1st Grade- End of the Year

Again the end of the year has passed by and we are half way through Summer Vacation. I apologize for the delay as some are due to technical problems unavoidable as well as overall uncertainty of the continuation of the Blog in this form.

My First Grade Students were very eager to learn about art as well as experimenting and discovering new talents in the Art room.

Charlie Harper is a great American Artist who used simple shapes and designs to create interesting animals. Below you will find work by students using his principles.

Chameleon's Colors by Chisato Tashiro and A Color of My Own by Leo Lioni were great inspiration for the work below. Students had to create an environment or habitat that the chameleons could blend in. They applied the words camouflage and habitat to describe their work.

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The painted elephants of India and the book Horton Hatches and Egg by Dr. Seuss were inspiration for the elephant art. Giraffes Can't Dance by Giles Andrea and Guy Parker-Rees inspired our giraffes. These two projects were very successful and made the 1st Grade hallway look like the Africa jungle. Unfortunately I can not seem to find photos. I will update when possible.

When we discussed weather and clouds I used the book It Looked Like Spilt Milk by Charles G Shaw to inspire the paint blotted images.

The Chinese Year of the Snake allowed us to make our Snake Charmers that twirled in the wind. One student thought it would be a great weather predictor. We used opposite colors to show texture and depth.

I wanted to teach them about landscapes and we looked at work by Georgia O'Keefe and Wolf Kahn. I read the book Desert Giant: The World of the Saguaro Cactus to my students and they had to create a landscape with 2 animals and a background with foreground, middle ground and back ground. The were able to choose day or night.

We discussed what a still life is and I showed them work by Picasso, Matisse, Cezanne and VanGogh. Students drew the still life on their table. I allowed them to add their mom's favorite colors for their Mother's Day Gift.

The images below were created by my students following an Art Deco design I found in a Interior Design book. I was trying to explain some of the Elements of Design. We went over line, shape, form, color, texture, space and value.

Every year their is a duck couple that has baby ducklings in the pond located in the school courtyard. This year they had 9. I read the book Make Way For Ducklings by Robert McCloskey. Students did a great job.

At the end of the year students did another self portrait. They looked at work of many different artist as well as different styles.

I can not wait to see their work next year.