Kindergarten Art

I love Kindergarten art!!! I love how much growth I see as an art teacher. I love how different each students art turns out. I love how excited they are about every project. I love how proud they are of their masterpieces when they are finished. And Kindergarten kiddos are hilarious always.

I wanted to highlight a few of my favorite Kindergarten projects from this year so far. We started out the year talking about shapes and color. My kindergarten artists created a ROY G. BV caterpillar out of shapes. This project was great because they got to practice shapes, colors, drawing, painting, cutting, and gluing all in one project. And I loved the finish product.

Artists used cardboard to create texture in their grass.

Two of the awesome finished products!

My kindergarten artists created self-portraits using shapes for their next project.. We read the book "the Colors of Us " by Karen Katz. This book celebrates different skin tones and diversity and I love it! My kiddos got to practice their shapes again! Learning to cut and hold scissors correctly is so important. So I love projects that give my kids the opportunity to practice cutting. Once they had all their shapes cut for their project they started assembling their self portrait collage. And I must say these turned out Ah-Mazing!

My sticky tables were so worth it! These kiddos collaged some masterpieces!

Hallway display!

My favorite time of year is fall! I love pumpkins, pumpkin coffee, my birthday, my anniversary, my husbands birthday, leaves changing colors, if it happens in the fall I love it! So of course I had to throw in a few awesome fall projects. These Kindergarten artists did phenomenal on this art project. We read the book "How Big Could Your Pumpkin Grown" by Wendell Minor. We talked about landscapes and how a landscape is a picture, drawing, or painting of outside. The kiddos picked out the landscapes in the book (which most of the illustrations are landscapes!). Afterwards we talked about horizon lines, foreground, and background and we identified these parts in some of these pictures. And they did awesome. Then it was time to get to work so we use oil pastels to draw a horizon line and then colored in the sky with the oil pastels. Then we set to work on the grass. We previously had made mad green painted paper using the colors blue and yellow. we cut triangles these papers into triangles and glued  them to the bottom half of our landscape. Finally time to draw a pumpkin!! I demonstrated how to draw the pumpkin on the clear touch. The artists used a black oil pastel to trace their lines and we painted them with yellow and red paint and voila....the red and yellow paint made ORANGE!!

I love my job! I get to make messes for a living and hang out with the funniest people.

 Talk Soon!

Sarah

International Dot Day 2015

First graders, Second graders, Third graders, and Fourth graders celebrated dot day the first 2 weeks of September. Dot Day is September 15th. This is a day that celebrates creativity, collaboration, and connecting. The inspiration for this day is from the book The Dot by Peter H. Reynolds. This book encourages everyone to make their mark! This book is fabulous for the beginning of the year. Some students are nervous about art and may not have confidence, which is crazy, because children's art is just fabulous! But this book helps teach students that there are all types of artwork and different is great in art!

First graders created these awesome abstract pieces. Students practiced creating lines on the clear touch panels and then they used a black crayon to create line designs on their paper(making their mark). They used liquid water to paint the shapes created from the lines they drew. Students used bold, bright colored paper to create concentric circles to put on their paper.

                           

                    

                    

                   

                    

Second graders worked collaboratively to make an awesome mural. Each class created a section to this mural. Each table created a piece for the background and then each student created a flower from a paper plate and painted paper. I got this idea from this awesome art teacher's blog http://cassiestephens.blogspot.com/2014/09/in-art-room-flower-y-mural-for-dot-day.html.

                                                         

                        

                      

Classes Left to Right Mr. Herman, Ms. Jamerson, Mrs. Tilson

Third graders created these awesome exploding dots. They came up with some awesome definitions for line, shape, pattern, and design. They then created an abstract piece of art with crayons using line, shape, pattern, and design. They painted these with watercolors and then cut them into 1 inch strips. They used construction paper to make a core and then glued these strips to their core. And used some paper techniques to enhance their exploding dots. This idea came from this awesome art teachers blog http://elementaryartroom.blogspot.com/2013/09/exploding-dots.html.

                                        

                                          

                         

Fourth graders created these amazing mixed media pieces. Students glued yarn down on a circular piece of cardboard. They then put aluminum foil on the circle. Students then used sharpies to create designs on the aluminum foil. They painted a square piece of cardboard and glue their design on the cardboard. These are awesome!!!

                          

                           

FIRST DAY IN ART '15-'16!

So I am finished with the first week of classes for the 2015-2016 school year and I must say I can already tell this year will be fantabulous! The first week's main component revolved around me getting to know my kids and them getting to know me. One of the many interesting things about starting a new school is no one really knows each other from faculty to students. I have 5 of my kids from my previous school and it was pretty awesome seeing their faces!

So here is what went down in the art room this week. The kiddos came in and I wanted to learn their names so I said "Hi (insert student name) and then they would say "Hi Mrs. Bixby, Bix, Bixie, or B." I even got a Mrs. Crispy. I accept about anything. It was so much easier when my last name was Hart! It rhymed with Art! Then I ask them a question to get to know them better.

After we know each other I break out into a spiel about my word, yes I created a word....ARTTITUDE! I ask them what two word they believe I used to make that word and every class gets it right. They are so smart! Attitude and Art. Then  we practice when I say attitude, they say attitude back and get real quiet. We talk about how to have a good attitude and then go on and talk about my rules. I only have 4 and they are simple.

Here's those 4 simple rules illustrated by Keith Haring

So once we get through all the intros, rules, and the kids get their seats they create their portfolio cover that will be stapled to an oversized file folder to hold all the awesomeness they create this school year. That's on the left in the pic below and on the right is the front of my August newsletter. The front of the newsletter is for the kids to create and the back is for parents to read! Its got a lot of info on the art department and the upcoming year.
The awesome portfolio covers are from Mrs.Knights Smartest Artists! Here is the link:
http://dolvinartknight.blogspot.com/2012/01/keeping-track-k-5-portfolios.html

Loving all these awesome details by this sweet second grader.

Check out this fun frame.

Awesome details by this 4th grader!

Only been in  my class for an hour and already learned about 3 artists! Love it!

Some sweet families created the first piece of art hung at WBES at open house.

Check out all the supplies these great kids have brought in!

I will be posting pictures soon of the first art projects of the year.

My best friend just bought a house! So I spent Sunday at Lowes and helping them paint the man cave. It is inspired by the 2015 University of Tennessee Football helmet. 

DIY smokey mountains! Please excuse the stuff they just moved!

2015 University of Tennessee Helmet






Talk Soon!
Sarah

MONSTERS, OH MY!!

So do you remember that awesome monster class I talked about in my last post? Well I had the opportunity to teach it again the past three days and wanted to share some of their "monster-pieces." One of the kiddos came up with that and I thought it was hilarious. Kids are the funniest humans on Earth (at least to me).

Makin' monster dolls with the girls!

How cute is this little monster doll! Love the color combo!

Check out this handmade monster costume from head to tail to toe. Can you guess what his favorite color is??!!

Another monster doll! Check out those teeth!

This butterfly loved this kid!


I have been super busy in my new class room and it is starting to come together! I have had some fabulous help this week from the parentals and my sweet husband. Will share progress pics soon!


Talk Soon!
Sarah

SUPPLIES AND PREP FOR '15-'16

Ya'll. I am about to start my fourth year of teaching art and I could not be more excited for the upcoming year. An opportunity arose at the end of the last school year that I could not decline. I will be part of the founding faculty of the new Waverly-Belmont Elementary School in Nashville, TN.

This has, is, and will be an awesome experience.There is so much work in building an art program and something totally different than my previous three years of teaching. I previously worked in a school with a plethora of supplies and now I am starting from scratch. So I have compiled a supply wish list for each grade level to help give this art program a great start!

I have been planning and testing out projects all summer. I have the best summer job, teaching art to 4-9 year olds at Cheekwood here in Nashville. This gives me the opportunity to make art with the same kids for 15 hours a week! Can you imagine how much art we get to create! And I get to see awesome art created by some of the best artists that ever lived and work in the most beautiful gardens. If you have not visited Cheekwood you have to go! I even had the opportunity to meet some of the new Waverly-Belmont students. I am always a little sad for my summer at Cheekwood to end, but this new chapter in my life has me too excited to be sad! I did not take many pictures this summer, but here are a few!

Mixed Media Flower by my sweet four year old class.

I LOVE lily flowers! Naturally I take every class to the lily pond.

This was my favorite class! Monsters, Oh my! Thanks to my dear friend Katie Kidd, the most awesome camp manager, for this picture in car line.

Check out Rui Rui at Cheekwood! Part of the Jaume Plensa exhibit.