Matisse Inspired Goldfish Bowl

These were created by some very talented Second Graders.  I was first introduced to this lesson by a lovely K-6 Art Teacher whose class I took over as a long term substitute last year.  Her version involved more coloring with crayons and painting with watercolors...however she did have the students include a window in the background and corners to indicate a room.  While blog surfing I realized that this lesson is quite popular and can be done in a variety of ways so I decided to attempt it myself with the students.  Although it is a very involved lesson with multiple steps (about 4-5 sessions) the learning is worth it.

Kindergarten Update and Pendants

Snowflakes that were begun the day before Winter Recess...simple oil pastel resist.

Textured pendants - one day for exploration and another day for creation of final piece.

Textured Mittens

First Graders just completed these lovely textured mittens.  We began by reading The Mitten by Jan Brett, which served as a great inspiration for the students.  They then were introduced to the word texture (the way an object feels) and began cutting up strips of various fabric.  On the second day we discussed the word symmetry and used the analogy of a butterfly as an example from nature.  We arranged our fabric strips from the week prior in a way that was symmetrical, thus creating a pair of matching mittens.  The third day students cut up glitter paper (made by brushing glitter glue on regular construction paper) and arranged their pieces to form a border surrounding their mittens...similar to the the borders surrounding Brett's lovely illustrations.  This lesson was inspired by the lesson found on the color, collage, and much more blog (http://colorandcollage.blogspot.com/), one of my favs!

Inspiration for Future Art Lessons

I'm dedicating this post to art lesson ideas gathered from some wonderful art teacher blogs from around the web!  I plan on creating lessons inspired by these posts and appropriating them to meet the needs of my students.  Thank you to all the art educators who constantly inspire me to try new and exciting things!

Kindergarten

http://modernartsmock.blogspot.com/2011/01/1st-grade-picasso-faces.html  
http://linesdotsanddoodles.blogspot.com/2010/12/ten-black-dots-kindergarten.html
http://www.eduplace.com/rdg/hme/k_5/shapebook/toc.html
http://kids-finelines.blogspot.com/2011/05/city-shapes-and-sounds.html

http://aheartists.blogspot.com/2009/09/first-grade-cityscapes.html 

1st Grade

http://www.flickr.com/groups/1005798@N23/pool/page5/
http://sgpart.blogspot.com/2010/08/lots-of-lines.html

http://josettebrouwer.edublogs.org/2010/09/16/lines-and-more-lines/ 
http://artlessonsforkids.wordpress.com/2008/11/30/lines-all-around/
http://kids-finelines.blogspot.com/2011/03/still-life-collage.html
http://mrspicassosartroom.blogspot.com/2010/03/mr-mrs-gadget.html
http://artolazzi.blogspot.com/2011/03/kandinsky-paintings.html
http://www.artismessy.org/?p=495

http://mrspicassosartroom.blogspot.com/2010/09/name-projects.html
http://ms-artteacher.blogspot.com/2010/09/joan-miro-animals.html
http://snippetygibbet.blogspot.com/2011/02/first-grade-architecture.html 
2nd Grade

http://dalimoustache.blogspot.com/2010/01/collagraphs.html

http://pantherspalette.blogspot.com/2011/02/2nd-grade-starry-night-paintings.html

http://davinciswings.blogspot.com/2010/02/2nd-grade-printmaking.html

3rd Grade

http://artwithrmotta.blogspot.com/2010/12/3rd-grade-torn-paper-landscapes.html
http://dolvinartknight.blogspot.com/2011/03/picassos-guitar-cubism-for-2nd-graders.html
http://dolvinartknight.blogspot.com/2011/01/matisse-inspired-studio-collages.html
http://vividlayers.blogspot.com/2011/05/contour-shoes-3rd-grade.html