Art-al-Sol 2012 (a little late, I'm sorry)

This summer I taught Art-al-Sol again. There was not a specific theme, but I did pull most of the lessons from Pinterest. The kids had a blast, and the projects turned out great! Here are a few of them to check out.

Coil baskets

Along with the guitar lesson, the other one most asked about is the coil pot lesson. I got this one from the Dick Blick website, http://cdn.dickblick.com/lessonplans/paper-coil-baskets/paper-coil-baskets-paper-coil-baskets.pdf In years past, I had taught my students to make coil pots using yarn or raffia, but the students got very frustrated, with the yarn or raffia constantly coming out of the needle, and changing colors. This lesson ends the frustration. The paper coil is glued together with Weldbond Universal Adhesive, which I never heard of, but it is amazing! The lesson plan is very easy, although it tells you to use Inovart self-adhesive print foam for the bottom of the pot. You are supposed to cut a circle from the foam and use that to start the bottom of the pot, creating a "snail" from the paper coil and sticking it on the foam. I felt that the foam wasn't sticky enough for that, they kept popping off, so we tried with just gluing the "snail" as well, and not using the foam. It worked better for us. The children didn't have to hold the coils in place very long, which really surprised me, most got theirs done in 30-60 minutes. We let them dry overnight, and then painted them with liquid watercolors. Just a word of warning, the paper coil really sucks up the liquid watercolors! Embellishments could be added on, but we ran out of time.

Guitar lesson...

I have been asked by a couple people to post the lesson for the guitars. It was really simple. I showed the students pictures of different types and styles of guitars, making sure to include some wild and crazy ones. Then I asked the students to draw their dream guitar. It could have any shape, color or design, as long as it was easily recognizable as a guitar. After they sketched out some ideas, the students were then given a large piece of black paper (20x30) and using oil pastels, they created their guitars. I allowed them to choose to add designs to the background as they wished, or they could leave it blank. Some added a few things, while others completely covered the entire background. They loved working on this project, and wanted way more time than I had planned on giving them.

Art-al-Sol 2010

I was very lucky to manage another Art-al-Sol camp this summer. Art-al-Sol is a summer art camp run by MNPS, and is a week long, all day camp open to 8-13 year olds. This summer, we focused on a theme that was inspired by the Chihuly exhibitions at the Frist and Cheekwood. We were able to go to the Cheekwood exhibit (on a very, VERY hot day!) and the children loved it! Below is some of the projects that we were able to complete during the week. We worked on microwave kiln glass, glass coasters, Classroom Chihuly, Shrinky-Dinks with pastels (hint: wet the pastels first, then draw on the shrinky dinks), friendly plastic pins, silk painting, window cling mobiles and bead pictures (using the fusible beads that are available at Wal-mart).

One of the coolest things ever!!!!!!

In buying supplies for Art-al-Sol, I found a glass fusing kiln that goes into the microwave. I ordered it and tried it out with my campers. It is AMAZING!!!!!! You design a glass piece, place it on kiln paper, and place it in the kiln. The whole kiln goes in the microwave for just a few minutes. The only drawback is that you have to wait for 30 minutes before you can take the glass out of the kiln and see it. I know...patience is a virtue, one that I usually have, but this time, it was very hard to wait. I found this kiln in an art supply catalogue, but I also found it at Hobby Lobby. It's a little pricey at about $119 at H.B., but with a 40% off coupon, it makes it more affordable. I have fired my kiln over 60 times, and it is still working great!

Art-al-Sol 2009

Each year Metro schools offers a summer art program called Art-al-Sol. I have taught this camp for the last three years. This summer, we used the theme of Art around the World. We had some great artwork this year, and I thought I would showcase some of it!