Tag Archives: fourth grade

Paul Klee Name Art

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Looking for an exciting name art project? How about introducing a famous artist at the same time? Try this Paul Klee-inspired graphic name art project.

Second graders create name art in the style of Paul Klee. Allow 1-2 40 minute classes. Artwork by Tyler.

Start out by introducing artworks by Paul Klee. This project is inspired by his graphic works such as Castle and Sun. WikiPaintings has lots of images of his art. Click here,  here, here, and here to see some of Klee’s other graphic artworks. This is a good time to talk about abstract art.

Materials:

  • Black construction paper, 11″x14″
  • pencils and erasers
  • Oil Pastels (including white)

Students should turn their paper horizontally. They write their names in pencil, using all capital letters. Encourage students to S-T-R-E-T-C-H their letters from the bottom to the top of the paper (note: students with long names may need to draw extra skinny letters, use longer paper, or perhaps use their nicknames).  The letters can touch the left and right sides of the paper AND touch each other: letters such as ‘E’, ‘F’ and ‘K’ look more abstract when drawn in this manner.

After they are pleased with the layout, they trace over their pencil lines in white oil pastel.

Students write their name in white oil pastel, then fill in the spaces with colored pastels.

Next they color in the spaces in their name. Encourage them to use a variety of colors, although it is fine to repeat colors. Students must not color in with black pastels.

Completed second grade art:

Randie

Flynn

Jax

 

Chris

Kian

Show students the completed projects and ask if they can read the artist’s name. Successful artworks are often abstracted to the point it is challenging to see the artist’s name! How does this compare to Klee’s graphic artworks?

This lesson plan was inspired by (or abstracted from!) this fabulous post on the Kids Artists blog.

Enjoy!

Do you have a favorite name art lesson plan for the beginning of the year?

 

iPad Alphabet Photography Collages

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Just finished the fourth grade iPad Alphabet photography collages.

I am thrilled with the results!

Our fourth graders shot color letter photos in our school garden, using camera-equipped iPads and iPod touches. I wrote about the first two days of this process in this post.

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On Day 3, students brought iPads to the art room (note: make sure your tables are super clean!). Students partnered up to help each other during the photo selection and editing process. First they selected their single best photo. Using the basic photo edit in the device, the students cropped their photos, changed them to black and white, then saved to the device’s camera roll.

Next, students emailed me their best single b&w photos.

I used a Mac computer equipped with iPhoto to sort the photos. Whatever photo editing application you use, I highly suggest creating a folder for each letter.

To create the group collages, I used the free website Pic Monkey. It was easy to create a grid and upload the 26 letter photos for each collage. I even added a frame and text before saving the photo. Note: Pic Monkey requires Flash and cannot be used on an iPad. Also, if you use Pic Monkey, plan on filling that grid in one sitting as you cannot save work to the site.

I’m not going to lie – the whole process took a lot of time. I did the collages at home after hours. I am not a photographer, and there was a lot of trial and error.
I will teach it differently next time, specifically:

Model cropping,
Model saving as a black and white image,
Model emailing photos to me with a correct email address, and subject line including name, teacher and letter.

I will also seek alternate iPad apps for the students, and photo collage apps for me.

Have you taught a photo project using iPads? Please share!

UPDATE: DONE! I finished the iBook for this lesson plan. It contains all the alphabet photos and collages.

You need an iPad to read it. Here is the link

 

 

 

Check out this book on the iBookstore:

Cover Art

iPad Alphabet Photography

Rina Vinetz, Cara Spitzmiller & Angie Tremble

Category: Education

iPad Alphabet Photography for Fourth Grade

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Armed with camera-equipped iPads and iPods, our fourth graders spread out in our school garden in search of alphabet letters. Each student was assigned a letter to photograph.

Letter O

It was interesting to see how they completed the assignment: some students found letters in the branches of trees, some created letters from stones and twigs. Some poured water on the pavement to draw their letter. If they were absolutely stumped (get it?) , I let them use a letter from the garden signs. I asked students to take 5-10 photos of their letter.

I am happy to report the fourth graders LOVED looking for letters. They were completely engaged, and helped each other.  I heard a lot of shouts of “I found a T! Who has T?”

This week, students used their devices and the Pic Collage app to turn their best photos into a photo collage. I asked them to zoom in so that we could really see the letter – aim for making a letter so clear a kindergartener could recognize it. They emailed me their files and we reviewed them as a class.

Great work fourth graders!

Our fourth graders are in a pilot 1:1 iPad program, and it is a huge success. The goal is to turn all the photos into a free digital book downloadable through Apple’s iBooks store.

Inspiration for this project came from www.alphabetphotography.com.

UPDATE: see the completed whole-alphabet collages in this post.

‘Under the Sea’ Repouseé

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This week fourth grade finished their foil sea creatures. If you have never tried tooling foil repouseé, you simply must!  It is so much fun.  If you are unfamiliar with repouseé, check out this excellent post at A Faithful Attempt blog.

Materials:

 

Day 1

We talked about the repouseé process. We are going to use a pencil to shape and press lines and patterns into our foil. We will make texture. For practice, I gave kids a piece of heavy aluminum foil and we folded it four times. The number one rule: always keep the foil on the newspaper pad. The pencil will  bend the metal down into the pad.

We practiced drawing different lines (wavy, straight, zig zag) and patterns on our test foil.  I showed kids how to flip the foil to the back and press lines into the back of the foil. Once kids got used to working the foil front and back, they really enjoyed the process.

Day 2

I passed out square paper sketch sheets and templates (optional – I encouraged kids to make their own design so long as it filled the square). Goal: create a sea creature with a textured body and textured background. When the sketch was approved, I gave them a square of foil. They taped the sketch to the foil and retraced their lines. then they turned over the foil and pressed more lines into the back.

Optional templates ruled to fit foil squares.

 

Pencil sketch and completed art

 

 

Day 3:

Color with colored Sharpies.  The color makes our repouseé art looks like jewels of the sea!

Here they are on display in the school lobby for our annual Ocean Week

Options:

Skip the background. Cut out the textured sea creature. Color on both sides and hang as a mobile.

Skip the pre-cut squares and do the project on folded heavy foil.

Have fun!

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Chalk Pastel California Missions for Fourth Grade

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Fourth graders made chalk pastel drawings as a complement to their California history social studies unit.  Allow two 40-minute classes.

 

Thinking about a successful, fun art project for a 4th grade California Mission lesson? Try this  art project from Deep Space Sparkle, easily adapted for a California Mission project.

Mission San Juan Capistrano

Mission San Diego de Acala, San Diego, California

Materials:

  • black, dark blue or purple construction paper
  • chalk pastels
  • black or dark blue oil pastel for outlining
  • hair spray (or other fixative) to keep completed artwork from smearing

Examples of completed 4th grade student work:

Deep Space Sparkle has all the instructions and a downloadable drawing aid for adobe architecture.  You may want to print out this California mission coloring page to use as a Mission drawing aid.

This art project fit in beautifully for our school’s annual 4th grade California history field trip. This year: Rancho Buena Vista Adobe. In past years: Mission San Juan Capistrano.

Tips:

Don’t let students blow excess pastel color. During class, provide a piece of newspaper so they can tap off the excess.

After class, I washed down the tables with a bucket of plain water and a large sponge. Expect to change the water and rinse the sponge out after just a few tables – they get really dusty – but it is worth it for such a successful project.

The completed artwork will smear unless you spray it with a fixative (I use ordinary unscented Aqua Net hairspray from the drugstore). Please spray the artwork outside!

 

UPDATE: New Photo tour of Mission San Diego de Acala! Full color photos of Mission San Diego PLUS PHOTOS OF REAL SIGNAGE from the exhibits. A great resource for your classroom, Mission San Diego field trip or mission project. Just $5 each. Click here for Mission San Diego PowerPoint.  Click here for Mission San Diego Keynote.

 

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