Cement Making

For the cement making, I used a plastic tray that held the wet cement into play. After the cement was poured into the tray, I had to shake the tray a little bit to bring the bubbles to the top and had to lay paper towels over the top to get some of the water off of the surface. Once enough water was off the top, I placed the picture into the cement. It is important to get all of the stones and the picture pressed into the cement so that it stays in. To ensure the picture stayed in the cement, I placed seashells on the corners. Then I just placed different types of stones in the cement deep enough to make sure they stay in, along with creating a heart design with the pink stones. The cement took two to three days to dry. Once it was dry, I slid it out of the tray. Finally I took a damp paper towel and wiped over the picture and the stones to clean the cement off that had went on top when placing everything into the cement. This made it look clean and shiny.

A cross curricular project for cement making would be for literature. Students could tell a story with objects placed into the cement. They could do one story within one stone or the students could tell one story using multiple stones.

Lacy Clay Ornaments

This project is Lacy Clay Ornaments. I started by drawing a design that was connected within. I started with a circle and then made a heart with circles on the inside. I connected the heart to the large circle with lines. Once the drawing was complete, I traced it with black permanent marker. I taped wax paper over the tracing so that I could squeeze the clay onto the was paper for easy peeling when taking it off. Once the paper was taped on, I mix water with some clay in a small bag. After the clay was mixed well, I cut off one corner so there was a tiny hole to squeeze the clay out. I traced my drawing twice with the clay to make thicker lines. Next, I used water colors to paint the ornament while it was still wet so that the paint colored the clay, along with blending it together. Finally I let it dry, then peeled it off of the wax paper and tied a ribbon by the top of the heart.

A cross curricular project would be to make fossils in social studies. Students can fill in holes in rocks with clay, and peel it out when dry to have a whole figure. This would help them understand how fossils are made.

Rainbow Fish Collage

The fish was designed by drawing a fish from an outline of a fish. I drew the fish upside down as instructed. Then the fish was cut out and had to be covered with different colors of paper, but the paper had to be torn instead of cut and the whole fish had to be covered. I chose red, purple, and blue because they look good together, along with the primary colors red and blue make purple. I glued the paper onto the fish, staying in the lines, then added some glitter ans sequins to bring some shiny details to the fish.
This project could be used for a reading/literacy class because the students would have to use their imagination for how they want the fish to look. It would be easier to use for lower elementary because their imagination is better, along with the students liking to tear instead of cutting.

Oil Pastels

The oil pastel art piece was completed by looking at an object, sketching it, then coloring it by blending oil pastels. I used monochromatic blue coloring for the jug. The more of the oil pastel that was on the paper, the easier it blended.
Oil pastels can be used for a social studies lesson where the students are learning about Native Americans. The students would be building tepees, and they could use the oil pastels to mix the different colors of the tepees.

Print It!

This project is print making mixed with the Easter holiday. I used a cleaned, foam meat tray and carving sticks to make an imprint on the foam so that it was textured. The texture had to be pretty deep into the tray without putting holes into it. Once the design was traced, I used ink and a roller to transfer the ink from the tray onto my carved tray. The ink had to be even. Then I used paper and smoothed it out over the foam piece. Slowly, I peeled the paper off of the tray. I did this with four colors. Once they dried, I glued them onto construction paper.
Print making can be used for social studies lesson where the students are learning about fossils. The students would be able to make their own form of a flat fossil.

Scratch Art

The scratch art project was created using a pointed wooden stick and black paper that is colored underneath. This way when the black is scratched off, the color came through. I had a shape and had to imagine an image and create a scene using the given shape. My picture is ghosts in a forest. The ghosts are made out of the shape. The ghost on the right did not turn out the greatest because I was not informed prior to the project that once the paper gets oily from being touched, it does not scratch off.
A cross curriculum project could be to use geometry when learning the shapes. The students would have to create a scene like I did, but have to include all of the shapes they have been learning. The students would like it because the black paper can come with a mixture of colors instead of one solid color. For the students to make the colors appear would be a joy to them.

Pebble Painting

This is the completed bulletin board from the project a classmate and I co-taught. The project is for second graders. The students had to dip different sizes of rocks into paint and shake them inside of a box. There was a piece of paper in the box so that the rocks created a design. The students also had to cut their paintings into shapes, so math was reviewed. With this project, the primary colors were learned, along with how to make secondary colors by mixing the primary colors. Another cross curriculum project for pebble painting is a science lesson that explains how and why rocks are different sizes. The students would learn about erosion.