Sidewalk Water Painting

Just came back from a visit with the grandchildren and discovered a wonderful warm weather activity.  Imagine painting with no mess.  The only ingredients needed are a container of water, a brush, an outside surface and imagination.

Soft brushes or foam brushes are easily damaged when used on the hard concrete or asphalt surfaces.   Try sturdy brushes such as inexpensive house painting brushes found at the dollar store.  Older children have fun watching their painting evaporate.  

A Year of Logan's Art

Logan went to three year old nursery school this year and loved the art he did with his teachers and friends.   He asked Grandmaman to take pictures of his art and make a slideshow.   Here is   "A Year of Logan's Art".   Logan loves being an artist.

Polar Bears/ Les ours polaires

Polar Bear
Watercolour
May 2012
Reegan and Grandmaman

Reegan and Grandmaman painted a polar bear walking on a bright polar icescape.   Reegan is three.  We learned that polar bear's fur has yellow in it. 

We learned how to paint the paper first with water from left to right, just like when we read and write. 

  We learned how to make marks with wax and when we painted the paint didn't stay where the wax was. 

We learned that hair dryers are noisy but can help make the paint dry faster.

Polar Bear and Northern Lights
Watercolour
May 2012
Ethan

Ethan painted Northern Lights in the background of his Arctic icescape.  He added claws and facial features with a sharpie and painted shadows under the polar bear's paws to ground him.

Windmills

Ethan, Tristan and Reegan had fun painting windmills and tulips.  I think one day they would like to go to Holland and see the windmills there.   Click on the words below to see-

How to Draw a Windmill

Windy Mills
Watercolour
May 2012
Ethan

Red Windmills
Watercolour
May 2012
Reegan and Grandmaman

Windy Valley
Watercolour
May 2012
Tristan

There are windmill farms in Southern Alberta.  They take the energy from the wind and turn it into energy we can use.

Tristan had fun making a model windmill at the Telus Spark Science Center.

Peggy's Cove

How did Peggy's Cove get it's name?

Was it named after Margaret's Bay, due to it's location at the entrance of the bay and then shortened to 

Peggy's Cove. 

 Or was it named after a young woman named Margaret who was the sole survivor of a  schooner wrecked on Halibut Rock one dark October night?

To read more about the legend of Peggy click Peggy.

The first lighthouse at Peggy's Cove, a wooden house with a beacon on the roof, was built in 1868 to mark the eastern entrance to St. Margarets Bay.  The current octagonal lighthouse was built in 1914.  It stands almost 15 metres high.  The lighthouse was automated in 1958. 

To see the lighthouses created by Mrs. Moore's grade five class click on the play button below.  The sentences that are written below each lighthouse were chosen from the stories each student wrote.

The following three stories were written by grade five students in Mrs. Moore's classroom. The authors retell all, or part of, the story of Peggy of the Cove in their own words.

Owen and Mzee

The friendship between Owen,
  a young hippopotamus,
 and Mzee (mm-ZAY), 
a giant tortoise, 
began after the tsunami that ocurred in the Indian Ocean on December 26, 2004.

Today, Owen and Mzee live together 
at Haller Park, 
an animal sanctuary outside 
of Mombasa, Kenya, Africa.

Click "Play" below, to see the story of Owen and Mzee as illustrated by the kindergarten and grade two students at Ecole Oriole Park School.

 Click Mzée and Owen to go to a website to find out more about Owen and Mzee


Here are some poems written and illustrated by grade two students at Oriole Park School.


.

Owen et Mzee

L'amitié 

d'Owen, un jeune hippopotame, et 

Mzee (m-zé), une tortue géante, 

a commencé après 

le tsunami qui s'est produit

dans l'océan Indien

le 26 décembre, 2004.

Owen et Mzee habitent ensemble 

au parc Haller, une réserve naturelle

située près de la ville de

 Mombasa, Kenya en Afrique.

 Cliquez "Play" pour un projet d'écriture de la classe de Mme Ferguson.

Cliquez "Play" pour un projet d'écriture de la classe de Mme  Sorsdahl.

Cliquez Mzée et Owen pour trouver une site web d'Owen et Mzée.

Tangrams

Tangram  

What do you already know?

How many pieces are in a tangram?

Can you name the shapes?

Watercolour and Tangram Animal Art

Start with a background.  Here's an idea. Tape out a border (small or large) and paint a scene of ground and sky.

Here's a different border idea.
Tape where the white is to get an interesting border and have fun with the colours.

Collage a lion on using  seven small tangram pieces.

Collage a turtle on using seven large tangram pieces.

Make this project your own.  Change the way you make the border.  Use small or big tangram pieces.  Make up your own animals.  Create more than one animal.
Change the background.
Now write a story about your tangram animal.


Read these stories before or after you create your work of art.
Grandfather Tang's Story (A Tale Told With Tangrams) by Ann Tompert
The Artist Who Painted A Blue Horse by Eric Carle

Blue, Red, Yellow, Green, Purple, Orange

I'm feeling......

quiet

daring

sunny

bright

regal

outgoing

nice

mean

blue

hot

cool

funny

mad

Which word is a color and a feeling?  

Kandinsky was an artist who was born in Russia in 1866.  His family liked music.  He liked to paint shapes and colours.  He believed that colours could express feelings just like music.  In the book "One" by Kathryn Otoshi the colours have feelings.  Let's try to  paint colours and shapes with feelings like Kandinsky.

Squares with Concentric Circles
painted by Vassily Kandinsky in 1913

How many squares are on Kandinsky's painting?  

Where are the smallest circles?  

Where are the largest circles?  

Which circles are thick?  

Which circles are thin?  

Name the colours that you see?  

How do you think Kandinsky felt when he painted his art?

How many squares are on your paper?

Choose an oil pastel and make a small circle in the first square?  What does that colour say to you?  

Choose a second colour.  Draw a second circle around the first circle.  Make it thick or thin.  It will be bigger than the first circle. Leave some space between it and the first circle.  What does the second colour say to you?  

Choose a third colour.  Draw a third circle around the second circle.  It will be even bigger.  You can make it thick or thin.  Don't forget to leave a little space between the circles.  What does this colour say to you? 

If you have room you may make another circle.  Wow, you just made concentric circles.  They all have the same middle.

Now, make concentric circles in the second square.  Use different colours, make them thick or thin and small to big.  Leave a little space between the circles.

As you fill each square with concentric circles think about making them all a little different.  Use different colours, make them thick or thin, make them small and big.

When all your squares have concentric circles paint over the squares with watercolour paint using a different colour for each square.  

We Day

Reegan et Sadie aiment danser.

To learn the We Day Dance

 with Reegan and Sadie click 

 We Day Dance.

Cinq petits-enfants de Madame

Je vois deux petites filles et trois petits garçons.

  Les deux filles portent des robes. 

 Une petite fille porte des bottes rouges. 

 Une petite fille porte un chapeau bleu.  

Les trois garçons portent des chapeaux. 

Un garçon porte un chapeau blanc et un tee-shirt gris.  

Deux garçons portent des tee-shirts rouges et des chapeaux bleus mais un de ses garçons est plus grand que l'autre.

Qui est premier, deuxième, troisième, quatrième et cinquième?

Merci mille fois

Un grand merci to a wonderful class and their parents for making my final year of teaching wonderful.  What an extraordinary group of amazing children!  As I reflect back on the year I have countless special memories of children who taught me through what I taught them.  As I move into retirement I will take those precious and happy memories with me.  Through teaching these children I gained as much as I gave.  

Thank you and enjoy your summer,

Madame Carole