Matisse Room w/Fish Bowl

I've been using this "Matisse Room" idea for awhile now, and I finally decided to try it with Kindergarten. I'm glad I did because one our Kinder's was so great, it's hanging up at the Frist right now in the Mayor's Art Show! Anyway, we made a room and then collaged a fishbowl with goldfish into our interior space.

Eraser Block Prints - 3rd Grade Art Club

Students carved images into an eraser and colored them with markers to create a 'print' or a stamp. They made a small book to stamp their images in.

Amusement Park Sub Lesson

I left this lesson for a sub a week ago and I was blown away by this 2nd graders amazing drawing.

Van Gogh's Vases! 2nd Grade

I borrowed this fabulous lesson from Deep Space Sparkle...if you haven't visited this amazing art teacher's blog, you have to right now! http://www.deepspacesparkle.com/

Anyway, we created these van Gogh inspired vases with flowers. They are still a work in progress...but they are looking so nice, I had to post them. The students began their drawings with pencils and are now adding color with oil pastels. They are using the magical 'white oil pastel' to blend and add highlights on the petals of their flowers. We realized after we started that outlining everything with black first works better and gives you an interesting tone with the petal color mixes with the black outline.

Not finished yet...but great progress made today!



i love this detail...the textures are so great!



I love these exaggerated flowers from Larry

3rd Grade Art Club: Yarn Creations

So, my Friday group of 3rd graders is small..er, so we have been doing some experimental projects. Here is a 'yarn drawing' collaged into a painted environment. The lesson needs some tweaking, but I think they are turning out well!

Jonathan's Rocket Crayon flying through space

Luis's hand...reminds me of the Inside Out Boy

Valentine's Day!

Space Crab! We seem to have a theme...

Christeena's cute duck!

Kinder/ 1st Grade Picasso Heads!

Collage of Picasso Heads!

I did this project with 2nd grade last year and decided it was too easy for them, so we are trying it out with Kinders and 1sters. haha.

First, we studied Picasso's paintings....looked at some cubism and other artists from the movement. Then, we created a "class picasso head" on the website: http://www.picassohead.com/ (you can make heads for hours). We all took turns adding Picasso-y features.

Click here to see Mrs.Van Dyke's class's picasso heads: http://www.picassohead.com/search.html?submitted=1&where=signature&query=van+dykes+class&selected=1174319

Then we practiced drawing 4 heads...as crazy as we could make them! We chose our favorite sketch and enlarged it onto a sheet of 12" x 12" white drawing paper. Then we used recycled materials to stamp in the features of the face with black paint.

Finally, we painted them using tempera cakes. Those pictures coming soon!

stamping Picasso Heads!

my beautifully presented stamping trays...

Star Wars Collage Video!

Jeremy Messersmith - Tatooine from Eric Power on Vimeo.