Warrior's Choice: Magnetic Dots and Computer Time

A couple of posts ago I began showing you my collection of activities that are available for students when they finish projects and have a little time left until the end of art.  I call this Warrior's Choice.  Here are two more activities that are provided for Warrior's Choice.

I purchased this aboriginal art magnetic dot kit from one of the companies that I orders supplies from many moons ago.  I don't remember the exact company but it was one of either Blick Art Supplies, Sax Arts and Crafts or Crizmac.  Sorry I cannot be more specific!

There are two student computers in the art room.  I provide a list of websites students can visit.  The websites are on sticky labels on the computer and those are the only websites the students are allowed to go to for Warrior's Choice.  I tell them that what they do on the computer has to be art related and that is why I limit the websites.  

https://www.nga.gov/kids/zone/zone.htm  has many activities and is probably the most visited out of all of these.

http://artpad.art.com/artpad/painter/

                                                 http://www.picassohead.com/create.html
http://kids.nationalgeographic.com/kids/games/interactiveadventures/tomb-unknown-mummy/

The last one is not directly art related, however relates to the the 6th graders' project on ancient Egyptian art.

6th grade Notan, 5th grade Pepsi Can Designs and Frank Stella

The 6th graders learned about the Japanese art of Notan.  The word notan means contrast in Japanese.  The students chose two pieces of paper in contrasting colors.  We made our notan symmetrical but all notan does not have to be symmetrical. 

Here are some photos of in-progress work:

I cut small squares and provided larger 9"x12" paper for the background.  I would have liked to be able to cut from larger squares but for some reason silly me didn't order larger paper for the background paper and so  we had to use 4"x4"squares so the designs would fit on the 9"x12" paper for the background. The background paper has to be considerably larger than the square for the whole design to fit.   Oh well.  Next year I will know to order 12"x18" paper for this project! 

I will post photos of finished pieces later!

Pepsi Can Designs

I have these Pepsi cans that I saved from the 1990's.  I have always liked the designs and thought that this could be a good lesson on graphic design.

 The 5th graders are introduced to graphic design and we discuss what it is and how it can be persuasive.

 The assignment is to create a new Pepsi can design that has the them of a season, holiday or event.

The designs must be completely colored and have the Pepsi logo somewhere in the design.  

We saved soda cans to wrap the designs around and they are secured with tape.

Frank Stella Inspired Masterpieces

The 5th graders and I take a look at some of Frank Stella's paintings.  We talk about how they are partially 3-dimensional and that he bases them on experiences he has had and things he has seen.  This is 'Record for an Exotic Bird' 1978 by Frank Stella.  I ask the students to point out shapes and colors that reference an exotic bird.  It is amazing how sometimes I learn from my students!

For the assignment I tell the students they will be creating a Stella-inspired creation based on one of their own experiences.  I encourage the students to choose an experience they have had or something they have seen and take shapes and colors from that experience to make a design.  

The students choose a background of wall paper for their painting.

They cut the wall paper to fit their tag board and glue it in place.

The next step is to choose pre-cut foam core pieces.  The pieces are pre-cut so the students have neat edges.  I explain that they are to choose shapes that they want.  The pieces all have straight lines, so if they want curvy lines in their art work this can be added by drawing and painting later.  

After the pieces are selected the students arrange them on the background and glue them into place.

Next the students go to town with drawing patterns and adding a lot of bright colors.  I tell the students that they can use as many colors as they want and they should create many patterns and designs on the pieces because Frank Stella uses bright, bold colors and many patterns and designs.

 

For the last step I put a different color of neon tempera paint on each table an instruct the students to add a few accents of neon colors. The students are free to move to the tables that have the colors they need.  I encourage them not to over-paint their paintings and that the neon paint is just for accents.  

I love these because of all of the bright colors and they are so fresh and playful!  The fact that it just took two class periods to complete this project is also a plus!

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Warrior's Choice

The assignments that I give my 5th and 6th graders usually last 2 or more weeks (they come to art once a week for 40 minutes).  The days that they are finishing up a project may allow for a little time after they are finished before the end of class.  I would like for my students to be engaged for the full 40 minutes that they are with me.  Creating activities that keep the students' interests and genuinely involved is always my goal, and a challenging goal at that!

Prior to this year we did what I called "free-draw," which was a supply of drawing paper, drawing books and markers.  But that only piqued the interests of some students, resulting in students being tempted to do things other than being involved in art learning while in my classroom.  Even if it was just for the last few minutes of their time in art, I felt that there was NOT something right about that, not to mention it led some students down the path to getting in trouble for lack of something interesting for them to do.

I had enough of that nonsense and decided to provide a bunch of activities for students to choose from.  But these activities needed to be economical because they would be available all year, easy to clean up, fun, and art educational of course!

I created nine activities to choose from not including the drawing paper and drawing books and also not including computers.  I went to the store and bought large, plastic storage containers so the supplies would be organized and easily put away when students were finished with them.  They are stored on a shelf that is labeled for each container so the students can see exactly where each container goes.  Do they always put them in the proper spot on the shelf?  No.  But we are working on that.  SMH

I will highlight one or two of these activities in the next few posts.  Oh! And I wanted to come up with a name for this collection of "free-time" activities that wasn't "free-time activities."  I wanted the name to be something that the students could relate to and sounded like they were getting to do something special.  I took our mascot: Warriors and added Choice to the end of it for the obvious reason that the students are choosing an activity.

Here is our first couple of Warrior's Choice activities:

Interior Deisgn

The students get to arrange furniture (laminated pieces of construction paper) in a room (a black sheet of poster board), and then choose fabric, laminate, paint colors etc... for all of the surfaces in the room.  I obtained an excessive amount of swatches of various materials and colors from a really great program called Zero Landfill in which anyone can come on designated days during the month of September and pick up materials that design and building companies would have normally thrown out.  The program is advertised to artists, teachers, and students but anyone is welcome to partake.  You can learn more about this program through the above Zero Landfill link. 

Modeling Clay

This is the most popular activity!  Students flock to this container after they complete their assignments.  I had some of these linoleum pieces from the above-mentioned Zero Landfill and use them as mats for working with the modeling clay because it is very difficult to wipe off of the tables.  The bin contains modeling clay, linoleum mats, and clay tools.  The clay started out as a variety of colors but then was mixed together to make an even grey color at first and then after I put a little more in the bin an even army green color. There was no way around the mixing of the colors!

I will post one or two more Warrior's Choice activities next time!  Stay tuned!

 Notan In Progress

Notan In Progress

 The 6th graders are doing a form of Japanese art called notan.  The word notan means contrast in Japanese.  Shapes are cut out of colored, square paper and inverted outside of the square and glued down.  We are making symmetrical notan by folding the paper and keeping it folded while we cut.  A contrasting color is chosen for the background paper.  This is a one-day project, which is rare in my class, but welcome because the 6th graders need some more 2-D art in their portfolios. We have only completed two other 2-D pieces so far this year.  Later the students, themselves will be selecting one piece from their portfolio to be displayed in the art show.  This is something I am excited about and curious to see the results of  because in the past I have been the one selecting art work for the art show.

I will post completed notan later!

Nanners says "Arty On!"