Winter Birds

Here is an adorable winter collage activity my Grade Ones did with the help of our Big Buddy class.  You can find all the instructions, including printable templates, at

 I HEART CRAFTY THINGS.

I HEART CRAFTY THINGS provides two versions for templates to create the birds.  One has the birds in one piece (other than the beak) and the other has them in multiple pieces.  We used the multiple pieces version here.  Putting all the bird pieces together would have been way too difficult for my little ones with the help of their Big Buddies.  If you try this with a younger class I would highly recommend using the simpler template.

Birds of a Feather

I had some fun with my kids this week of their summer break doing a bit of painting.

I had them paint random "dots" all over their page in either warm or cool colors.

 When dry, they traced around their shapes and added some simple features using a sharpie.

They also used an orange pencil crayon to color in the beaks.

My daughter added a few little feathers on the top of each bird's head.

Simple and sweet!

Baby Birds Display

I finally got my baby bird art up on my classroom bulletin board.  Here they are:

Baby Birds for Spring

My Grade Ones made these adorable baby birds this week!  Unfortunately my camera has stopped working and I brought our "new" camera in to school.  I had so much trouble with it over-exposing the photos.  As cute as these pictures are, some of the photos do not do them justice.  The colours are way more vibrant and beautiful in person. 

We did a directed draw on black construction paper using various lids to make our circle shapes.  The heads were styrofoam bowls, the eyes were baby food jar lids and the body was the bottom of a large yogurt container.  We then free-handed the wings, top feathers and feet.

The students then used oil pastels to colour them in.  I gave them creative rights as to how they wanted to colour them.  The only rules were the eyes needed to be the same colour (because you know there are always those kids...), the wings needed to be coloured the same and the beaks needed to be yellow or orange.

After they were fully coloured they used black pastels to outline everything - this is the hardest part, and add eye lashes.  The final touch was adding a white dot of pastel in each eye to create the reflective light and add to the cuteness!!

     



My Sample



Pinch Pot Fun

I love summer!  With my time off from the classroom I'm free to try different projects that have been on my mind that I may not have had time to do otherwise.  I had some clay left over from when I did the clay plates with my son's class and decided to do some experimenting with pinch pots.  My daughter wanted to join in the fun so we created these pinch pot owls.

We used air dry clay.  First we created a simple pinch pot.  Then we added the wings which were actually made from a large heart cookie cutter that we then cut into half to create 2 equal wings.  Then we made 2 circles for the eyes and attached them.  Lastly we attached a beak shape.

We then used a bent paper clip to make impressions for the feathers.  A marker cap was used to help create the eyes and any other impressions were make by a wooden skewer.

  

This white owl in my 7 year old daugher's owl.  As I didn't have much in the way of acrylic paints at home she had to resort to painting it all white.  She didn't mind.  She said it was a snowy owl.

I think I'll buy some citronella tea lights and use them as candle holders during the summer months on our patio!

Here are some other pinch pot creations.

Easter Egg Carton Chicks

Here is a simple and fun Easter craft that I got from FamilyFun.go.com. 

Here is the link with instructions:

http://familyfun.go.com/easter/easter-crafts/all-easter-crafts/fancy-feathered-friends-675266/

The kids were thrilled with the results and couldn't wait to take them home.  They looked even cuter when we added their painted easter eggs!