Fall Art Projects

Boots, leaves, colorful trees, and cool crisp air... fall is one of my favorite times of the year!  

With each season comes so many ideas of fun hands-on art projects!  In our school, first graders do not go to an "art special".  Therefore, we work hard to incorporate different activities using art supplies and learning some of the different art concepts.  We use fall-themed art projects to teach students about colors and painting.  

With each project we start out by doing a read-aloud.  We then do the art project, and if there is time, we like to have the students write about their project!  

The first one is a leaf project.  We start out by reading Red Leaf, Yellow Leaf.  

If you can't get your hands on this book, there is a read-aloud available on Youtube here.

Then we make leaves! First I print out different leaf templates from Google images and cut squares of red, yellow, and orange tissue paper.  

All the students need to do is rip the tissue paper apart, glue it on the back of the leaf template, turn it over and cut it out.  I made time-lapse a video to show my students how to do this.

The students can also do a writing piece to describe their leaf and the colors they used.  I like to hang the fall leaves on my window!

We also use fall art projects to introduce paint in the first grade classroom.  For this project, start out by reading any fall story!  Here are some suggestions:

Then the students get a paper with a leaf-less tree.  I also found this image on Google.

I only give the students red, yellow, orange, and brown paint.  I encourage them to add leaves (on the tree or on the ground), pumpkins, scarecrows, birds, a sky, and anything else they might see in the fall!  Then they just paint. :)  Here are some of the beautiful paintings from one of the first grade classes.

Students will then write about their picture and they will be hung in the hall. 

Another fun art project was inspired by a larger version I saw on a friend's front porch.  My friend took seven large pieces of wood and nailed them together with one slanted across the top.  The slanted wood and above became the hat of a scarecrow/snowman and the bottom became the face.  We decided to read a scarecrow story and create the scarecrow/snowman using popsicle sticks!

Below is the story we read.  I try to read a mix of fiction and nonfiction books during these units.  

We then spend one day creating our scarecrow.  I let the students paint while I used the hot glue to stick on the eyes and hair.  Because of the paint and hot glue, we let the scarecrow sit out to dry overnight.  The next day we paint the snowman on the back for winter!

The students really enjoy making these crafts and it is always fun to see how all the different scarecrows/snowmen turn out!  The greatest thing about all of these crafts is that they are all relatively low cost.  Most of the supplies used were things that I already had laying around somewhere in my classroom.  It is important to give students opportunities to be creative throughout the year.  Sometimes we get caught up in all of the assessments and it's hard to take the time to do fun art activities.  Another great thing about all of these projects is that it can be so easily connected to literature and writing.  

Whether you're a teacher, parent, grandparents, or someone else who works with children; I hope you enjoyed reading this!  Good luck with your fall art activities! :)

Columbus Day

Happy October!  Some of you may have already started planning for the entire month of October.  I bet some of you are planning fun fall and/or halloween themed activities; but don't forget about Columbus Day!  I like to use this holiday to teach my students about Christopher Columbus and to talk about exploration. This year I decided to create a Christopher Columbus mini-unit to teach some of the first grade common core concepts. 

The first part of this mini-unit is teaching the students some key vocabulary.  In my Christopher Columbus Activity Bundle, there are vocabulary cards (in color or black and white) for the students to examine and discuss some of the key terms used throughout the unit. 

Many of these terms are commonly used throughout other units.  It is nice to use this unit to introduce several of these key vocabulary terms for the rest of the year.   

When creating this bundle I thought about some of the important literacy skills that I need my students to work on.  Some of these skills include fluency and sight words.  These are both skills that help students become better readers.  A few things that I included the help students build their fluency skills are: a poem, a story, and fluency sentences.  Fluency sentences are one of my favorite things to use with students because you can easily differentiate by using either simple or complex sentences. You then break them down word by word.  Students read the sentence, a line at a time, and build up to the complete sentence. (pictured below)

Another fluency strategy we use is sentence sequencing.  It is incredibly powerful for students cut a sentence apart, glue it in order, write it, and read it.  Not only does this strategy help with fluency, but it also helps students better understand sentence structure.  This is something you can easily make using sentence strips and a pencil! 

You may have noticed the hat on my little explorer on the first image.  The template to create this hat is also included in the bundle.

Since it is still near the beginning of the year, I like to do ABC order whenever I can with my students.  This helps to reinforce the alphabet from kindergarten in a more complex and hands on way.  Some students are able to handle cut-and-paste activities or need extra practice with those fine motor skills.  If you need to save time or you don't want students cutting and pasting you can always have them simply write the words and cross them off in the word bank.   

Sight words are another big component of first grade.  There are so many wonderful free color-by-sight words pages that you can download from the internet.  I decided to create one to go along with the Christopher Columbus unit!

In my school district we are blessed to have several students from different countries around the world.  Throughout this unit we have several wonderful conversations about exploration and world travel.  It is a great opportunity for students to share information about their native country or countries they have visited.  During class discussions we often sit in a circle.  I like to introduce the topic or question, pair students up, and give them a chance to share with their partner.  After a few minutes of partner talk we come back as a group and pass around the class "microphone."  The only person who can talk is the speaker with the microphone.  I have found this to be incredibly effective and students have gained a better understanding of respect and how to be good listeners.  It is fun to hear the students' perspectives and where they've been or come from.  We take advantage of any opportunity to have meaningful class discussions.  

Some other fun activities we like to do:

1. map and globe observation and discussion
2. build "junk boats", race them, and discuss good vs. bad materials to use
3. country flags observation and discussion
4. students can create their own country flag and write about it
5. research project on different explorers (write a paper or a summary, dress as your explorer, and present to the class)
6. dress like an explorer day!

There are so many different approaches you can take to teach your students about exploration and Christopher Columbus.  If you choose to teach your class about the famous explorer you can download my bundle here. 

Otherwise, I hope you're able to use some of those free ideas and have a wonderful experience discussing exploration with your students!  

Happy October!