5th Grade Moai Clay Sculptures

 Moai Sculptures of Easter Island by my talented 5th Graders!  These are just so impressive.  We actually began by designing totem poles with our clay, but they were just too tall and didn't look right...they actually looked like the long eared sculptures which made me change the entire swing of my lesson.  So we made our virtual trip to Easter Island.  One of their favorites was the national geographic you tube video that described several theories for how the people moved the sculptures.  The link is:  http://youtu.be/J5YR0uqPAI8
We also had to watch the mini clip from The Night in the Museum.  It just turned into a fun project that the students are really excited about.  They are now currently working on "Did you know?" posters to display with our sculptures.

Trucks and the ABC Rhyme

I just love my job teaching RAW ART!  Here is a fabulously written and cleverly illustrated book that we used for our art project.  The students created their collages inspired by the illustrations of Megan Halsey.  We used maps as she did in the book for part of our collage.  We learned how to draw trucks.  I took photos of them to place themselves as the driver.  Then I taught them my rhyme where they had to complete it with the first letter of their name.  The power point link I made gives all the details.

Julie's Trucks Power Point

Thanks to Deep Space Sparkle's interview with Megan Halsey and ideas she had there.

The ABC rhyme you begin using letters that start w/ "A" to fill in the blank and continue on through the alphabet.

My name is ___________.

I am very __________.

I'm going to _____________ with at truck load of ____________.

My name is Gaven.
I am very Great.
I'm going to Gulf Shores with a truck load of Grapes.

Egyptian Wonders

It was time for some NON-FICTION!!  We took a look a Egypt.  I found this cool book in our library.  We did several sketches of their selected piece then I gave them sheets of thick aluminum and they used the opposite end of their paint brush to create their piece then we used oil pastels to color.  I think they turned out great!

Lady Liberty

This is a great story with wonderful illustrations about the Statue of Liberty.  I read this with my 4th-6th graders then they used sharpies to draw lady liberty and we painted them with a very watered down water color and cut them out to glue onto their NYC reflection piece.  Some of the students did a night sky with glitter fireworks which looked very neat.

Sock Monkey's Travel the USA

Sock Monkey's Travel the USA

I loved the adorable sock monkey's that I have seen so many art teachers do with their students and I wanted to try something similar with a writing piece and story.  I found the book Monkey and Me by Emily Gravett that is a great for younger students with its repeated patterning and predictions of what animals will they meet next.  It also has adorable illustrations.

So I read the book along with my kindergarten - 2nd graders and then we created our monkeys.  The next piece was the writing piece.  We talked about what if we took our monkey's on a trip with us around the USA.  We looked at a map of the states and they gave a million different stories about places they had traveled.  Then they created a "postcard" to attach with their artwork from a state they had previously visited.  They turned out really colorful and we have had many compliments!

Guatemala Worry Dolls

We took a virtual trip to Guatemala and explored their country and customs.  One of our favorites were their Worry Dolls.  I pulled out these wooden doll pieces and every bit of scraps and whatever I could find and they hot glued away!  They were some of our favorite pieces!