Kindergarten - Scarecrows!

SCARECROWS! I love Scarecrows in the Fall! Especially when they are made by Kindergarteners! I LOVE the book Scarecrow by Cynthia Rylant. It is beautifully written and beautifully illustrated by Lauren Stringer. We talk about the TEXTURE Fall can bring, that we will be making scarecrow pictures with real and implied textures.

Week 1 - I share the book first with my class, and then we prep papers for our plaid and rough denim jeans. A 6x4 brown construction paper with crayon plaid and then coloring with the side of a blue crayon on a blue 3x4 piece of construction paper. We save these for the next week.

Week 2 - I give the students a 11x17 piece of light blue paper and a 11x9 piece of light green paper. Students are asked to barely cut a strip off one wide end of the paper, to make it slightly bumpy. Then we glue this down on the bottom half of the paper. Student use crayons to draw a sun and clouds, then corn stalks on the right and left side of the paper, I remind them, the scarecrow will be in the middle, so don't draw corn there. If they want to make the sky more blue, they can use crayon to color the sky. I give them a 1/2"x 6" strip to glue down to the center of the paper for the stick our scarecrow will be set on.

I draw on the back of their brown plaid papers a rectangle on each side to cut off so that it looks like a shirt. Then a line on the back of the blue paper to cut it in half to have 2 pieced. We glue the shirt down first, then the two legs. 

Week 3 - Faces - I give a 3" square with a circle drawn on it, have them cut it out and glue down. I also have them fringe some yellow strips of paper for hay coming out of the cuffs. They glue these on as well. Then some fun finishing touches... button eyes, I have pre-cut fabric squares for knee patches and burlap for straw hats. Then a black crayon smile that looks stitched on. Any any other stitches they want to add! If they want to add a red barn on the horizon line, they can do that too.  :)

There are lots of ways to make this project, I have come to like this version a lot. These look adorable all hanging together in the hallway. :)

 

Kindergarten - Eric Carle Very Hungry Caterpillar Collages

Who doesn't LOVE a kindergarten Hungry Caterpillar??? I have done this a couple different ways in the past, but this is my favorite. I like it on YELLOW. I am not sure why, but it makes it so happy! 

Students get to paint a 9x12 yellow piece of paper with green and yellow paint, creating texture with scrapers and sponges. Next time, I give them a 2x9 inch strip, they cut it up into "french fries". Not too thin... then I walk by and put a long line of glue down, they glue it all down. 

Next, they cut out the circles for the caterpillar. Before class, I prep a bunch... I cut all their painted paper up into 3x3's. Their paper becomes community paper, each student gets 5 green and a red, (from other classes who have made painted paper). I hand draw circles on the back for them to cut out. We get the caterpillar glued together and then make a sun in the sky with some yellow orange papers from other classes. If they want clouds, they can cut some blue papers or use markers. 

I love giving them markers to add "friends". I demonstrate how to draw some bugs with dots behind them suggesting movement. They love it! They all like to draw a rainbow. This one is always so sweet when hanging in the hallway, a crowd pleaser for sure! 

Kindergarten makes Arlo!

If you teach the young ones, you have to read this book and create an Arlo.  My students LOVE this book so much, they insist that I read it over and over!  Arlo Needs Glasses is created by author illustrator Barney Saltzberg. It is a pop up style book which kids love.  I originally borrowed this lesson from Deep Space Sparkle, (Deep Space Sparkle's Arlo Lesson).  Which, is truly my favorite way to teach it.  The first year, I did it exactly the same.  Then,  I wanted to do it again! So I changed it up a little, and this year I thought it would be fun to try making cloud clay/model magic glasses.  It was fun, yet I still like the paper ones with all the bling a bit more!  Crayon & paint, oil pastel & chalk... whatever you want to use! They will be super cute!!!!

 

Kindergarten Lichtenstein's in Primary Colors!

This has been my new favorite Kinder project this year... one I pulled out of a hat 10 minutes before they were coming.  You know... one of those days you're sure they were not finished with the last project, but.. the were! 

I fast... pre-drew a curve at the bottom of the papers for the sun and made it work! First day, we talked a lot about primary colors and the color wheel.  I showed them the three Lichtenstein paintings below and we outlined the sun in blue and painted the rays. That was it.  Next week, we painted in three sections yellow, (including the sun), then printed circles with red using a circle sponge on a stick. Next week , we printed the stripes with cardboard and added some printed circles.  DONE! They ALL turned out cute!  My other two classes did stars and lightning.  I pre-drew both the star and lightning and taught it basically the same way.  The only difference, the star and lightening needed a cardboard printed outline. Overall, great results!!!