Mason Academy – Fall 2018
Art Adventures Projects
[Best_Wordpress_Gallery id=”3″ gal_title=”art-adventures”]Theme: Imagination and Discovery
Goal: Incorporate media exploration and education, and conclude each project with a game and/or fun learning activity. These games will bring each project full circle, provide camaraderie and a sense of community within the class. Students will be able to improve upon their communication and teamwork skills in fun and interactive ways.
Overview: There will be a total of 6 projects, possibly 7. Each project will embody the theme of Imagination and Discovery, which will hopefully resonate with the students’ interests. The projects will begin with planning inside their journals and advance to a larger surface. All of the projects, including the individual projects, will include collaboration within the process.
Each project will begin with a form of media exploration in order for the students to become more comfortable with the medium.
1.) Let’s Explore Patterns
Imagination Theme: Under the Sea
Medium: Crayons
Objective: Learning about patterns in a fun way. Students will complete a part of a larger drawing with patterns and see how the drawing unfolds when the class assembles the drawing together like a puzzle.
Individual and Collaborative work
Planning process: Students will complete 2 different sets of patterns in their journal, which will prepare them for the final project.
Final Project: The class will split into 2 groups, 2 groups for 2 drawings. During class each student will receive 1 piece of the drawing. On the square they will make an assortment of patterns, similar to the planning process. When the project is completed students will assemble the drawing amongst their group like a puzzle.
2.) Let’s Connect With The World
Imagination Theme: Creative freedom to either incorporate fantasy and imagination or make a connection to their life.
Medium: Tempera Paint
Objective:
Complete a portrait of themselves and a friend. The friend can be real or imaginary. The chosen friend could be a human, an animal or a mystical creature, the possibilities are endless. This project will allow students the freedom to either make a connection to their life and a beloved friend, or imagine a world where their friend is a mystical creature or anything they want it to be.
The portrait will be completed in layers. The under layer will only incorporate 2 complimentary colors, by doing this students will learn a basic sense of color theory. Students will choose 1 color and use its complementary color. Then they will complete the additional layers with primary colors.
The project will conclude with a color game. A scavenger hunt for the colors they used in their paintings.
Independent learning with play and collaboration.
Planning process: Students will complete at least 1 portrait in their journal and chose their complementary colors that they will use for their project.
Final Project: The class will complete their portrait on 8×10 paper and will play a game based on their chosen colors.
3.) Let’s Make Up A Character – Part 1
Imagination Theme: This large project will comprise 3 different projects that will explore different elements of storytelling. This project is inspired by fantasy and imagination. Students are encouraged to create a character of their wildest imagination.
Media: Bookmaking (Accordion Book), Printmaking, Mixed Media on Cardboard
Objective: Use their imagination to create their own mystical creature/character, while exploring different forms of media.
Independent artmaking that will conclude with fun activity that the students will love.
1st Media Used: Bookmaking. Students will fold a long piece of paper and produce an accordion book. Within the book: they will tell a story, provide some background information on their character or just produce visualizations of their character.
Planning process: Students will draw/sketch their character within their journal and conceptualize a rough idea of their story.
Final Project: Students will complete their accordion books and those that finish sooner will share their stories amongst a small circle.
4.) Let’s Make Up A Character – Part 2
Media: Printmaking
Objective: Create a symbol that is a visual representation of their character. This will establish the character’s identity. What makes this character them?
2nd Media: Printmaking on 5.5×8.5 paper.
Planning process: Students will draw/sketch out a couple of ideas in their journal in preparation for the real thing.
Final Project: They will draw out their symbols on printmaking sheets and will start the process of printmaking.
5.) Let’s Make Up A Character – Part 3
Media: Mixed media on Cardboard
Objective: Students will create masks that will bring their imagined characters to life. The project will conclude with a freeze dance session wearing their masks.
Final Project: Students will create their cardboard masks, which will give a final visualization and 3D perspective to their character. The freeze dance will allow the students to be free, have fun and be proud of their finished masks.
[Best_Wordpress_Gallery id=”5″ gal_title=”mystical-creature”]
6.) Let’s Create A Life-Size Mystical Creature
Imagination Theme: Mystical Creature – Large 3D Mystical Creature
100% Collaborative
Medium: Mixed Media
Objective: The final project that concludes the imagination and discovery theme.
Planning process: Students will vote on which mystical creature will be decorated.
Final Project: Freedom to decorate it with their preferred medium.
7.) Free Drawing
Medium: Mixed Media
Objective: Free draw and experiment with new media.
Planning process: There is no planning process.
Final Project: Students will draw with a graphite pencil on a black paper anything they’d like, then trace the drawn lines with Elmer’s glue. Once the glue has dried, students will experiment with soft pastels. The pastels will overlap the dried glue and create a colorful and textured drawing.
Media Exploration
- Crayons and Markers
- Color Pencils
- Soft Pastels
- Tempera paint
- Bookmaking
- Collage
- 3D art utilizing cardboard – mask and large sculpture
Creative Discoveries – Summer 2018
Students were between the ages of 6-9, which is a significant age variation. However, many of the projects were collaborative and reinforced skills such as teamwork and open communication. They were encouraged to express themselves through artmaking and exploration. Toward the end, the class came together to create the final installations.
The theme of the class: Summer Dreamland.
I was an assistant to the the Creative Discoveries class. The class comprised of media exploration revolved around the theme of creating a Summer Dreamland.
We worked with various forms of media from embroidery, 3D paper sculpture, drawing, painting and printmaking. Each project within the curriculum focused on their Summer Dreamland.
Students named their Summer Dreamland: Candy World.
Media Exploration
They embroidered their journal cover with a symbol and representation of summer – within their journal they illustrated plans for various projects and documented their time in the class.
In addition, Students used tempera paint for portraits of themselves and a neighbor – they created flags through a series of printmaking – and made paper zines with stories of Candy World
After a series of planning, students collaboratively started to create paper installments of Candy World.
The students did a wonderful job creating Candy World and expressing themselves through various art forms. As an instructor I learned a lot about how to structure a class and motivate students. I’m looking forward to the next discovery.