swing of things at school. We will begin our fourth week on Monday!

Kindergarten students are working on learning how routines work in the art room. They are also learning about basic shapes. This coming week we will begin creating shape robots...more to come on those later. Kinders are focusing on creating their own special types of robot and using their own imaginations. 

First graders are studying the work of Piet Mondrian. We have been discussing Mondrian's use of primary colors and shapes. Students have been cutting and gluing rectangles and squares of primary colors into beautiful compositions. Over the summer I found the coolest idea on You Tube ever! GLUE SPONGES. Glue sponges are wet sponges soaked in glue. They sit in a small container and students press their paper down on the sponge. Since we have short 30 minute sessions for art, the sponges have made clean up so much easier and have solved the problem of students waiting for me to help unclog their old glue bottles. Glue sponges have also cut down on spills, using too much glue, and messy hands!!! I cannot say enough about them!!!!! I love them. They are from Greg Smedley's channel YouTube. Check it out! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zv_-9WqT-cM

 
 

 reading corner

Second graders are working on drawing shapes. We are learning that you can draw shapes in order to create drawings of animals, amphibians, creatures and.  Students imagined they were swimming underwater with sea turtles. They were to take underwater pictures of sea turtles. We talked about how to draw a sea turtles close-up. Next week we will outline the sea turtles with oil pastels and then create resists for watercolor backgrounds. More to come on the sea turtles...

            

Third graders are learning about illustration and drawing buildings using 3-D  one-point perspective. We looked at the work of NYC illustrator, Marz jr. We are really practicing how to line up our rulers in order to make straight lines. We have a few more weeks to go on this project, stay tuned for more soon.  

Fourth graders are studying the work of painter, Wayne Thiebaud. They are creating  drawings and paintings of desserts. The primary focus of this lesson is adding line to their drawings. They are also practicing drawing a border on their paper using a ruler. More photos to come when we are further along on this project!

Fifth graders are creating 3-D optical illusions of their hands. We are focusing on drawing lines with rulers and contour lines of hands. The most difficult step of this project is shading using colored pencils. The shading is difficult because it requires subtlety of pressure. Students must work on controlling the pressure of their shading. We are also discussing how to make a color darker using complimentary colors. Again, more photos to come when we are further along. 

Stay tuned for updates on what we are doing in the art room during this new school year 2014-15!!!!

Be sure to follow Mrs. Moffitt's Art Room on Facebook too!

March-Community Projects, Clay and Celebrations

March came in like a lion....Kindergarteners and first graders learned about pattern and textures by creating March lions. The lions were displayed at the art show at Grimes.

This March has been a busy month in the art room. Students have participated in MidWest One Bank Student Art Contest. Students in 3rd-5th grade created art work for the contest, based on the theme of "Seasons," ironically the winter of 2014 seems as it will never end. 10 students from Grimes were chosen to have their art work featured in the bank's 2015 calendar. 2 Student from North Hill were also selected. I am very proud of the student's hard work on this contest. Student art work is displayed in the bank for a few weeks. On March 11th, the bank provided an artist reception for the students. Winning students were photographed and received ribbons.

                     
                     
            


Third Graders have also been busy building coil pots. They have become very versed in scoring, slipping and applying glaze. They really have enjoyed being able to build things with clay.

This year has flown by with countless projects and many different varieties of media. Student artists work so hard to go above and beyond expectations. They work for several weeks on many different projects. Just as working hard is important, celebrating student accomplishments is equally important. 

Last week during Spring Parent Teacher Conferences, I displayed the students work in an Art Show in the Grimes lunchroom. Over 100 students attended along with their parents. We served fruit snacks and Kool-Aid. The students were able to see the work of their peers and really enjoyed getting to view their own work displayed for the public. It was wonderful to meet parents and discuss what was happening in the art room. A great time was had by all. I appreciate all the parents, students and staff who helped make the art show possible. I'm very excited to do it again, next year!

Art Club

January and February 2014

Kindergarten students finished out December by reading Rainbow Fish by Marcus Pfister. We
read the book and created our own watercolor resist fish, complete with one small scale of glitter, just like in the book.  When we returned from winter break, students added the glittery scale and glue polluted our art room with glitter for weeks! Such fun, I can safely tell you that glitter can be an art teacher's nemesis. In January, students began to create snowy houses out of shapes and construction paper. They used Q-tips to paint snow on top of the houses. We talked a lot about shapes, collage and details for our houses.

Before winter break students created medallions. They gained experience carving and stamping the clay. Students at North Hill glazed their pieces and students at Grimes used metallic paint to finish theirs.

First graders read Where the Wild Things Are  by Maurice Sendak. First, they glued wiggle eyes on their paper, then they had to draw their own creature around the wiggle eyes. They had to use markers
to color in their monsters and also add a background to their picture.The goal for this project was to
encourage students to use their own imaginations to create a creature.

 


In January, second grade students began practicing colored pencils and using different types of pressures with their pencil in order to create value on drawings of "Up" Houses. We talked about the movie "Up" as it is our classroom theme this year. We also watched clips from the movie and talked about how different houses look (architectural features). We also considered shading and value while using colored pencils.

           

Before winter break, students completed a name study inspired by Jasper Johns. Johns was known for his work of painting simple objects, numbers, and letters using oil paint and incorporating collage pieces. The big idea was for students to experiment with several different types of media and use the
letters of their name with different patterns to create a beautiful John's like compositions.

Second graders just moved into to studying movement and sculpture. They created paper sculpture break dancers. They used templates and traced them on tag board. They were able to practice their cutting skills along with colored pencil blending and use of expressive lines. Then they cut halfway up and halfway down the line of symmetry on each dancer. They slid their cuts into each end and made their dancers come alive. Break dancers have been a favorite project for second graders this year.

Third graders have completed Jasper John inspired name pieces as well. They enjoyed exploring  many different types of media especially paper cutting and painting. Third graders also enjoyed drawing Up houses and adding perspective and dimension to their drawings, as a treat before winter break we watched clips from the movie while students completed their drawings.



Fourth and fifth grade studied the work of American painter George Rodrigue. Rodrigue gained fame in the 1990s for his paintings of blue corgis called "Blue Dogs", though students were encouraged to draw their favorite breed of dog in any monochromatic color. The goal was to add a personality to the dog drawing and then cut it out. Out of all do the dog drawings we only had one cat sneak in.

Beginning in January, 5th grade students at Grimes started Art Club on Tuesdays after school. we complete community and school art projects and do many self directed projects which are slightly more advanced than regular class projects.

Stay tuned for the next update for Burlington art coming in March!