Starry Starry Night

I came across this on pinterest and I fell in love (SHOCKING, because I fall in love with a lot of things on this site).

(To access the original link of this picture, just click)

My idea is to make a bulletin board dedicated to the ArTiSt in every student.  I made this printable for my board.

This also reminded me of some of my art lessons that I have taught in the past.  One of my favorite things to do is to introduce a different "Featured Artist" each month.  I review their artistic style, examples of their work, and then we create our own version.

One of the best lessons is Vincent Van Gogh, he is a great artist to use to teach texture and line.  I found this really good you tube video tribute to Vincent and it shows a lot of his famous work.

I then simplify the lesson by having the students practice making small lines with pastel crayons.  Once they master this technique I have the students try blending colors (I did this step in Grade 5, not with the lower kiddos).

When they are ready I have the kiddos create their own starry night (I left the image of Vincents on the Smart Board for a reminder).

Lastly, I had the students create a night time scene by using black paper. 

Here are some of my Grade 2's artistic creations.

I am so impressed with the amount of patience many of my kiddos used.  I have taught this lesson to a Grade 1-2-3 combined class as well as a Grade 5 class and something clicked when I taught it to these Grade 2's! They took this assignment so seriously.  I even joked that I should only hear their pastels tapping the papers (not thinking these chatty cathies could ever do that) but they did! So much commitment to their art.

I was AM a very proud teacher.