Steps of the Mosaic

Making a mosaic has many many steps. If you look at my previous post, you will see that we worked with clay to make mosaic fish and sea creatures, but that is only the beginning. To make the mosaic, first the 3rd and 4th graders glued down their ceramic piece. Then the other grades helped by placing down tiles around the fish. We put brown and black tiles on the ocean floor and blue and green tiles in the sea.
None of the tiles in the picture below are glued down yet. We were still moving things around to decide how we wanted it.
Now we started gluing! Wear gloves while working with liquid nails. I had liquid nails stuck on my hands for a few days.
Kiara was smart and wore gloves.
After everything was glued (which took A LONG time) we put grout in between all the tiles. The mosaic is FOUR PANELS large!! I hope it will be installed this summer.
Ms. Elleby painted the fish on the panel you see below.
I painted the two fish on the second panel.

REAL CLAY!!

Since, we do not have a kiln (oven that cooks the clay) at our school, we have not had the pleasure of working with real ceramic clay until this spring. ArtReach, a program with Lill Street, came to show us how to make art with clay. They fired the clay in their kiln at their very large studio on the north-side Ravenswood neighborhood.

3rd and 4th graders were rewarded with this lesson because of their excellent behavior. First they designed their fish/sea creature on paper. Next they learned how to work with the clay, and finally they made their clay sea creature!
Eryn plays with the clay
Kori's jellyfish
Ryshaun's Octopus
Jamari's crab
Bria's starfish
Sereniti's fish
Emonie's fish

Egg Carton Flowers

2nd grade and Art Club made this interesting flowers using egg cartons, pipe cleaners and tissue paper. Although some students did an awesome job, many of them did not look very "flower-like" A lesson to improve on! The flowers needed more support. Next time I will probably paper mache over the egg carton.

Pastel Sand Dollars

The 4th and 5th graders practiced using pastels while making their Sand Dollar Designs. Some students had never heard of Sand Dollars, so first we "Google Imaged" Sand Dollars. I told them about how they are in the same family with star fish. Can you see why that might be so?

I still need to take more pictures of their Pastel Sand Dollars because they all did an awesome job.
Artwork by Tyeyana

Silly Hats

Kindergarten was learning about all the different ways to manipulate paper while working on their "silly hat." They made spirals, used crazy scissors, hole punchers, crimped, you name it. Next they glued their paper on the hat. I told them to twist and turn the strips of paper like a roller coaster. Some students even glued on the play money they earned for prize day.
Hat by Neima

Side Projects

Iyana made this paper mache flying pig using balloon, tissue paper, and a pink pipe cleaner tail. It all got started when I had the brilliant idea to make paper mache cupcake piggy banks. The students went to see "Pinkilicious" the play, so I thought they'd like that. We used paper mache for the shape of cupcake and spackle for icing. It was not such a brilliant idea. A lot of work, a big mess, and they did not turn out well. Most of them are still unfinished. Whoops! I was better off making Flying Pigs like Iyana!!

The 3rd floor girls LOVE using craft string. Here are a few pens that the girls designed.

Luau

To celebrate Dr. Heath's retirement, Fernwood had a big Luau in June. It featured music, BBQ, Clowns who made balloons, a tattoo station, four or five blow-up games, and a trampoline. We did many Luau-related art projects included the Tiki Heads below. I also posted some pictures taken at the Photo Prop Station. They are too funny not to share.
Tiki Head by Armohni

 Tiki Head by Daion

Busy Busy Bees!!

I have not posted any artwork in a while. This is what I have been busy doing.
ART CLUB!! Thanks to my art club helpers who came Mon-Thurs (sometimes even Fridays, they couldn't get enough art club ;-)) to help out with the art room and work on their art projects.
Art Star Celebrities taking pictures on the Red Carpet at Fernwood's HipHop Award Ceremony. I blurred faces because some students have not turned in photo permission forms.
Mosaic Part One: Gluing all the pieces down, and getting hands dirty with Liquid Nails. For future reference, wear gloves while using liquid nails. But if you are like me and get liquid nails stuck on your hands, use nail polish remover to get it off. I discovered that after a couple days of dirty looking hands.

Mosaic Part Two: Grouting! Very fun to feel the mushhhhy grout. But if you are concerned about your carpet, you might want to lay down a blanket! Whoops.