Diggs-Latham Art: October 2009

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

What's Happening?

Kindergarten: Students in kindergarten are currently making connections with the season of fall/autumn. They are drawing shapes of leaves, with crayons, and creating a composition by overlapping leaves of fall colors. They will finished their project by painting watercolor paint over the crayon to achieve a crayon resist technique.

First Grade: In first grade, students are exploring portraiture and discussing how portraiture has changed over time by using painting, drawing, and camera techniques. Students are studying proportions of the face, sketching with chalk, and finishing portraits with tempera paint.

Second Grade: Second graders are finishing a tempera painting with a pumpkin as their subject. They review organic shapes and made connections with the current autumn season as well as holidays and celebrations of the United States. Students will finish this project with a formal critique of their work.

Third Grade: Third graders are also studying portraiture. They are beginning to explore oil pastels and their characteristics. They will add color and detail to their portraits by mixing colors and using pastel drawing techniques.

Fourth Grade: Fourth graders are starting a unit in connection with their Social Studies curriculum. They are researching cities in North Carolina in Media/Technology class and will use what they learn to create a cut-paper composition of their city. They will explore architects of the city and use information about specific buildings in the city to add distinguishing details to their city's silhouette and skyline. They may choose to use tissue paper to lay over colors to create the affect of fading colors in the distance. They will add some textures and details in the foreground with markers.

Fifth Grade: Students in fifth grade are beginning a unit with biomes. They are studying biomes in Science and researching images of biomes in Media/Technology class. They must use what they learned to create their own pastel drawing of a biome or ecosystem. To help students focus their project, they are using a "raft," which is an outline or graphic organizer that presents students with a choice of three roles: famous artist, travel agent, and animal. They must draw from the perspective of their role, for a particular audience, and satisfy a topic that relates to their role.