Miss Nelson's Art Projects

Description:  For this project, we practiced drawing on a small white piece of paper before taping it to a styrofoam plate and transferring our drawing. We used rollers and acrylic paint to paint our styrofoam before pressing it onto a final paper and rolling it again. I chose to draw fish in the ocean. Extension Activity:  An extension activity for this project could be in science. Students could be instructed to draw animals from a certain environment or ecosystem. Students could then present their project and some characteristics of their ecosystem to a partner or small group. 

Description:  For this project, we used templates to cut out our snake heads and tails before cutting the pieces for the body with a ruler. We used glue sticks to attach our loops together. Once our snack was assembled, we used Q-tips to create eyes and a design using black and white paint.  Extension Activity:  An extension activity for this project could be in language arts. Students could write a short story about their snake. Their short story should include a setting with their snake as the main character. The focus of the writing activity could be to include a topic sentence, supporting detail sentences, and a closing sentence. 

Description:  For this project, we practiced looking at 2 of Vincent Van Gough's paintings and wrote what we noticed about them using art vocabulary. Then, we practiced 4 watercolor techniques on a small sheet of paper. Next, we drew our flowers and vase and outlined it with a sharpie. Finally, we painted our sunflowers using at least 2 different watercolor techniques.  Extension Activity:  This art project would also include a math component. The students could be learning about measurement and have specific measurements of the width of the vase needs to be or how long the stems are on each flower. Students would practice using rulers by measuring in inches. 

Description: For this project, we drew 4 aspects of our lives using markers, colored pencils, and crayons. For each picture, we wrote a sentence describing what we drew and why it is important in our lives. I drew building blocks because I work at Aldersgate Church's Kingdom Kids Preschool. I drew a cross for my faith. I drew footballs because my family has season tickets to North Dakota State's home football games in Fargo. I drew lane ropes and waves because I swam for 8 years and am a lifeguard. Extension Activity: In lower elementary, this could be incorporated in language arts. Students could draw and write about their drawings. Students could be working on forming complete paragraphs with topic sentences, detail sentences, and closing sentences. Students could present their paragraphs and drawings to the class to cover presenting standards as well. 

Description: For this in-class activity, we used warm and cool colors strategically to hide an animal on our paper. We drew our animal upside down with a cool color and then used warm colors to make patterns over our animal to disguise it. We could test how well our animal was hidden with the red overlay glasses we made. The artist referenced in this lesson was Henri Rousseau. I chose to draw an elephant. The image with the red overlay glasses is harder to see, please click on "Read More" and click on the first image to view the elephant on a larger scale.  Extension Activity: An activity that could be used with this art project could be a science lesson looking at environments and how animals have characteristics and adaptations to disguise themselves from prey. The teacher could explain animal environments and adaptations before starting this art project with the students. 

Description: For this project, we reviewed Vincent van Gogh's life and used visual thinking strategies to infer ideas about Vincent van Gogh's Starry Night . Then, we created our own silhouette image. We covered a large, dark-colored paper with bright and colorful tissue paper. Next, from black construction paper, we cut out our desired landscape.   Extension Activity: Vincent van Gogh's life could be integrated into language arts. Students could research or be presented with facts about his life. Students could write a narrative about his life and include a picture of a silhouette and collage. The visual the students create will allow the students to show their creativity in addition to sharing their knowledge about Vincent van Gogh.