4th Grade: Silhouettes and Oil Pastel

I have no idea what to call this project - but it is really amazing and cool.  I got the majority of this lesson from smART Class, and then tweaked parts.  The high contrast, and visually dynamic product was perfect for my fourth graders.

The first day students and I reviewed what they know about colors - which colors mix to make others, which ones work well together, which ones make brown... etc.  Then we passed out liquid watercolors (honestly, never going back to cake watercolors), and two coffee filters per student.  Students were in charge of folding their coffee filters in half, twice, getting a paint brush and painting them.  This seems easy and perhaps 'boring' but the kiddos LOVED it.  The coffee filters absorb and bleed the colors around and into each other - something paper normally won't do.  It was fascinating.  The first class I introduced this to, I also planned to have them cut out their black paper - but only two kids got that far, so for rest of the classes we just enjoyed the painting.

Pumpkin patch and skeletons coming out of graves!

The second day I introduced what we were going to do with these filters.  (I purposefully did not tell them when they were painting, because I didn't want them to over plan).  I stressed to them that they did not have to do Fall or Halloween - but anything: a normal day, Christmas, Easter, a pretend place.  Our goal, rather, was to use shapes and size to help communicate to our audience what was happening not to do just Halloween.

Knee-high by the Fourth of July

Next, students used a tracer to trace and cut out a hole on their paper.  Next, students unfolded their dry coffee filters and picked which one to use for their project.  (I had students make two so that if they hated one they had another choice, and if they made a mistake on their coffee filter that we couldn't solve they had a back up).  They taped their coffee filters on the back of their paper, flipped it over and went to work drawing with a Sharpie in silhouette style. Some students really struggled with the idea of silhouette and others nailed it.  I think, in the future, I will try and introduce silhouette more purposefully and see if that helps.

The simple added detail of a house number.

The third week we busted out the oil pastels and grew our picture out into the black.  I encouraged students to take what they had already draw and continue that into the black space.  We did part of one on the board together - they brainstormed a bunch of ideas for me and then I did a 'think aloud' where I said everything I was thinking, including mistakes and changing my mind about things.  I reminded and encouraged students to use their knowledge about perspective - things far away appear smaller and things closer appear larger.  I also showed them how wonderfully oil pastels layer and blend.  I encouraged them to use more than one color for each part of their picture - if you have pumpkins, do more than just one color of orange.  I would show them and they would all 'ooooh'  'ahhh - that looks so real'.  I then, turned them loose.  Many remembered about perspective and applied it, some still are struggling with the idea that sidewalks should appear larger at one end.

Christmas!

On the fourth and final day students finished up and we did a whole class review/critique.  I post all finished work on the board.  I then set a timer for 10-15 minutes, depending on how much work is complete.  I explain to the class that if they need all class to finish they can use all class - however in 15 minutes I will clean up everyone who is done and we will do a class review.  They may join us as soon as they are complete.  So, after fifteen minutes I ask everyone who is done to clean up, anyone who is not done should ignore clean up and continue to work.  I pull everyone to the carpet and I lead them through a series of open ended questions.  Sometimes I ask them to point, sometimes to raise their hand, sometimes to pair share, sometimes share to the whole class.  My goal is to get them to look more critically at their own work and be inspired by each other.  Some questions I tend to ask:
"Find yours on the board.  When you have found it, please point at it so I know you found it."

And the field goal is good!

"Put your hands down and look at your own work.  Find something you feel you did a good job on.  When you have something, raise your hand. (wait for all hands).  Please share quietly with someone next to you".
"Look at the projects and find one, that isn't yours, that captures your attention.  For some reason out of all of them you keep coming back to this particular one.  Raise your hand when you have one. (wait for hands).  Now look at it more closely, maybe compare it to others around it - what about it captures your attention?  Notice I didn't ask which one you liked - I asked which one captured your attention and why.  When you share please use your artist words to describe what captured your attention for example: Ava's really captured my attention because the texture of her grass makes it look like its blowing in the wind.  NOT: I like Ava's because it is pretty.  Share with your neighbor about which one captures your attention and why."

Snow angles and the Aurora Borealis.

"Anyone want to share out to the class about which one captures their attention and why?" -- As kids do this I do not agree or disagree with their picks - simply  "okay" and call on another.  This review is not about what I think.
"Point at one that you feel used color really effectively -- find another"
"Point at one that you feel is very unique."
"Point at one that you feel has strong craftsmanship"
"Find yours again.  Look for something that you would change or add.  Maybe you were inspired by another student's idea or use of material.  Tell your neighbor.  Does anyone want to share out what they would change?"

Those shadows and highlights!

Rectangular Prisms (3-D Buildings) and Making Thinking Visible

Okay - so I have been thinking about updating this blog for weeks now - but I have been SO busy, that by the time I get home, I just don't have any energy to write a coherent blog message.  Which is kind of hilarious because it is currently 9:30 pm.  I was at school at 7:50 this morning and left tonight at 9:00...... one word:  conferences.

Anyhow, something amazing happened today in my room and I just need to share!

I have posted on here about my exploration into Making Thinking Visible - my struggles and ideas of how awesome it is.  Today I didn't do a thinking routine, but the thinking routines gave me the foundations for a discussion we had today in third grade.

Lets back up a minute:

Last week we reviewed 3-D shapes: sphere, pyramid, triangular prism, cone, cylinder, rectangular prism, and cube.  After we reviewed shapes I told them we were going to draw rectangular prisms - but from the corner and we were going to pretend that they were VERY tall so we couldn't see the top.  This means we would see the front corner, two flat sides, two far corners and the top edges but not the top itself.  (I got this idea for this project here).

I had the kids draw a bunch of arrows - varying in height and size.  Next we drew straight lines down from the tips of the arrows - if the line touched another arrow then it stopped.  Low and behold tall rectangular prisms.  We then decided to add windows and doors to our shapes to make them into buildings!

Back to the present:

So this week we are painting their buildings.  I first thought about making them use certain colors to help them with their color theory - but at the last minute I just let them paint.  We talked briefly about colors that work better together and having a high contrast between the buildings and the sky.  As students worked it seemed more that they just painted with colors they liked and didn't really plan ahead.

This was a little frustrating, but I also had told them to paint however they felt moved to paint, so I couldn't be too upset.  (The only rule I really put on them was that they needed to paint IN their picture and not over.)

So, TODAY is where it got really interesting!  Instead of telling the kids about contrast and how different colors work together - I wanted them to find it on their own.  This is where my new foundation in Making ThinkingVisible helped out!

I took three paintings from yesterday's class (a different class) and hung them on the board before my new group came in, making sure to cover the names. (I also waited till the class left to take them down).  I wanted to make sure students could participate without fear or worry about someone critiquing their work.

I started by asking the kids to pick their favorite one.  No voices, no comments - just look and decide which one they liked best.  Then I asked them 'What made you pick that one?".  This time when they had an answer I wanted them to raise their hand.  When most hands were in the air I asked them to share with an elbow partner.

Next I asked them "Which is your least favorite?" then "What makes you like it the least?"  - I had them share.

Then we went through each picture and students raised their hand if it was their favorite - I then called on a few kids to share why.  For the same picture I asked who liked that one the least.  I, again, asked for students to share what made them decide that.  It was great to hear that some students like number one because of all the colors, but others didn't like it because they found the colors to be too much.  We repeated this for the next two.

While we were doing this I learned A LOT!  Turns out third graders enjoy lots of color - almost the whole class picked the first one as their favorite.  Interesting enough students didn't like three as much because the sky was green and not 'real' (which is also why it was the favorite for some kids).  I then pointed out that number one doesn't have a real sky either.  Hmmmm.....

So as we were doing this I realize that the whole reason I was asking these questions was to see if they could notice which buildings were easier to see - but no one was headed that way.  Most of the kids liked the pictures based on colors or craftsmanship.  This in itself was interesting.  Sometimes I forget that kids are kids and have a different aesthetic on art than I do.  I look at the pictures and find the contrast to be more pleasing, even though I love lots of bright colors.  It was helpful for me to learn this information about my students to see that their color choices were indeed choices and not as haphazard as I originally thought.

I then asked them two more questions:

1) Which one has the best craftsmanship? What makes you say that?

2) Which one is it easiest to see the buildings on?  What makes you say that?

This got even MORE interesting.  Students were all over the place for craftsmanship.  Some decided having white spots made it have poor craftsmanship, while others based it on how much the paint bled into other colors.  Ahh the lens of a 3rd grader.

I was expecting students to pick their favorite cities for the one you could see the buildings best in - being that those they already had a bias to.  Interestingly enough almost every kid in the class picked number two as being able to see the buildings the easiest.

We then spent some time exploring why number two was easier to see -- they all had buildings, all windows, all had doors, and all had the same kind of sky.  Number two had less colors and was most like number three - but number three was still kind of hard to see the buildings.  Students started to talk about light colors and dark colors and how the orange was a lighter color and blue more medium or dark.... this is where I jumped in and we talked about having high CONTRAST.  Colors opposite on the color wheel have a higher contrast and stand out against each other.  Colors on the color wheel that are close to each other have a lower contrast, meaning the colors are more similar.  So the third picture has yellow buildings and a green sky -- yellow and green are close to each other and have a low contrast.  Blue and orange in number two have a high contrast because they are across from each other on the wheel.  The first one uses the same colors on the building as in the sky so it all blends together.

At this point we talked about actively choosing the colors they wanted for their desired outcome.  Did they want LOTS of colors all over, but see the buildings less?  Did they want to be able to see the buildings easier?  I even had a kid pipe up and say that you could use cold colors on the sky and hot on their buildings because they are different.  Totally!

The class today I think had a better idea of what contrast means and what it looks like - I have no idea what their papers will look like... they didn't have a tone of time to paint today.  It will be interesting to see if there are more high contrasted pictures or more color everywhere.