Surrealism Dreams

We spent the first part of summer school talking all about Surrealism and dreams.  We watched a Brain Pop Video on Surrealism, read about Surrealism, Rene Magritte and Salvador Dali in this Scholastic Arts magazine.  After we had learned all about surrealism and how it can relate to dreams, students were given this prompt to write about "What's the strangest dream you have ever had?"  After spending some time writing  students created a self-portrait with their surreal dream serving as the background.  Students spent a lot of time translating their words to imagery, mixing colors, and using new watercolor techniques.  The inspiration for this lesson came from here.  I was in awe of the work these students did and wanted to at least try out a portion of this lesson.  

Teacher Example

Student's who finished early came up with a title for their artwork that correlated between their dream and painting.

End of the Year Kindergarten Projects

I was all over the place with my kindergarten classes this year.  I had some very tough groups so we couldn't always do the same thing as the other classes.  Here are a couple of projects we did in the last couple weeks of school, and I mean literally every single class did something different.

Kindergarten Spring Chicks

This funny spring chick lesson really captures the kindergarten attention.  We did the drawing together and outlined with a black oil pastel or sharpie.  Some of the classes used liquid watercolor to paint and other classes used oil pastels for the bird and pan watercolors for the background. I really love using liquid watercolor especially in Kindergarten because the colors are so much more vibrant.  However, the schools I travel from room to room I find difficult to use the liquid watercolors because of set up reasons (never knowing how many sets I will need because of seating arrangements).

Hope these cuties make you laugh, kindergarteners really "awwwwwwwed"at their cuteness.

5th Grade Wassily Kandinksy

This lesson was inspired by Russian artist, Wassily Kandinsky. Kandinsky is considered as the inventor and theorist of abstract painting in the 20th century.  5th Graders emulated Kandinsky's style.  We talked about the great influence music had on making his creations.  The black outlines were made with sharpie marker, students listened to classical music and draw how they felt the music.  We also discussed abstract art and how color can change a mood or express a feeling.  Students explored different watercolor techniques to fill their paper. 

"Color is the keyboard, the eyes are the harmonies, and the soul is the piano with many strings.  The artist is the hand that plays, touching one key or another, to cause vibrations in the soul."

--Wassily Kandinsky