Teacher Reflections: Pumpkin Painting

The last few weeks have been a blast! I saw a one-day lesson plan on making raccoons using shapes. The lesson called for gray paper and all of the raccoons turn out the same. I wanted to change this, so instead of gray paper, we talked about George Rodrigue's Blue Dog artworks and I challenged my 1st Grade artists to creat a raccoon of a different color. As we progressed through the shapes and different types of lines, I really liked the outcome. However, I noticed that if the blue paper is available, over 80% of the class would choose blue. So, I removed it as an initial choice. This was a fun project, it was fast, and the 1st graders gained some confidence in drawing an animal. Check out the full gallery on Artsonia.

Another project I love is the Wish Weaving project where the class focuses and learns about Marc Chagall and his dreamlike art style. Now, this is a project that I started as a student teacher, and it bombed! My supervising teacher told me that it was a good experience to go through a failure because now I needed to adapt. So I did. And, now the end result is a project that studies Marc Chagall, drawing wishes, learns about mixed media, and how to weave. The opening step is to draw a wish or a dream. Here, this 2nd grade artist is drawing his own interpretation of The Village and I, but relating it to himself and his brothers. I love it when my young artists make these connections!

Lastly, the new local bank sponsored a pumpkin decorating contest for my 3rd grade artists. So, they brought in the pumpkins and the artists went about painting their designs. There were some great ideas and I love how confidently the artist went about their pumpkins.

#2ndgrade #1stgrade #3rdgrade