Hello, my name is Carie and I am a kindergarten teacher in
Illinois!
A few years ago, our school district decided to cut our elementary
art position. Our Art teacher was AMAZING! She got our kindergarten and first
graders to create masterpieces that I couldn’t even create on my own! So we
were very sad to see her leave and take all of her Art Magic with her! So, for
the past few years I have been trying to make Art as meaningful to my students
as she did hers. After years of giving students construction paper and letting
them cut and paste the pieces to make jack-o-lanterns; like this...
The construction paper jack-o-lanterns are fun too...
but...........
This year I decided to get
over my fear of letting all of my students paint at the same time and let paint
do the talking!
Painting is very therapeutic and my kiddos needed some of this
therapeutic time (as did I). As I was filling paint trays, I ran out of orange
paint so I used it as a teaching moment to teach students which two colors make
orange and then showed them how to mix red and yellow...then WAHHH LAHHH, we had orange! We then talked
about how to use each paint brush in only one color so not to mix the colors to make even more colors. We didn't want crazy color pumpkins for this activity...just orange :)
I let the students choose what size of paper they wanted
(12X18 or 9X12). They then got to choose if they wanted a short, fat pumpkin or
a tall, skinny pumpkin. (They all reminded me that those different kinds of
pumpkins were opposites). Each student
also got to choose if they just wanted to paint a pumpkin or if they wanted to
paint a jack-o-lantern. Then I let the
painting begin.
They had enjoyed it so much, they wanted to paint more pumpkins and
jack-o-lanterns. If we would have had had more time, I definitely would have let them! They
were so calm and serious while painting…they need
this ART time to express themselves and let their true personalities show in through in their “masterpieces”
I hope everyone has a very Happy Halloween!!
My Son is 9 year old, he always like to draw painting of animals but my daughter 8 year old has passion of painting fruits and trees. Can you let me know how to identify each child interest so that we can improve their skills in that particular area of expertise. I know there are many software online which helps to draw pictures but a handmade painting has its own identity and Art.
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This is a WONDERFUL post. I'm a retired K teacher. Hope you can visit my blog: Kindergarten & Preschool for Parents & Teachers. Pinning this now.
ReplyDeleteHi, Susan! Nice to see you here!
DeleteI love that you added the color-mixing activity, Carie! I pinned your post to my Pumpkin Unit Study board at http://pinterest.com/debchitwood/pumpkin-unit-study/
ReplyDeleteVery fun and colorful photos! Pinned! Thanks so much, Carolyn
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