Symmetry Paintings

This is a project that one of my 5th grade classes created for the school's art show. I gave them a cardboard circle (a pizza round, ordered out of a art supply catalogue) and a large piece of paper. They traced the cardboard circle onto their paper and cut it out. Next they fold the circles into fourths and started drawing designs. When they have a design they like, they trace the design with sharpies, and by holding the paper up to the light, transfer to the other three sections of the circle. After the design is finished, the back of the circle is coated in graphite, and then the design is transferred to the cardboard circle. Next, the students paint the design using pencils erasers and tempera paint. The last step is to outline the the design and the edge of the cardboard circle with black paint.

Paper Coil Sculptures

This is one of the projects that a second grade class completed for the school's art show. We started off by creating a very shallow "box" or "tray" from a piece of black construction paper. I gave them a 12" square piece of black construction paper and showed them how to cut the corners and fold it up to create the box. Then I gave them 1/2" wide strips of paper to create walls within the box. I taught them to fold the ends over and glue the folded ends to the sides of the box. Then we raided the scrap paper box. I demonstrated to the students how to cut strips of various widths of paper and curl them around a pencil or crayon. Then the edge of the coils are dipped into glue and the coil is placed within the box. Each separate area created by the walls in the box is filled in with a different color.

Art Show Photostory

I have taken the pictures from our MAT art show and created a photostory of the show. I just learned how to use photostory, and I really enjoyed creating this video. I see many potential uses in my classroom.

The beaded pictues are my artwork, and the watercolor pictures are my friend Ted's (Art with Mr. E for those of you familiar with his blog)

What I've been doing...

So, for the last year or so, I have not been posting very frequently. The reason for this is that I am currently working on my masters through the University of Idaho online MAT program. I will finally graduate in May, but as a requirement of the program, I was required to have a show of the artwork that I have created over the last 5 semesters. My friend Ted and I had a combined art show on April 15th. Here are a few pictures of the show and my artwork. I have really enjoyed going back to school, but I am also glad that the end is in sight.