Pinterest Find: Fall Tree Paintings

Some may think it is a little early to be painting fall trees, but when I saw this art project on Pinterest, I just had to do it with my son and a couple of new friends.  It was a hit with all three of the kids who thought that it was pretty cool to paint with q-tips.  

La classe della maestra estre Valentina

The above pic is the pin that I used as a guide for this project.  Please be sure to visit the link above to view the process. 


Artwork by LM(2.5) and M(3)

I think we'll be painting with q-tips again... easy clean up for sure! Have you started any fall crafts with your kiddos?

Jen

Chameleon Themed Books and Activities

My children have always been fascinated with chameleons! When peanut was just 2, she would ask the librarian for the same Chameleon book weekly- Chameleon, Chameleon by Joy Cowley.  She adored the photos in this non-fiction book and would "read" along with her favorite parts.

Little man has been fascinated by the chameleon characters in his fiction books: The Mixed up Chameleon by Eric Carle, A Color of His Own by Leo Lionni, and Chameleon's Colors by Chisato Tashiro . 

Chameleon isn't happy with being a chameleon and wishes to be like other animals, even humans.  We enjoy seeing him get mixed up as he wishes to be a flamingo, a deer, and more.  At the end of the story it teaches a great lesson about being happy with just being you! 

Activities

1. Act out the story with...

The Mixed Up Chameleon Story Patterns from Kiz Club

2. Paint a chameleon
Art Project by in His grace

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"Parrots are green, elephants are gray, pigs are pink." But chameleons change color wherever they go. "On lemons they are yellow. In the heather they are purple." One chameleon is not pleased with his changeable appearance. He thinks, "If I remain on a leaf, I shall be green forever, and so I too will have a color of my own."

Read to find out what this chameleon discovers! Another sweet story about accepting who you are. Great for teaching colors and camouflage science concepts.

Activities

1. Explore camouflage with this cool activity!

Colorful chameleons activity by Helping Little Hands

2.  Play a game.

Camouflage Chameleon Game by Bright Hub Education

3.  Toddler Activity
After cutting out a variety of different colored chameleons, have your child match colorful pom poms to the different chameleons.  For fine motor fun, provide plastic chop sticks. (If creating the above game, the chameleons can be reused for this activity.)

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What a fun story written by the Japanese author, Chisato Tashero. We love the colorful illustrations of the different animals yearning to be different colors and patterns.  What happens when all of the animals turn different colors?  Read to find out how the problem in this story is solved! Great story to be combined with the above stories of self acceptance and differences. 

Activities

 

1.  Make a Chameleon Puppet

Toilet Paper Roll Craft from DTLK

-just add a popsicle stick to make it into a puppet

2.  Explore Culture
Teach your child about Japan. Read a book or explore online.  Next, share on a  map Japan's location in relation to our country.  Share simple phrases in Japanese.

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More chameleon themed printables/activities-

ABC matching chameleon cards from The Virtual Vine

Chameleon Party Blowers from Disney Family

Books we'd like to explore...

So much fun.. looking forward to doing lots of chameleon activities with my kiddos... hope you'll join in on the fun!  Leave a link in the comments if you have a post or a fun idea!!

Enjoy your day!
Jen



5 Fun Pattern Activities

Patterns can be found everywhere in our world including music, math, and art!  There are so many fun ways to share patterns with kids.  We discovered this wonderful book- Pattern Fish by Trudy Harris.  It was enjoyed by both my toddler and 2nd grader.  Fun and interactive! Bubble-bubble-pop...

1. Create colorful pattern fish using stickers, markers, or crayons.  Great creative thinking activity.

fish printable

2.  Using colored fish manipulatives or goldfish crackers, have your child create patterns.  AB pattern- yellow, red, yellow, red... or ABBA green, yellow, yellow, green. Our crafts N things used dappers to create fish patterns- awesome idea!

3. At education.com, I found the article Preschool Math: Exploring Patterns.  Many wonderful ideas!  One of my favorite is Movement Patterns- jump, skip, jump, skip..... What  a fun way to get moving and teach patterns at the same time!

4. Make a colored pasta or cereal(fruit loops) pattern necklace.

5.  This pattern snake activity caught my eye on Pinterest! (mess for less)

Happy Patterning with your little one!

Jen

Ff is for fish, fingers, and feet!

Squishy paint between your toes!  Sound like fun? Maybe not to you, but to my little one- he just loved it! We have been focusing on the letter Ff this week.  Yesterday, we made a fish and did a letter Ff activity.

  Today we painted with our feet and fingers!  Little man decided to get his face involved as well.  It does start with the letter Ff, so how could I say No! 

and of course after painting with your feet, you just have to read....

Enjoy your day,

Jen

The Nightengale by Amy Short

Isn't this illustration just beautiful?  It was created by a friend of mine who also is a talented artist.  I just love it!  Although it could be for any time of year, it reminded me of Christmas, so I wanted to share. To find our more information about Amy's work or to make a purchase, be sure to stop by her site.

http://www.amyshortart.com/

Christmas Blessings,
Jen

Cave Paintings

For a recent art lesson, Sunshine learned about primitive art.  I don't think she realized that art started so long ago! One of the caves that she toured online was the Lascaux from France. The above photo is from this cave.  If you are interested in learning more, tour the cave below!

Tour a cave in France!

Next, Sunshine collected items in nature to create her own art.  Using flowers, dirt, leaves, and rocks, she experimented with these earthly items to make art.  The dandelions and the dirt worked the best out of all of the items she collected.  She mixed the dirt with water to make paint. 

I think a variety of berries would have worked out well for prettier colors- blues and pinks. This concept can also be combined with using natural elements to die eggs.  We did this at Easter one year, but I think for an experiment, it could be done anytime of year!

Enjoy,

Jen

Nature Around the Neighborhood

For Peanut's Science assignment yesterday, she had to take a nature hike around the neighborhood. With bag in hand and her siblings, she trekked around looking for rocks, bark, grass, leaves, flowers, nuts, etc. 
 

Oh no, little brother found a stick!

 Here are some suggestion for taking your own Science Hike....
-encourage your child to talk about what they see and hear in their surroundings
-give time for observations and questions
-set everything on a table and discuss discoveries
-set out art tools and let your child make a collage or add drawings to a nature journal

Enjoy your weekend!

Jen

For the LOVE of Art

We've had an ARTFUL week in our household!  I love observing and listening to the kids while they create.  Why would I say listening?  Well, they hum as they work.  It is nothing less then blissful for them.  Here are a couple of examples of recent art work that they've created!  Enjoy the mini-art show......

Eric Carle inspired

Moving art

All Over Motif- focusing on color and shape

Butterfly Sculpture

Enjoy your day and have fun being CREATIVE!

Jen

ps.  To see how we create art like Eric Carle- visit this past post! :)

The Art Zone

Here's a fun website that we found today-The Art Zone.  The girls experimented with the Brushter and enjoyed being creative with "paint." Online paint that is!  If you'd like to paint with the kids, but want to take a break from the traditional messy painting- that we love by the way, you'll have to check out Brushster. It has a lot of cool options for creating.  We still need to explore other applications on The Art Zone such as....

Faces and Places- a 2 part exploration of American folk art

Photo Op- an introduction to digital photography and image editing

Collage Machine

and more!!

Can't wait to learn more about art with the kids.  If you've been on this site or if you get a chance to check it out,(being you have sooo much time on your hands while you are parenting- lol) let me know what you think!  I'd love to hear about your experience with this website from the National Gallery of Art.

Jen

Fun Flea Market Finds

Flea markets are so much fun. I love looking at antiques and other people's treasures and who doesn't love finding a good deal. Today, I only spent $3 and I came home with a great wicker laundry basket, a copy of The Cabin Faced West, two books about our state, and a really cool book that I wanted to be sure to share with you. It's titled Spot the Differences: Art Masterpiece Mysteries.


What's so cool about this book is not only does it show 25 famous paintings, but it is also a fun puzzle book. On one page you will find the original painting, but on the next page there are 6 to 14 changes in the painting to discover. The book also includes facts about each painting and the artist. Oh, it was so worth 50 cents!!

What fun finds have you found recently?  I'd love to hear about them!

Take Care,
Jen

Featuring Imagination Soup!

Okay, it took me about 5 minutes to fall in love with the blog- Imagination Soup!

Imagination Soup is written by Melissa Taylor: writer, teacher, and parent.

She hopes that her website will give you plenty of ideas to keep your kids learning everyday.

Her latest blog post shares ideas for planning family artist dates. She writes that a family artist date is "a playful time for creating, imagining, dreaming."

Well, my family is in! Who doesn't love to do all of these things? To learn more about artist dates, be sure to visit Imagination Soup. If you choose to join in on the fun, let me know. We will be sharing our own ideas on Creative and Curious Kids for our own artist dates this summer!

Take Care!

Jen

How to do art- Eric Carle Style!

Of course, we can't do art as good as Eric Carle in our household, but you can't blame us for trying can ya? I've always adored his illustrations.






Some of my favorite books include The Very Hungry Caterpillar, The Very Quiet Cricket, and the The Very Busy Spider. Using the method of collage, Eric Carle creates the most colorful illustrations. He does this by first painting papers. We really enjoyed the process of painting our own papers.

(I can't take the credit for this idea- it was actually a project assigned by Abby's art teacher, but I loved the idea and wanted to share!)

First, you create papers using a variety of media, such as watercolors, fingerpaints, crayons, or markers.








As the papers are drying, the next step is to plan the illustration. (sketching a rough draft)



The final step is to cut out shapes, experiment with them, and then glue them on construction paper to complete the illustration.

Sunshine did a wonderful job creating her cat illustration. (above photo)

Visit the photo and video gallery at
http://www.eric-carle.com to view Eric Carle creating his papers and illustrations. Great way to show our children real art in action!

Have a wonderful and creative day!

Jen

Travel With Us to Africa!

Last week, we were in Australia studying Aboriginal art and Australian music. This week, we "flew" over the Indian Ocean and landed on the continent of Africa. So far, we learned about different types of African masks.




Sunshine designed her own animal mask based on the African Elephant.




She is also studying the Meerkat and started recording facts about this African creature. Aren't they cute?
She had fun learning about the Meerkat over at Animal Planet.
I made a little booklet for her to help her focus her research. So far she has found out about the meerkat's diet, anatomy, and predators. We also enjoyed reading a folk tale from Africa. Next week, we will be exploring African music.
We are so lucky that she has an awesome art and music program through her Cyberschool. Her meerkat project is enrichment that I had planned for her to correlate with her other studies. She explored a variety of African animals and chose her animal based on her own interests.

If you ever need suggestions on planning your own mini-research project with your kids, let me know! Also, there are so many ways to demonstrate learning through a variety of products. For example, poster, puppet show, mural, etc.

Have a great day!!

Jen