grades 1 to 3 | Mama Cormier

….what are grade 1s, 2s, and 3s capable of?

Back in April my friend, colleague and our school’s music teacher asked me if my students could paint large copies of some famous Canadian paintings that could be used to decorate the back of the stage for our outdoor concert in June. At first I was a little hesitant and reminded her that my students were only 6 to 8 years old. I thought about it for awhile, found a book in the library of Canadian art and then asked my students which paintings they would like to copy. I tried to steer them towards art that had large shapes and simple lines.

My grade two class loved Lawren Harris’ iceberg art and insisted that they could do it. The first grade one class chose Emily Carr’s totem pole and the other grade one class were highly influenced by me and chose the Jack Bush abstract art. My older students, the grade 3s were asked to choose something from the North and they agreed to paint a Ted Harrison piece.

Normally I would encourage students to paint in an artist’s style but for this project we wanted the paintings to be recognizable. I cut out large pieces of heavy paper and taped them to the wall outside each classroom. I made a few marks on the mural paper as a guideline for the students so that they could draw the foreground, middle ground and background. With the Jack Bush painting I divided the paper into sections and the students took turns drawing the lines as I held the ruler. They then labelled each section with the colour and the student who would be filling it in.

The grade 3s impressed me the most with the Ted Harrison painting that they chose. I gave them the least amount of assistance and they drew all the detail, including the whale without any help from me. It was also the first painting to be finished so I used some of the students from this class to assist the younger students with their paintings.

All four paintings were finished with no time to spare. We reinforced the back with duct tape and then taped them to the stage wall. They were perfect and fit the entire back wall. It was encouraging to hear parents actually naming the pieces or the the painters as they walked down the hall while the students were painting. They even recognized the Jack Bush piece because they had just come back from a field trip where his paintings were being featured. No, the names were not above the paintings during the painting process!

Here they are. You can getter a better idea of the size from the last photo where they are on display at the back of the stage.

….a great lesson for symmetry and using oil pastels

My grade 1, 2 and 3 classes were given a quick introduction to Georgia O’Keefe’s flower paintings. I had some beautiful calendar pages that featured some of her florals. I pointed out how she blended colours and how the whole page was filled with her flower image. Most of the classes had studied symmetry in their math classes so I showed them an example of symmetry in nature and one that was man-made.

For this lesson I wanted them to try and create a flower that had at least two lines of symmetry. I showed them how to divide their paper into equal quarters and then I started the flower from the middle. I demonstrated how to blend colours and over lay colours using oil pastels.

Most of the students got the concept and many loved adding more and more colour. When a student didn’t like their colour choices I showed them how to add white or peach to lighten or soften their picture. They were so open to trying this technique and most came back with a completely different picture and much happier with their project.

The first slideshow is work from my two grade one classes and the second one features larger samples from my grade two class.

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