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The Snowy Day Art Project

January 17, 2013 By Patty Palmer 5 Comments

A Snowy Day Art Lesson

A Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats is a perennial favorite in art rooms. The text is simple yet it easily brings round memories of my childhood days in Atlantic Canada; cold, raw and filled with possibilities. My Southern California students have very little, if not any, experiences with snow. A few have gone on ski trips but I suspect that might be the extent of it. Still, with the help of this book, I show them that it is not always possible to wear shorts year round.

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Filed Under: Art and Literature, Third Grade, Winter Art

Penguin Art Project

January 14, 2013 By Patty Palmer 16 Comments

Penguin-Art-Project

If you are looking for an expressive, easy and impressive penguin art project, look no further! These adorable penguins are quite easy to complete in two, 40-minute sessions and use simple art supplies. I’ve seen so many adorable penguin art projects, but my favorite are these. Thank you Mountain Color!

To read the tutorial for this lesson, click here.

Filed Under: First Grade, Painted Paper, Winter Art

Winter Art Projects Lesson Plans

January 10, 2013 By Patty Palmer 2 Comments

Winter-Art-Lessons

Fill the cold winter months ahead with a bevy of beautiful Winter Art Projects! This 22-page booklet offers three cute, painterly and technique driven lessons to date. Inspired by a very large moose, a tranquil winter scene and the Great White North, these three lesson are adaptable for grades 1st-6th.

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Filed Under: Fifth Grade, First Grade, Fourth Grade, Second Grade, Sixth Grade, Winter Art

A bright spot in a crazy day…

January 9, 2013 By Patty Palmer 19 Comments

craft-tape

Today was hectic, chaotic and a wee bit stressful. Details, you ask? Let me just say that clean-up went awry and somehow my students thought that pouring the trays of liquid watercolor paints down the drain was helpful. Hmmm. You all would’ve been proud that I managed to hold back on cursing a blue streak.

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Filed Under: February Holidays

Multi-Media Snowman

January 7, 2013 By Patty Palmer 2 Comments

Collage-snowman-art-project

If I had to choose my favorite snowman art lesson, it would be this one. The combination of skills: tracing, cutting, shading, drawing, pasting, composition, and painting checks off all of the standards but it was self-expression that really dialed this lesson up. I love seeing children engaged in art projects. You know the look; head down, tongue sticking out the side of the mouth, paint-covered hands. When this happens, you know the project hit a good note. It helps to begin this lesson with steps and process, but allow the children to finish the embellishments without interference. This is what my first graders did…

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Filed Under: First Grade, Winter Art

Fun with Art Movements

January 4, 2013 By Patty Palmer 6 Comments

Fun-with-Art-Movementswith border

Fun with Art Movements introduces Impressionism, Expressionism and Cubism to young children with three easy, colorful art lessons. Inspired by Van Gogh, Monet and Picasso (you can’t get any better with these three!) this 23-page booklet shows how to introduce these art movements in a fun, exciting way through coloring pages/drawing guides, full-color tutorials and special techniques.

Click here to continue reading.

Filed Under: Famous Artists, First Grade, Fourth Grade, Kindergarten, Second Grade, SHOP FOR LESSON PLANS, Third Grade

Arlo Needs Glasses Art Lesson

January 3, 2013 By Patty Palmer 18 Comments

Arlo-Needs-Glasses

Arlo Needs Glasses by Barney Saltzberg is about as cute as you can get when it comes to interactive picture books. My group of Kinders LOVED this book. We read the book before we created our own Arlo dogs. Because the book is interactive, it is difficult to expect the children to stay seated. They [...]

Filed Under: Animals, Art and Literature, Book Reviews, Chalk Pastels, First Grade, Kindergarten

Video:Double Loading Painting Technique

January 2, 2013 By Patty Palmer 13 Comments

double-loading

Double loading is a painting technique I use in all my art classes. It’s super easy, eliminates some common painting problems like using too much water , plus it’s truly beautiful. After many requests asking me to explain how I teach this cool technique, I have finally done it! Here is a short video (1:45 [...]

Filed Under: ART LESSONS by Technique, Art Videos

Deep Space Sparkle Reflections

January 1, 2013 By Patty Palmer 15 Comments

dreams-and-goals

I love welcoming another new year. It gives me a chance to reflect back on all the good things in my life. It’s been such a wonderful year, full of new experiences, new friends and a few changes. Winter A casual conversation with a neighbor last year inspired me to start walking along the beaches [...]

Filed Under: Blogging

Five things to do to make your art blog sparkle

December 28, 2012 By Patty Palmer 16 Comments

How-to-make-your-blog-sparkle

It’s that time of year when resolutions are made and goals are set. You may be thinking of starting an art blog or perhaps expanding on the one you already have. Perhaps you are wondering about monetizing or changing formats or even kickin’ it up a notch. Maybe you are wondering if the effort is [...]

Filed Under: Blogging

Collection of Winter Art Projects

December 16, 2012 By Patty Palmer 14 Comments

Winter-Art-Projects-

I so enjoy the mornings when I get to peruse my favorite art ed blogs and search for lesson inspiration. I found a bunch of fantastic winter-themed art lesssons that I have saved via my Pinterest boards or on Evernote. Here is a collection of winter art lessons from some wonderful art ed bloggers… 1. [...]

Filed Under: Winter Art

Archiving Childhood Artwork

December 14, 2012 By Patty Palmer 10 Comments

childhood-artwork

Any artwork that I did in elementary school art class is long gone. I remember a few projects very well, mostly the 3-D cities and marshmallow covered grapefruits that resembled igloos rather accurately, but there is no tangible evidence that either ever existed. Drawings that I did on my own at my kitchen table, however, [...]

Filed Under: Living the Artful Life

Watercolor Art Projects for Grades 4-6

December 9, 2012 By Patty Palmer Leave a Comment

Watercolor-art-projects

The best watercolor projects start out as great drawings. Learn my simple techniques for creating wonderful pen drawings and the best approach to enhancing each project with pan and liquid watercolors. Designed to enhance upper grade units of study, the booklet can also be purchased with access to three video lesson tutorials! This 21-page booklet [...]

Filed Under: ART LESSONS by Technique, Fifth Grade, Fourth Grade, SHOP FOR LESSON PLANS, Sixth Grade, Watercolor Projects

Holiday Collage Project

December 6, 2012 By Patty Palmer 2 Comments

Holiday-art-collage

Sometimes children need a lesson free of instruction, standards and expectations. My third graders finished the final steps of their watercolor projects and instead of doing free-choice art time, I set out collage supplies. My directions were simple: create a holiday scene of your choice. I suggested houses, trees, snowmen…anything quick and easy. On the [...]

Filed Under: Seasonal, Third Grade, Winter Art

Cute Christmas Art Projects

December 3, 2012 By Patty Palmer 13 Comments

Christmas-Art-Projects

I’ve been admiring the supreme cuteness of all of the Christmas art projects on my favorite blogs. I don’t do any holiday based art lessons at my school. No one has said that I couldn’t, it’s just a choice that I made a long time ago to focus on non-religious art lessons. And besides, Christmas tree [...]

Filed Under: Seasonal, Winter Art

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