Art Friday.

Jenny- thanks for the affirmation- here is some more home school!

On Friday we did a more extensive art project. We invited Maria and Grace, who are also home schooling over on the other side of the hills, over to work with us.

First we read a book, The Dot, (on Tumblebooks) which I recommend for kids who are shy about making art. Then we looked at a book that is illustrated with collage pictures.

We started with a black square and then added a primary shape that I had precut. From this, they were off and running. At about halfway, we went outdoors and did some texture rubbings. They added pieces of these somewhere in their collage.

To present their final product I slipped them into plastic sleeves (for 3 ring binders) and folded and taped the extra plastic to the back. We set them up in the gallery (on the piano) for all to view. I think they were happy with their work.

From a teacher's perspective, here are some elements that make this different from another run-of-the-mill art project. We started off with a black square, different from the usual white 81/2x11 paper. Black really made it pop. We used lots of different materials, including my precious prisma paper instead of ol' construction paper and some scrapbooking asian patterned paper. I asked them to cover as much of the black as they could, even if they were covering it with more black. I also had them do big and small elements to add visual interest. Lastly, they really enjoyed running around outside looking for textures to do rubbings of!
I am really proud of their artwork!