2 Soul Sisters Art Ed: August 2017

Thursday, August 31, 2017

Do You Walk The Line? (Profile, Line & Color)

Do you walk the line? Well, I sure do try and I love to start off the year with a line and color lesson. This is a great lesson to have the students do with 9 x 12 white paper, Black Sharpies and Mr Sketch Markers.

Directions:

Profile of a person

Face has to be colored (like puzzle pieces)

Need more than 2 different types of lines in the background

1 class period

I have blogged on this before at this link:

http://2soulsisters.blogspot.com/2015/03/strike-profile-using-color-line-and.html

Jump In The Line - who doesn't love this movie?!?! =) 1969

Wednesday, August 30, 2017

The Pretty Lily...Pads

Monet's Lilies made it to Perry, Georgia. In July, I visited Giverny. For the post on my trip to Giverny, click HERE. I was inspired by Monet and I passed on my excitement on to the students. During the first few weeks of school, I introduced the 8th grade students to Monet. I showed the them following video. We watched and painted for 5 days. I have hung the artwork in the hall and the comments have been so positive. I am very proud of my 8th graders for such an outstanding effort on a project.

The video we watched:

The art the kids produced:

Lily pads appear to float atop the water, but the stem that they are attached to may extend many feet down to the bottom of a pond or lake, where it takes root. Yep, lily pads are not what they seem. Honestly, same goes for people. We only see the surface, but when we dive in the pond with them, we see the roots...and the roots are a complex mass of mess...just like the roots that are attached to our pretty lily pads....Do not be fooled by the surface you see...Life is not one big, pretty lily pad.

One of my favs. Modest Mouse and "Float On".

Tuesday, August 29, 2017

Emoji Expressions-Interactive Sub Art Lesson

I needed a quick review the first week of school and a sub lesson for art class. And, thanks to Art With Jenny K...I found just what I was looking for on Teachers Pay Teachers. This was a crazy start of the school for me as I have never missed any days the first week of school in all of my 26 years of teaching. I needed a lesson that was fun but yet detailed! So, in my search for all of the things for my daughter's college drop off - I started looking for lessons with emotions.

Ways to find Jenny K's Lessons:

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Art-With-Jenny-K

https://www.facebook.com/jennykgiftshop/

http://www.jennyknappenberger.com/

https://www.pinterest.com/artwithjennyk/

Great lesson to start the year with! 1969

Monday, August 28, 2017

Giverny Sunflowers and The Grateful Dead

While visiting Giverny (to see full post about Giverny, click HERE), I took the 2 pictures below of the sunflowers and was inspired to do sunflowers with 3rd Grade. Third Grade does a unit on sunflowers each year. Last year, we did clay slabs with sunflowers. (Click HERE for clay slab with sunflower project) Sunflowers are my favorite!

Directions:

The kids placed a big roll of masking tape in the middle of a 12 x 12 paper. They drew a circle with pencil.

Then, they painted orange in the circle to make the center of the sunflower.

Once they got the orange on the paper, they used bright yellow and yellow ochre for the petals. Some chose to add a little white. I loved all the different colors in these sunflowers.

I encouraged them to put the paintbrush on the edge of the circle and the paint towards the outside edge. I loved seeing some turn the paper as they pulled the paintbrush towards them.

After we got the yellow petals down, they painted black over the orange center. Now, the center was more brown. They put yellow dots on the center of the flower.

Once the paint had dried, the kids drew petals with black sharpie.

I think they turned out pretty!

Here's "China Cat Sunflower" by Grateful Dead.

China Cat Sunflower is an interesting name for a song. I looked into this song and found this information from Songfacts. (Click HERE for Songfacts Link)

Robert Hunter mailed the lyrics for "China Cat Sunflower" to the Dead in the middle of 1967. This helped establish him as the band's lyricist.
In his book of collected lyrics, Box of Rain, Robert Hunter states, "Nobody ever asked me the meaning of this song. People seem to know exactly what I'm talking about. It's good that a few things in this world are clear to all of us." Hunter was indeed asked about the song some time later. In David Gans' Conversations With the Dead: The Grateful Dead Interview Book, he said that he first got the "germ" of the song while sitting with a cat on his belly on Mexico's Lake Chapala. Hunter never comes out and says he was on any particular drug (other than saying he was in a "rather hypersensitive state"), but his story of following the cat into Neptune and seeing cats marching across rainbows leaves little doubt.

Groovy song, for sure. The song was released in 1969. So, that explains lots.

1965

Friday, August 25, 2017

SMILE...Pass It On (Maclay Middle School Open House)

Last year at the end of the school year we had extra clay. I had kids make some small emoji smiley faces. We bisqued them and then used stroke n coat to glaze them the first week of school. I thought it would be fun to have on a table for parents for our open house. The process is below on how we made it happen.

So this is how we do open house. The parent follows the student's schedule around in 10 minute increments. This way you touch base with each class to do a quick run through of your class and have enough time for Q and A.

Homeroom 6:55-7:05

A Block 7:10-7:20

B Block 7:25-7:35

C Block 7:40-7:50
D Block 7:55-8:05

E Block 8:10-8:20

F Block 8:25-8:35
G Block 8:40-8:50