Happy New Year!

Wow, it’s been a long time and I feel terrible about that.  I’ve gotten quite a few new followers since my last post and y’all are probably wondering why in the world you bothered.  Well, the holidays were rather busy – busier than normal – and I got a new phone and haven’t had access to my old photos that I took of my holiday art and boards.  I think I did share some on Instagram before I got my new phone so if you are an Insta-user, check out tinyartroom there.

So, right before our Winter break, I started all my classes on their Art to Remember projects.  A few grades finished and a few are finishing this week.  All of the projects are turning out great and I have two new Art to Remember projects that I’m trying out this year.

Kindergarten was one of the classes that finished before the break so I was looking around on Pinterest and my favorite art blogs (see the blogroll to the right) to see what I could find for them that would ease us back into the swing of things.  For some of these kids (and me) I feel like it’s a second First Day of school so we need to tiptoe back into it.

I found this awesome project over at this cute little French art blog called Le Petites Têtes de L’Art which Google translated to “Small Heads of Art” so… let’s just stick to stumbling over the French pronunciation.  Anyway – the kids loved making this so much.  At the end of class, I asked them what they liked so much about it.  They all said some version of  “I liked the scribbling” and “I like cutting the paper.” So, basically they liked being given a goal but allowed to go about achieving it how they wanted.  Ahhhh… choice based art.  I promised them we would do more of this.  🙂

For now, check out the results of today’s work:

   
   
   
    
   
 

Fun with Dali

My second graders love learning about Salvador Dali and looking at pictures of him and his artwork. He’s so crazy and cooky, it’s right up their alley. We also learn about blending and intermediate colors, and analogous color schemes with this crayon resist project.

Painted paper birdhouses

I saw a post over at Painted Paper and fell in love. Birdhouses can be so boring but using the painted paper gives them a new dimension and I think her’s turned out so pretty.
My 3rd graders started painting paper this week and have absolutely loved it. I also used PP’s post about about “how I paint paper” when I introduced this technique. Lots of good suggestions she has!
Below is my example and I can’t wait to see how my kiddos’ turn out!

And here are A few of the kids’:

Parrot Heads!

5th graders will be painting parrots starting this week. We will paint them on black paper. I’ve got a ton of examples that they can choose from and then draw them freehand. I’m going to try tempera cakes and see how they do with controlling the paints. This is my example so far. I want to go through it as they go through it so they can see the progression and layering of colors.

So proud of the hard work my 5th graders have put into these awesome paintings. They are looking fantastic.

Winter birds

First grade did these beautiful cardinals before the winter break and I took pictures of them and then went into my Christmas food coma. I am ready to share them now, even though it’s 70° outside in January!!! I feel like I live in Florida except I’m still like 12 hours from Disney World. Back to the art: My lovely first graders are such good artists and they are so eager to please and follow directions so well, their art can’t end up any way but great. We drew these together using sharpies (no pencils or erasers here!) and then took our time to color nice and bright. 🙂