Mother's Day Beadwork

Crafts and beadwork was the title of this lesson. the teachers did a great way of working Mother's Day into it since it was a week later. The elements presented to the 3rd grade class were color, texture, and pattern. For our bracelet, we used strips of magazine paper. There were four ways for us to roll our magazine strips, which we chose from to make our pattern. My pattern included a white bead, a pink bead, and a black bead. To make the beads, I rolled the magazine strips over a wooden dowl and then glued the strips. After I rolled the bead up, I then strung it onto the piece of yarn that we had.


An extension activity that would work great with the bracelets would be making them at the beginning of the school year. It would be like a friendship bracelet. Students could make their own beads with whatever color they wanted, and then they would trade it with classmates.

Masks-Modern Art

Modern art was the topic of this Fourth Grade lesson. Realizing that art can be different than how we really see it was an important concept. An element that we covered during this lesson was texture.
To make the masks, we rolled out clay and made it as even as possible. We then carved whatever shape we wanted the mask to be. After we made the masks, we carved in different textures by using wooden dowls, pencils, and whatever other objects we wanted to use. We had four sections and each section had to have different textures in them. Once we designed out masks, we made the mouth, nose, and eyes. To get them to stick to our mask, we used a technique called scoring and slipping. To do that, we made small scratch marks where we would put those pieces, then, we put small amounts of water under the eyes, nose, and mouth. When we were finished putting our mask together, we painted the whole mask black. Once it has dried, we chose whatever colors we wanted to paint it.

As an extension activity, studying different cultures that use masks would be a great way to tie in social studies into the lesson. Learning the where and why other countries make masks to wear would be exciting and something new for fourth graders.

Seasons

Fall and Winter were the two seasons that we focused on today for our Second Grade lesson. To start, we got to pick whatever color we wanted as a back ground, whether black, blue, etc. Then, we made the tree trunks with brown construction paper. To make the truck, we put our forearm and hand on the paper and we could make either a tall or short tree. To add texture to the tree, we safely crumpled it up before we glued it to the background. Next, we used tissue paper to make the trees. If you chose a fall setting, the colors that you focused on were warm, such as yellow, red, and orange. If you chose to do a winter setting, which I did, you focused on cool colors, such as blue, purple, and green. To make the trees with tissue paper, we twisted it around the eraser of a pencil and dipped it into glue. Another way that you could have made your tree for the winter setting was to use cotton balls, which would also have reflected the snow. Once we were done with our tree, we added to our background.


As an extension activity, you could do a science activity and talk about the type of animals that live in trees during the two different seasons. There may be animals that migrate somewhere before winter and there may be animals that live in them all year round.

A Box of Crayons

A box of crayons was the title of the lesson for our kindergartners. Diversity was a new vocabulary word we introduced during this lesson. To start the lesson, we did an activity called "trading places." We would call different traits out and if the students had that trait, they would trade places with another student. After that game, we had the class take a piece of white construction paper and fold it into three parts. They would then draw a head on the first part and fold it behind the other two parts and pass it to the person to the right of them. That person would draw the middle section of the body, and then fold it under and pass it to their right. The final section would have the feet drawn on to it. After everyone was finished, we showed all of the drawings to the class and discussed the importance of everyone being different. When we were finished with that, we had the class draw on the crayon templates. We asked them to include a picture of themselves and anything else that they like, such as their hobbies, colors, or dreams.


As an extension activity, it would be great to work in Martin Luther King day with it! Showing students positive role models that embrace diversity and change would be different for them. Reading different stories and watching videos of Martin Luther King would be a good activity.

Mother's Day Cards-Scratch Art

This Mother's Day card worked great with our class's timing. The card is a good idea that have your 4th grade students make for their family. In this lesson, shapes and color were the main focus of the scratch art. Our first step for our card was to color a cardstock  with crayons. We maid sure that the crayons were pushed down hard while coloring so the colors covered the whole piece of paper. Once we were finished coloring, we painted the cardstock paper with a mixture of tempera paint and detergent. The paper had to be completely covered and had to not have any clumps on it.
 While waiting for the paint to dry, we got a piece of paper where we drew what we wanted on the outside of the cards. We drew on side of the piece, and on the other we colored it all black with our pencil. After we drew what we wanted on the outside of the cards, we traced it onto the black paint with a big #2 pencil. We had to press down very hard so that we could see our shapes. Then we traced over the pencil marks with a wooden sticks so that our colors on the cardstock would show through. The colors showed up really well and were cool to see! Once the outside of our card was finished, we wrote a note on the insides for our moms.

As an extension activity, I would use the scratch art on different shapes according to different holidays. You could paint leprechauns, Easter bunnies, or Santas. Your students could decorate those cutouts any way they want and it would be a great way to decorate your room for the holidays-very colorful!

Mask Making

This mask project was for a third grade classroom. The teachers showed us masks for examples from all around the world. Some of the examples existed of African masks, Mardi Gras masks, and Italian play masks.
The first step to our masks was to color the paper plate that we got. We waited for it to dry, then we cut out the eyes and we made a nose for the face. Afterwards, we made the hair. We had lots of choices to make our hair. There was yarn, construction paper, or colorful pipe cleaners. Once we had the hair on, we got to add whatever else we wanted to our mask. There was paint, glitter, sticky letters, and beads that we had to choose from. It was really fun to see the masks that everyone had made  because everyone's was so unique and colorful

An extension activity that would be great with the masks would be a social students lesson. You could have the students pick a culture of their choice and then make a mask that represents that culture.

Holiday Printmaking

This holiday printmaking lesson was for a 2nd grade class and did a great job of incorporating shapes, colors, and holidays.
Students chose five pieces of construction paper that we wanted as our background. We then practiced drawing scenes that we would want to have printed on our papers. After practicing, we drew our scenes on a white foam tray. We put paint on the foam trays and spread it around with a roller. When we had the tray covered, we flipped it on the piece of construction paper and pressed down (hard!) The finished product on the construction paper was the scene we had drawn on the foam tray!

For an extension activity, you could use the printmaking to make cards for holidays. The holidays you could make cards for would be May Day, Mother's Day, Valentine's Day, or Halloween!