Using One To One Technology in the Elementary Art Room

My professional goal this year involves using our new one to one technology in the Art room.  Because of the high number of students I see per week (900) I needed a simple way to use technology that would benefit the kids and be helpful to our technology goals.

Students were very excited to see why they were asked to bring their device to art class!

I decided to do a simple Google Drive folder lesson, having the kids name new folder as an ART folder.  I then demonstrated how to take a good photo of their work, no table, no floor, no fingers, etc. in the picture. Whole piece of artwork in the photograph. Students got to work photographing several pieces of work I had saved using the camera app on their ipads.

We currently are doing this in 3rd, 4th and 5th grades and I hope to use in grades 1st and 2nd next year when they receive their one to one devices.

Once I become better at the technology myself, it might be possible to do small voice descriptions of the art piece or create a slideshow. 

I was very happy to see how seriously they took their task of taking a good picture.  

                                                              

Elements of Art Cactus Project 3rd Grade lesson

"I can use the Elements of Art" These colorful Owls and Cactus stand up projects turned out great and 3rd graders enjoyed using all the elements of art in their patterns.

I had students trace a cactus or an owl shape onto tagboard to begin the lesson. 

 We then discussed the elements of art and used all of them except texture in our patterns on the owls and cactus plants.  The TEXTURE was added with glitter lines after we discussed how texture looks on a 2D picture. 

As a final touch students cut out their shape and then used two small cardboard feet to hold up their art project.
All turned out colorful and artists were proud of their work.

Paper Plate Goose Kindergarten Project

"I can make art about my world"

Kinders talked about Canada Geese which they have seen on a lake in town. I told them I was going to show them an easy way to make a goose.









To begin every child was given a paper plate and a black crayon and teacher demonstrated on the board how to draw a v shaped beak, a neck and the back of the goose.  Then we colored each part with crayons and added black feather lines on wings.

Kids had choice of leaving the paper plate or gluing on to a background and drawing an environment around their goose. Also could add a winter scarf if they wanted to have more color.  

Many many geese were made at home or at art stations in the Kinder classrooms after this lesson!


                                                       

Cute Clay Cupcakes First Grade Lesson

This project is available on Pinterest.  The cupcakes turned out very cute.  It was necessary for me to check each bottom piece after it was pressed into the silicon cupcake wrapper to ensure that air bubbles had been removed from clay.  I did not do this with the first class and had a lot of breakage.  

These were painted with tempera paint and coated with gloss medium.

Parents really loved these adorable and colorful cupcakes.

Picasso Emoji First Grade Lesson

I like to do Picasso with my First Grade Students.  They enjoy learning about his different styles and how famous he is even though his paintings are so unusual.

This new lesson combined a popular icon EMOJIS with the Picasso lesson.

I began with a visual on the projector of common emojis.  I had students discuss at their tables the following questions: What are these called? How do you know about them? Where have you seen them? Do you think most people in the United States know about them? 

After discussion and coming to the conclusion that emojis are a popular item in our culture, we traced the inside of a tape roll in corner of our paper and chose an emoji to draw. We colored our circle with yellow and then drew chosen emoji with pencil and then colored with markers. 

Next the 1st graders traced a larger circle and glued it into middle of paper.

I read some parts of a book about Picasso, emphasizing his different color periods and cubism.  We then worked together to mix up our emoji in a Picasso style, using the same emoji as the small one but adding cubist shapes and moving face parts around.

Students thoroughly enjoyed this change up of the typical emojis!

Beautiful Pumpkins with Golden Vines First Grade Lesson Plan

For this lesson we looked at pumpkins on the vine visuals on the projection screen. The kids were especially impressed by the giant pumpkins! Artists then drew with pencil on an orange half sheet of construction paper. We drew a long stem and tried to use up the whole paper. If the pumpkin had a bump or wasn't perfect that was even better!
We looked at the high light on the pumpkins in our visual and how it was darker near the bottom. We colored those details in with construction paper crayons. 
After cutting pumpkins out carefully, students glued onto black back ground and added a light source, moon or stars or both. 
Last and most favorite part was to paint beautiful, curly, golden vines coming from the stem.

Extension/ Exploration and Problem Solving Ideas

Part of my professional teaching goal last year was to provide students with more problem solving and exploration type of projects.  This is difficult to do in a 35 minute Art period once a week when I have curriculum to cover and lots of different materials I want them to experience. 

However, I found that once they got used to doing this type of activity they enjoyed it.

Here are a few ways I provided students with open ended lessons and problem solving opportunities. 

This was an extension of the X tiger lesson. After drawing the tiger using a letter X and discussing the parts of a tigers face and patterns of a tiger, Kindergarteners were given white, black and orange paper and asked use scissors, glue stick and crayons along with the colored papers to create a tiger. The visual of a tiger was on the projection screen but they were given no other guidance.

 Those who finished their problem solving paper tiger could also color a cupcake with animal patterns. Visual of animal print cupcakes was on projection screen.

 For this lesson, 2nd graders watched a drawing video of how to draw a cute penguin (Art Hub For Kids. com). After completing their drawing and coloring it they were asked to make another penguin using only black and white construction paper, blue tissue paper, scissors, glue stick and markers.  

 This was similar for 1st graders who watched a robot drawing video and then made a robot out of gray construction paper and marker.
After they finished both projects we discussed which was easier or more difficult for them and why.