The Line that Connects Us All

It has been a great start to the year! Our opening project that all of out students collaborated on is "The Line that Connects Us All." We are all unique but when we come together, at school, our lives touch and we are all connected.

Each student was asked to create an artwork that represents themselves. In order to make it collaborative, the students were asked to draw a line between 2 dots on their papers (3 inches up from the bottom). When placed directly side by side each student's art connects with all the other students' art! The line that runs through all of the artworks is "The Line that Connects us All." We are all unique but when we come together at school our lives touch and we are all connected.



Once students bring these home they can connect their artworks at home with their siblings' art and a new collaborative work is born. In this case, the line illustrates their family connection.

The book I used to kick off this project was Andrew Drew and Drew which I give a whole hearted 5 stars for creativity and artistic encouragement!

3D Surrealism Stairs

First, 5th graders looked at the artwork of MC Escher.  We focused on interpreting his artwork and admired his skillful use of shadows to create 3D effects. We also checked out some of his artwork with stairs. He has a lot of art with staircases but "Relativity" is a favorite!

Next we practiced drawing stairs in 3D.  We used rectangles, parallelograms and trapezoids and then added shadows keeping in mind the light source!

After looking at Salvador Dali's surrealistic art, we read the book "Dali and the Path of Dreams," to get a better understanding of surrealism.  Students were asked to combine Salvador Dali's surrealism with MC Escher's stairs and create their own surrealistic work of art!

Goals: I can...
- Tell about MC Escher
- Tell about Dali
- Create a variety of 3D stairs
- Use surrealism
- Blend colors
- Use watercolor pencils

Monet Seascapes

First graders explored painting in the style of Monet. We learned that Monet was one of the fathers of impressionism. Impressionist brushstrokes are created using dabs of color.  Monet loved to paint water scenes so we created our own seascapes!









Learning Goals: I can...
- Tell about Monet
- Create my own unique seascape
- Show distance using size and placement on the paper
- Paint in the style of the impressionists

ArtPrize "Collaboration Youth Award"

Our rock fish won 1st prize in our category! 

The kids won the "Collaboration Youth Award at ArtPrize! This award is the top award in our category with $5,000 dollars attached! 

ArtPrize is open and the Hudsonville Public Schools Art Program is participating in ArtPrize this year! This includes all of the students that I teach at Bauer and Forest Grove Elementary! We hit the ground running on the first day of school with acrylic paint!

ArtPrize Dates: September 20 - October 8, 2017

HPS Art Location: DeVos Place Convention Center, (outside, along the river) 

Website: www.artprize.org/66018

Vote Code: 66018

This collaborative art project is based on the book, Only One You, by Linda Kranz. It celebrates the uniqueness of each child within a larger “school of fish.” Each child’s brightly painted fish rock will join the “school of fish,” swimming together, and symbolizing our children entering the world. Altogether, around 6,000 rocks will be painted by Hudsonville art students in grades K-12. Stop out and enjoy the art!

Thanks to Linda Kranz for permission to enter this project in ArtPrize.

Thanks to Jessica Moyes at Sharon Elementary for the inspiration.

Thanks to Maggie Bandstra (Alward Elementary) and Celine Nienhouse (South and Forest Grove Elementary Schools) for securing our fantastic venue and coordinating the installation!

Fifth Grade Digital Art

Fifth grade used the program "Acorn" to create their own versions of a famous abstract work of art. They were given access to a shared google folder that had folders dedicated to a variety of artists that they have learned about over the years and their famous works of art. Next they set to work learning to use Acorn (similar to Photoshop).

Acorn is a simplified (and somewhat glitchy) version of Photoshop. I really liked using this with my older students because it is so close to Photoshop that I feel like they are getting something of a real world experience.

Learning Goals: I can...
- Create a file in Acorn that is US Letter sized
- Use Google Drive to download a famous work of art from a shared folder
- Use Preview to open the famous work of art and to pick colors from the original artwork
- Use Acorn tools and modify size and opacity: Paintbrush, bucket, smudge, eraser, eyedropper
- Use Photo Booth to take a picture and insert it into Acorn
- Use layers and change visibility
- Convert Acorn file to JPEG
- Drop JPEG into a shared google folder to submit it to Mrs. Seitz

Rotational Symmetry Weaving

Third graders love this project! This is one that I will certainly do for a number of years! This idea has been floating around the internet for years and I finally tried it last year! We talk about the difference between bilateral and rotational symmetry.

The first day and we paint our plates... 

Next comes the weaving...

 

Learning Goals: I can...
- Tell the difference between rotational and bilateral symmetry
- Use rotational symmetry
- Weave
- Tie overhand knots

Here is an art teacher tip...

Place yarn in ziplock bags with the tail sticking out and tell kids to treat the bag like a yo-yo... gently tugging at the tail (which is the only thing sticking out of the bag). Let the bag gently bob in the air as the string gradually comes out of the bag. I stapled the ziplock closed on either side of the string to keep it from falling back in the bag. Soon I will try out using the heavy duty ziplocks with a zipper... that might work better than staples which come out over time!

If you want to prep cutting a bunch of colors at once you can do this!

The Scream

Fourth grade used the program "Acorn" to create their own versions of "The Scream," by Edvard Munch!

Acorn is a simplified (and somewhat glitchy) version of Photoshop. I really liked using this with my older students because it is so close to Photoshop that I feel like they are getting a real world experience.

This was a totally new experience for me because I have mostly stayed away from computer art partly because of computer availability but it finally felt like the right year to jump in! My first class was a huge learning curve for the kids AND myself. By the second class, my process for teaching on Acorn was SO much more streamlined! (Thanks kids for bearing with me!!!)

Learning Goals: I can...
- Create a file in Acorn that is US Letter sized
- Use Google Drive to download "The Scream" from a shared folder
- Use Preview to open "The Scream" and to pick colors from the original artwork "The Scream"
- Use Acorn tools and modify size and opacity: Paint brush, bucket, smudge, eraser, eyedropper
- Use Photo Booth to take a picture and insert it into Acorn
- Use layers and change visibility
- Convert Acorn file to JPEG
- Drop JPEG into a shared google folder to submit it to Mrs. Seitz

Hundertwasser Architecture

Each year our fifth graders learn about the art of painter and architect: Friedrich Hundertwasser.  Hundertwasser is a whimsical artist who really is amazingly creative.  Some classes were able to learn more about Hundertwasser through the book  Hundertwasser for Kids: Harvesting Dreams. This book gives a playful peak into the mind of the artist!

After looking at artwork created by Hundertwasser, we came up with a list of common characteristic: colorful, buildings, faces, and lollypop trees.  We used these characteristics to help guide our designs.

Learning Goals: I can...
- Tell about Hundertwasser
- Balance color
- Use etching lines to create texture
- Explain what architecture is