Koi Watercolors and Stars and Stripes

Wrapping up the school year!  I spent today directing students as we did a thorough cleaning of dried up paint and all the nooks and crannies of the art room.  Feels great to have that done!  Now, here are two of the projects we wrapped up with.

Overlapping Koi Watercolor

Snatched up this idea from Elementary Art Fun.  Fourth and fifth grade students first spent some time looking through books on koi fish, making sketches, and taking a few notes in their journals.  Then they sketched out the fish on watercolor paper, and painted them.  We decided cutting the fish out would make the picture more interesting, so students watercolored a background, then cut and glued the koi to the background paper.  This was one of my favorite projects with this group of students.

American Flag Balloons

This next project did not at all go as planned.  Kindergarteners and first graders following the Core Knowledge Sequence are to be able to recognize the American flag.  To give them more exposure to the symbol in a unique way, I had them papier mache balloons, and then we painted them like flags.  Unfortunately something went wrong with some of the mache and it started dissolving when the paint touched it.  So some worked and some didn't.  But then I whipped out the playdough and everyone went home happy.  Disaster averted!

To finish out the year, I brought in Ava's playdough set so students had something to work on while others finished up projects.  I did playdough K-8 on our last day, and each grade loved it!  I'm thinking about ordering some for the school to have on hand regularly for early finishers.  Here are two little creations I loved.