5th Grade Abstract Sculptures with Haiku

To start this lesson, 5th grade students had a discussion how certain colors, lines and shapes help describe different emotions. For example, happiness is sometimes associated with yellow, the sun, and curly lines. We also discussed how every person may choose different lines, colors and shapes to describe an emotion.

Next students picked on emotion to describe. They then created an abstract sculpture using cardboard and acrylic paint. I was inspired by this lesson from a Pinterest post that took me to this website.

After students finished constructing their sculptures, they each wrote a haiku to go with their emotion. The sculptures are now on display in the elementary school display case with their Haiku.

5th Grade Sidewalk Artists

My family and I took a trip to Germany and Italy this summer and I spent the first few days of art class showing my students a slide show of our trip. One of the pictures from Florence, Italy was a street artist recreating a famous Renaissance painting with sidewalk chalk for money. After a long discussion on WHY the artist chooses to do this, one of my students said, "I wish we could do this here at school!"

What a great idea! Students first picked their own famous painting and we practiced recreating their paintings in the classroom before picking a sunny day to work outside our main entrance to school.

The students were impressed with their finished products and other grade levels are now asking to do it also. I think it was a success!  Here are some snapshots from the day.