Georgia O'Keefe Art Lesson Plan

 5th Grade Georgia O'Keefe Art

This is a go-to lesson for me and here's why:  This lesson works for any grade... really!  I've done this with Kinders up to 8th graders, and have found they all can be successful at it.  They turn out really nice and are great for brightening hallways, the kids learn about an artist and get an introduction to observational drawing. Read on if you want to see how I do it!

You will need:

- Assorted fake flowers - buy these once and you can use them for years!  Michaels always has sales on their flowers, too. 

- Oil Pastels or crayons

- Watercolor paints

- White paper.... big or regular sized... how much time do you have??

Lesson Plan:

1.) Introduce Georgia O'Keefe. Wikipedia some stuff about her life, and/or find a youtube video about her. There's tons of stuff out there. 

2.) Show pictures of Georgia O'Keefe's flower paintings. Ask the kids what they observe about them, and what they think she's doing differently from other artists. If you can get it out of them, you're looking for them to say she's painting them really big! Explain that part of what made her art famous, was that she painted flowers in EXTREME CLOSE-UP instead of the typical view of flowers in a vase on a table or something. 

3.) Talk about the difference between a CLOSED COMPOSITION and an OPEN COMPOSITION. (Closed means nothing's going off the page and everything's contained in the picture boundaries, Open composition is the opposite). Explain that they will be doing an Open Composition today.  Show them your example, and tell them there's one rule when they're drawing their flowers: Their flower must be SO BIG that it touches at least 3 SIDES OF THEIR PAPERS. This is a hard one for some kids to get.... a lot of kids tend to want to draw everything tiny. This is a good stretch for some, and gets them out of their comfort zones. 

4.) Hand out art supplies and work!  Give each kid one of the fake flowers to draw.  If you're working with older kids, remind them to look for color variations and tiny details and shapes they might see in their flowers - work on those observation skills!! Draw first in oil pastel, cover with watercolors. You might emphasize the use of a contrasting color in the background to really "pop" their flowers.

5.) Let dry, then hang up somewhere boring that needs some LIFE and COLOR!

3rd Grade Georgia O'Keefe Art

3rd Grade Georgia O'Keefe Art

5th Grade Georgia O'Keefe Art

3rd Grade Georgia O'Keefe Art

5th Grade Georgia O'Keefe Art

5th Grade Georgia O'Keefe Art

Two lessons in Perspective

Today, I learned of the massacre of the children at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, CT.  I don't know what to write after that sentence.  The faces of the 2nd and 1st graders I teach keep coming to mind.  Their tiny voices, shiny hair, uninhibited grins.  Big people are supposed to protect the little people in this world.  It hurts my heart to think about it too hard.

It's a lesson in perspective whenever something this tragic happens.  I have my family, my friends, my work, my mental and physical health, my... everything.  It makes every current worry seem so much less important.

I'm not going to go on about gun control or health insurance for the mentally ill, not here in this blog-space.  This space is about bringing positivity into the world and into children's lives through art.  Read on if you'd like to learn about a lesson in a different kind of perspective. 

BAOBABS PERSPECTIVE LESSON

(Best for grades 3-8)

This lesson was a part of the Madagascar Mural Collaboration residency that I did with 4th graders last week (the previous blog post has all that info).  This was the second big art project that we worked on in the classroom, while small groups were painting the mural.

Supplies:

-Watercolor sets and brushes

-Black and white tempera paint

-Background paper (we used watercolor paper taped to brown construction paper)

Day 1:

1.) Introduce students to Baobabs through pictures and/or youtube video. I like this one.

2.) Have kids describe in words what the shape of a baobab tree is like. How are they different from other trees? (wide, curved trunks, branches only at the very top and spreading outwards, etc.)

3.) Have kids paint sunsets with watercolors covering their whole papers. Let dry.

Day 2:

1.) Explain perspective to the kids. Things that are closer to you will look bigger and darker. Things that are further away will look lighter and smaller.  Explain that today, they will be painting the baobab trees that are furthest away in their pictures.

2.) Mix up some grey tempera paint. Have kids outline their baobabs in pencil first.

3.) Have kids paint in their baobab trees and some of the ground with the grey paint.

Day 3:

1.) Have kids paint the closer baobabs in black tempera. Explain perspective again, emphasizing that they should paint these trees a little bigger than the last ones.  Make sure they know it's ok if their trees overlap each other some. 

2.) Now put them up and talk about how awesome they are! 

Winter Wonderland Window! (say that 10 times fast)

I just spent three days with a few artistic youngsters at Oaklea Middle School in Junction City, making this window painting!  Oaklea's after school coordinator asked me to come out and help the kids get their courtyard windows all dressed up for the season.  I worked at Oaklea last spring, making a big jungle-y mural near their gym.  For this project, the program coordinator chose 5 students who were the most dedicated and serious about the work we did last year.  These select few kiddos and I made this window mural!

Man, is window painting a different animal than regular mural-ing! The paint looks so different when it's got light shining through the back of it! Every brush stroke really shows up. The whole thing changed so much too as the sun went down since we were working from 3pm to 5pm!

The main concept I introduced to the kids for this project, was simple perspective.  As objects get further away from you, they get smaller and lighter in color.  Without further prompting from me, the kids remembered this concept as they painted their trees and mountains.  Proud art teacher!

Overall a good, new experience for me and the kids.  Hope to go back to re-haul these windows again for the spring! I'm seeing fields of spring flowers..... :)

Peter Max Artist Lesson for Grades 3 - 6

This is a lesson about the artist, Peter Max. I like this lesson for 3rd graders up to 6th graders. This is harder for the littler kids to really get into, but older kids LOVE doing this one. Here is my lesson plan:

• First, talk to the kids about: Who is Peter Max?  He was an artist whose work got popular in the 1960‘s.  Ask them, "what comes to mind when you think about the 60's?" You may get "peace signs!", "Hippies!", etc. Then you can talk about his imagery that he used that spoke to this time period.
•  Talk about how Peter Max did things like album covers, posters for concerts and events, and other illustrations. Ask the kids, "What is the difference between an illustrator and other kinds of artists?" Explain: Illustrators create art from other people’s ideas, fine artists create art from their own. Illustrators get paid by other people  to make their ideas come alive, visually.  Children’s books, magazines, product packaging, etc., all use illustrators to tell a story. 
• Show examples of Peter Max's work in a computer slideshow. Ask kids to hold their comments until the end of the presentation, but to be thinking about what do all of these pictures have in common? What do you notice that keeps showing up in a lot of these pictures? How do we know it’s the same artist? At the end, take comments from kids and talk about Peter Max's style and how it is unique.  Hopefully the kids notice these things: He made lots of heavy outlines in black. Stars. sun rays. doves. people. neon. BRIGHT and FLAT colors. 
• Mention: He was interested in astronomy (study of the cosmos) and so thats why he had lots of stars and planets in his art. 

Explain the procedure for the project: First, do pencil drawings. They must include a sun and/or stars in a composition that is mostly sky. Then, outline everything in black sharpie. Color everything in with markers and highlighters.

These are what some of my kids have come up with. They turned out amazing, I think!!! I LOVE doing this project. The kids get SO into this. I think Peter Max's style lends itself perfectly to kids projects. 

I hope some of you out there can use this lesson plan and enjoy!

Stars and sun rays,

Corie