Colors across Texas day 1 art mini-camp

We learned a bit about west Texas today and drew Monument rock to paint with thick acrylics. We used some texture paint and the kids learned to pounce in the background rocks using several colors randomly. They used pallet knives to paint the rock itself and the foreground sandy area. Some made theirs darker and some lighter but all were really good.

We also drew a cluster of cactus on watercolor paper to paint. The boys didn't want flowers on theirs but I think they put on the buds. I think most kids are not used to painting with water first then putting in the watery paints but have the "oh wow" reaction when they can see the paints move and mix. This one also turned out really good.

Making a Texas Star quilt square @WBCL

Quilting is all but a lost art for kids but a great way to discuss history for Texas's birthday and be creative too. I precut triangles before class and brought extra fabric for filler and examples of Texas Star quilts. This one is kind of a spinning star. I had the kids position the triangles first then glue them to a paper backing. They then selected other fabric in squares or triangles to fill the page. Some did borders too. Fun and easy way to get into this and I got tips from a mom who quilts when I flipped one of my triangles and got all tangled. We will try on sewing a square this summer I think.

Making a Valentine's Day basket at WBCL

I was given a sack full of Valentine's Day cards last spring break and wrestled with how to best use them in a project for this class. We have made and decorated Valentines cards several times out of a variety of materials and I know we could've done that again. Instead we chose to tear the cards in half separating the back from the front and converting the back into a basket by folding its edges of up and in and stapling it together. We used fun foam hearts for the ends and decorated them with artwork from the cards. Lastly we punched holes in the hearts and used a pipe cleaner to form the handle. This project took on a lot of participation from the parents and everyone seemed to be having a good time with it.

Blue horse collage for Chinese New Year

I was excited to see a few months ago that Eric Carle had a book about a blue horse and it was recommended as a resource for Chinese New Year. Luckily one of the parents has a copy of the book and was able to bring it for the class. Before class I did a drawing of the horse based on his book and ran off copies for the participants. I had them cut out the horse and then use several different colors of blue tissue paper to make a collage on the horse. The example had a different colored saddle blanket and we were able to find some striped tissue paper to use for the blanket. Some of them were able to make a 3-D mane and tail and others chose to keep their's flat. Lastly we mounted it on red construction paper as most of the examples I've seen use red for celebrations.

Drawing and painting winter birds @WBCL

This was a draw along with me lesson (see drawing above) which worked very well last night. I get some fairly young kids in the class and have been doing more draw/paint sessions of late. They love it and they are pretty good at it. The parents do help with the drawings as needed but the kids hold their own. We also had colored reference pictures to consult when we painted the birds. I chose cardinals and jays because they have similar shapes but dramatically different colors. we even did a bit of color mixing and added a few details like sky or branches to them.

I have a dream hands project @ WBCL

We started out with a bit of a history lesson about who Martin Luther King was and then I read part of his speech to the kids. I had made up a sample with the circle in the middle, printing I have a dream, three faces to color, and then a few of the colored hands in a circle around The edges. Some of the kids got very very detailed in their drawings and their colorings. We were fortunate to have a donation of people colored crayon to use for this project.