More X-Ray Handprints!

I just got back from the California AEYC Conference where I delivered workshops on “Art, Literacy & Brain Development.” The handouts from those workshops are posted here (you'll see them on the right sidebar) for you to view or print out. To prepare for the workshops I taught several literacy based art lessons to a variety of children in classrooms that varied from ages 3-5. It was fun leading children through messy art ideas that had a literacy connection, and once again I included the X-Ray Handprint in some of the lessons. These photographs were taken from a Kindergarten class, and the video clip shows a wonderful close-up of a child doing the final phase of scraper art, which reveals her handprints. Take a look!

So many of the conference attendees were excited to learn about X-Ray Handprints, so I decided to post these new photos here. See my previous post from Tuesday, Dec 14, 2010 for more X-Ray Art ideas, or find the complete lesson plan on page 44 in Smart Art 2 (MOREART).

It’s been a busy conference season so I’m a bit late on my monthly post. Thanks for waiting! If you sign up to be an Art and Creativity Blog subscriber, each new post will conveniently come to you as an email. That makes it super easy to get a stream of new art ideas for your classroom. Please subscribe today, you’d be doing me a favor by showing your support. Thank you!

X-Ray Hand Prints!

Watch how your hand prints seem to magically jump off the page, when you make x-ray hand prints using BioColor® "Scraper Art." X-Ray Scraper Art is an amazing process, take a moment to watch the video clip recorded live at the Discount School Supply NAEYC Math & Science Workshop.



I've also added a new "NAECY Handout" column at right which includes X-Ray Art as part of the NAEYC Math & Science Handout. Please consider printing out and sharing this handout at the next staff meeting! Teachers are always asking for new ideas that teach math and science through hands-on, sensory play. The handouts provided here are written with your "right-brain" in mind, they are easy to digest and rely heavily on diagrams and pictures. You'll find the same applies to Smart Art Ideas Activity Book and Smart Art 2: More Smart Ideas Activity Book.

These photos show 3-year olds making x-ray hand prints as part of teaching nutrition & building strong bodies. This activity provides a great opportunity to talk with children about the importance of milk, yogurt and other calcium rich foods in building good bone health. With that in mind, I added my favorite new science product, the charming little skeleton man (18" Skeleton Model), which allowed me to reference an anatomically correct skeleton model as we began the activity by discussing our bones and hands. This incredibly inexpensive skeleton model is a must-have for science centers.

I hope these photos inspire you to try x-ray hand prints with even the youngest of children. By giving the children a chance to create a colorful paint border around their hand prints, we ended up with delightful paintings that combine art and science in the best of ways.

Materials you'll need:
BioColor® Paint, 16 oz., Black
BioColor® Paint, 16 oz., White
BioColor® Paint Scraper
Nancy™ Paint Bottles Classic Tips, 2 oz. - Set of 12





Enhance this Lesson with:
18" Skeleton Model
More Smart Art Ideas Activity Book
Human X-Rays - Set of 18
Body Banner
Foam Skeleton Floor Puzzle - 15 Pieces

CD Photo Frames

Recycle old CD’s and turn them into colorful picture frames, using BioColor® and your favorite photos. Since BioColor® sticks to plastic and other slick surfaces, it’s easy! Simply collect used CD’s and choose photographs with images that are small enough to cut out, glue down, and still leave enough room to add BioColor® paint. This recycled art project is easy, inexpensive, and unique!

This first example shows a wedding photo created with a BioColor® design that lets the shiny CD peek through. After gluing down the picture, I used gold BioColor® to create a circular border, then I applied black and yellow BioColor® around the photo into a star shaped design. It hangs in a prominent spot on my wall at home, and is often a conversation piece. People love it when they realize the picture is simply glued onto a CD then painted. No other tempera paint will stick to plastic, so this recycled art project makes good use of BioColor®’s unique property of sticking to slick surfaces.

These next two photo frames are simpler examples of the same process and could easily be created by younger children. Apply BioColor® using pre-filled plastic Nancy™ Bottles. When making a photo frame, it’s important to have something to hang the frame from. The easiest way to create a hanger is with a loop of yarn. Slip a 12” strand of yarn through the center of the CD hole, and tie it at the top. Now glue on your photo using tacky glue, and begin applying BioColor® any way you like. It’s easy to make dots of various colors, and a little more challenging to create lines, like the blue and white heart shapes shown here. Start with dots if you want to start easy. Drag a toothpick through the dots to create little swirly designs if you like.

Apply BioColor® in dots and lines directly from Nancy™ Bottles, or use a paintbrush, or combine both. In this close-up you’ll see that dots were applied from Nancy™ Bottles first, then a paintbrush was used to spread around the paint and change the surface texture. You want a fairly thick layer of BioColor®, so make sure to lay it on a flat surface to dry overnight.

Another fun idea for Recycled CD’s is to make Dream Catchers using BioColor®, feathers, and collage materials. Traditional Dream Catchers hang over beds and “catch bad dreams” before they bother your sleep. Authentic Native American Dream Catchers can be very intricate and beautiful. These playful imitations, or what I like to call “Urban Dream Catchers,” are a fun way to imitate the real deal.

Lastly, here’s a picture of my workspace before I began making some of these samples. This recycled art idea has easy set up, and uses very affordable supplies, probably no more than 10 cents per project. And if you’re like me, you have dozens of old CD’s stacked around, just waiting to come to life as something shiny, fun and artful.

Materials You’ll Need:

CD Photo Frames:

BioColor® – BIO16 – Set of all 11 Original Colors
Gold BioColor® – BIOGO – BioColor® Gold
Nancy Bottles – NANTWS – Nancy™ Bottles, set of 12

Tacky Glue Pens – TACKYPEN – Tacky Glue Pens, set of 24

Used CD’s
Yarn – 5LBR - Remnant Yarn, 5 lbs

Urban Dream Catchers:

Fluorescent BioColor® - FBIO – set of all 9 colors

Nancy™ Bottles – NANTWS – Nancy™ Bottles, set of 12

Tacky Glue Pens – TACKYPEN – Tacky Glue Pens, set of 24

Neon Colored Feathers – NEON- 750 feathers
Iridescent Fabric Shapes SHINYFAB – 500 pieces
Yarn – 5LBR - Remnant Yarn, 5 lbs

For more ideas on how to use BioColor® on slick surfaces check out this video!

IncredibleFoam® Dough: Delightful, No Mess Art

IncredibleFoam® Dough is a light modeling compound (think substitute for clay) that’s wonderful to touch, squish, and sculpt into 3-Dimensional Art. It comes in dozens of colors and it’s an inspiration for creative young minds, like 4 year old Jordan pictured here. Does he look proud of himself or what? Jordan came up with this idea on his own, by pressing several colors of Foam Dough onto an 11" x 17” piece of construction paper, then later gluing down the pieces with white glue so they’d stick.


Foam Dough also makes a great Small Group Activity, as illustrated by this collaborative artwork. A small cluster of school age students created a picture by working together and pressing Foam Dough onto the tabletop where they were seated. Each child was given a different color of Foam Dough to start, and they were asked to work cooperatively to decide on a theme and create one unified picture. I loved the result, as well as the teamwork it inspired.

Other 3-D figures and sculptures can be created in simple or more complex fashion, depending on a child’s age and interests. We’ve created them here on paper plates so they’re easier to carry around, and they can later be glued down onto the paper if desired.

Whether you apply Foam Dough to paper, or shape it into a freestanding 3-D sculpture, it looks great and is always easy and fun to work with. And did I mention it doesn’t make a mess? Foam Dough is clean, soft, and mess-free, yet it’s also completely open ended so it brings out children’s natural creativity. Plus, it never dries out, even if you forget to bag up the leftovers. Experiment with it yourself, and you’ll find that IncredibleFoam® Dough holds lots of discoveries. It even floats! Imagine making little boats for your sand and water table, or combine it with collage elements like the Shining Star Rhinestones, Sparkle Stem Pipecleaners, and Colorations® Washable School Glue pictured below.

The IncredibleFoam® Dough Classroom Pack is my favorite, since the color cubes are a delight to look at and easy to distribute. But, you can also purchase IncredibleFoam® Dough in a larger Set of 7 Basic Colors or a smaller Sampler Pack. However you try it, you’re guaranteed a lot of active learning and pure sensory delight!

Multicultural Crafts from Russia

I just returned from a family vacation in Russia and picked up some wonderful arts & crafts. Don't you love these fabric art pictures and this sweet 14-year-old Russian girl who made them? I met her in a small village outside Moscow and her two fabric pictures were so charming, I had to buy them both. After all, how often do you run across a 14-year-old entrepreneur whose work is this original?

They are made from such simple materials: fabric scraps, markers, and glue – amazing! I just love it when I find a new form of art, especially when it’s been created by a young person. And that's the beauty of foreign travels, they take you on adventures where you meet amazing people and discover creative new things about other cultures.

And how about this little wooden Russian Nesting Doll, which I decorated myself with watercolors and colored pencils at a cultural center for tourists. I had fun and felt right at home participating in local arts & crafts activities. They sell pre-painted nesting dolls all over Russia, but I never had to buy a set because I had the pleasure of painting my own. What an unforgettable souvenir!

If you are fortunate enough to take a vacation this summer, don’t forget to bring home local handicrafts to share with your classroom. Multicultural Crafts are one of the best ways children can share in and appreciate the everyday lives of other people from around the globe.

You’ll find plenty of multi-cultural arts & crafts projects in Discount School Supply’s section on multicultural crafts.

Or, try out my Smart Art Lesson “Native American Spirit Sticks” – attached here.

Have a great summer!

The Source of My Strength

The following is adapted from a workshop that I did for Discount School Supply customer, A Window Between Worlds (AWBW). AWBW is a training & resource agency for battered women's shelters. AWBW serves women and children at shelters and this workshop helped their training for Program Coordinators from shelters throughout Southern California. For more information about AWBW and using art as a tool for heailng, check out http://www.awbw.org/.

Objective: This month's workshop is designed to engage teens in a creative exercise to identify the things about them that are strong. They will create symbols that help represent the source of their own personal strength, so that they will be able to more quickly and readily understand their strengths and access them when needed.

Materials:

Colorations® Smooth & Silky Art Sticks
BioColor Paint (4 colors plus silver and gold = 6 total colors)
Nancy Paint Bottles Twist Tops (optional)
Balloons - one per person
Small paper plates - one per person
White Cardboard Pencil Box - one per person
White heavy weight construction paper (for warm-up and handmade stencils)
Paper towels for cleanup
Colorations® Glitter Paint (optional)
Paint Brushes – one small & one large
Colorations® Glue
Cups with water

Prep: Pre-fill Nancy Bottles with BioColor, filling 4 bottles with standard BioColor and one each of gold and silver, for a total of 6 Nancy Bottles full of BioColor per small group of participants. Fill one Nancy Bottle with paint for every 4 people. Try out each warm-up application before the workshop. Make yourself a sample of the Source of Our Strength Box to familiarize yourself with each stage, and so you will be confident leading the session. Create your sample box from your own voice as a healer, someone who provides healing, compassion and positive solutions for children.

Setup:

1.) In the middle of the table place 4 standard and 2 metallic BioColors in Nancy Bottles, 1 Nancy Bottle of glitter paint, 1 set of Silky Sticks. Place an extra small stack of white construction paper for warm ups.
2.) In front of each seat, place 2 sheets construction paper, 1 balloon and one paper plate.

Demonstration:

Note: During the demo/warm-up, it is useful to first do a demonstration of each step and then give participants a turn.

Art Material Demo and Warm-up #1: Balloon Printing with BioColor

Step 1: Using 4 standard colors of BioColor, plus silver and gold, place quarter-sized dots of paint in center of plate.

Step 2: Blow up balloons, not too big, so they fit into your fist or grasp (2"- 3").

Step 3: Firmly press balloon straight down into paint palette, then "print" paint onto paper. Bounce/print balloon all over.

Step 4: Create stencil patterns. Using thick, white construction paper, tear stencils by folding the paper in half and tear out images as if you were making a snowflake. Position stencil and balloon print on top. Remove stencil to see pattern surface. Repeat. Overlap stencils and repeat with a variety of colors to create a pleasing design.

Art Material Warm Up #2: Intro to Silky Sticks

Step 1: Dry Application: Take a few different Silky Stick colors and make a simple doodle
to experience the materials, pressing hard to lay down bright pigments. Don't think about it too much, take this time to "loosen up" and leave your critical voice behind.


Step 2: Wet Application: Dip Silky Sticks into water before making another doodle. Experience the difference in wet and dry applications.

Step 3: Wet Application with Paintbrushes: Take your larger paintbrush and dip it into water. Apply your wet brush to your original dry doodle, creating a "flow-release" effect as it releases the colored pigment into a dilution of color, like a watercolor. Next take your smaller "detail" brush and dip it into water, making more detailed flow effects. You can also use your wet brush, or finger, directly on your Silky Stick as if it were a dry watercolor cake, and use your finger or brush directly onto your paper. Set aside all the warm up creations to make room for the activity.

Introduction & Relaxation:

Ask the participants to try to relax, put down their art materials, and if they wish, close their eyes for a few minutes while you guide them through a brief period of self-reflection.

Continue with this dialogue (or change the concept to your own voice):

Today's workshop is meant to to focus on our strengths, so that we can increase our sense of safety and well-being. We will remind ourselves today that we are each strong enough not only to survive, but to overcome and rise above what has happened to us in the past. Today is about living in the present moment of strength, community, healing and support. Our artwork will help us focus on what it is that makes us strong and keeps us strong. With that in mind, try to relax and reflect upon where it is that you find your own personal strength. In times of need, do you call upon your faith to give you strength? Or do you think of your mother, your brothers or sisters, your friends, or something else to makes you feel strong? When you ask for help, who listens? What is the source of your strength? (Give people a short quiet time to reflect on this question). Now, open your eyes and take your Silky Sticks and a fresh piece of paper, and DRAW A SYMBOL that represents the SOURCE OF MY STRENGTH. Your symbol can be made up of one image, or a combination of images. Just do what comes naturally. There is no right or wrong way to create a visual symbol. The easiest way is to simply get started and see what happens!

Creation:

Part 1: Inside of Box

Take your SOURCE OF MY STRENGTH drawing and re-create it on the inside of your pencil box, using the Silky Sticks. Consider your original warm-up sketch as a starting point, and re-create the image in a more finished form on the inside of your box, adding details and embellishing it however feels right. Don't over think it, just let it flow without being critical of how it looks or what it means. As you create your visual symbol of strength on the inside of your box, imagine you are creating this image from your source. Whatever comes of this experience will be the "right" image of strength for you today.

Part 2: Outside of Box

Now comes the time to decorate the outside of your box more playfully, by balloon printing the outside with BioColor and your own handmade paper stencils. Add glitter paint if you want to add sparkle. Create a design of your choice, so that when you place it on a shelf or dresser table where you live, you will be reminded of a pleasant time spent with creativity and community. No one but you will know that inside this box lay very important symbols, symbols that represent the source of your strength and the inner resources you call upon.

Closing:

Have participants share their boxes with a partner, or with the group. If they share with a partner reinforce the importance of being a good listener (i.e. paying attention and not interrupting). Encourage the participants to look inside their "Strong Box" whenever they need to be reminded of their personal strength.

Tips:

When selecting boxes to decorate, be sure to purchase ones that have an unfinished surface, like the ones from Discount School Supply. A slick, or glossy surface will not allow the paint to stick.