Elements and Principles of Art Scavenger Hunt

Line

Shutters at the Red Rooster Coffee House

Color

Donut from Tim Horton's

Contrast

My dog J.J.

Emphasis

Flower on hiking trail

Sioux City, IA

Texture

Close up of a ball of yarn



Totem Poles

In this lesson, we were taught the role that totem poles play in the Native American Culture.  We were given multiple pages of picture of animals that are often used on totem poles.  We were given small pieces of paper to practice drawing the animal we wanted to create. They had us incorporate the same colors that we may want to use in the final product.  I decided to make a moose and I made him blue because blue is my favorite color. Something that we had to include in our totem pole was a 3D aspect.  Although you can't tell much in the picture, I have pieces of paper folded accordion style to make his antlers stick out. Once finished, each table backed their animal with the same color paper so that they could be assembled together to make a totem pole. We then each filled out a note card that stated the animal we made, why we chose the colors we did, and what the animal stands for.  

As an extension activity, I think it would be cool to have the students come up with their own legends for their favorite animal or an animal that interests them.  They could first hear about Native American legends and why certain animals mean what they do.     

Buffalo Hide Stories

For this lesson, I got to co-teach this to the class with a classmate.  We started out the lesson by having the students listen/watch a recording of the Tommy dePaola's book The Legend of the Indian Paintbrush. We discussed with the students the kind of things that Little Gopher saw and painted in the story.  The students were shown four different watercolor techniques and had a chance to practice them.  They then chose one of the techniques to use to paint their sunset as the background of the project.  Before applying the watercolor, the students were to draw stilts or something to hold up their buffalo hide with brown crayon.  While their paint was drying, the students were to come up with Native American symbols to represent something that has happened in their life.  This would be similar to the stories that were painted onto buffalo and deer hides by the Native Americans. Before the class period, we cut up, wet, and crumped paper bags that the students later used as their buffalo hide. On the paper bag, the students were to write their story using at least six symbols. Once all parts were glued together, the students were to write a summary of their story on the back of their rubric before handing it in.  

As an extension activity, I would have the students complete a full story about their symbols.  They could share these with their classmates and work on their composition and storytelling.  The students could even be assigned an important event in history and have them represent it using the Native American symbols.  

Our bulletin board

Ceramic Leaf Bowls

Pottery and the use of clay was the focus of this lesson.  Each student was given the choice of multiple different leaf patterns to use for their leaf bowl.   After smoothing out the clay, we were then instructed to trace our chosen pattern into the clay and cut it out.  Once the leaf is cut out, we were shown how to smooth the edges using water and our fingers.






Unlike some clay, this clay did not need to be fired in a kiln so we were able to paint our clay immediately. While we painted them, the leaves were put into styrofoam bowls so that the clay would keep the shape of a bowl. 

Because of the use of leaves, this could be used for younger children to talk about the different seasons.  For slightly older children, you could talk about the uses of clay in the past.  The clay we used was clay from the earth so you could also talk about the parts of nature that might be in the clay.

Cobra Knots

For this lesson, we got to create our own Cobra Knot keychains. We were told about the important role that different knots have played in the past and our everyday life to this day.  Rather than just hopping right in with the craft lace, we practiced how to make the knot using yarn.  Once we had that under control, we chose on of the two color triads (primary or secondary) and tied our knoting using craft lace. It's not seen much in the picture, but the red craft lace was the middle color that the other two were knotted around. 

I think that it would be cool to have the students research different types of knots that may have been used in different time periods.  The students could then teach their peers how to tie them.  They could also compare knots that we use on a daily basis to those used in the past. 

Scratch Art

For this lesson, we got to create our own scratch art sheets and then scratch a scene into them.  Although there are already made scratch art sheets you can buy, we learned how to make them ourselves. We were all given a square piece of cardstock and instructed to color a pattern on it using either primary or secondary colors, pressing quite hard so that it is plenty dark.





 Once that is done, we painted over our pattern with black tempera paint.  We created a scene on a separate sheet of paper using dark pencil lines, then transferring that to our painted piece of cardstock.  Lastly, we used a small wooden stick to scratch along the lines of our scene.  Two different patterns needed to be included in our scene, which is seen in waves and sand. 

This project would be interesting to incorporate into history.  Scratch art could be compared to forms on storytelling and communicating that was used in the past.  Students could come up with things that they think are similar to scratch art (ex. hieroglyphics, cave art, etc).

Dream Vacation

For this lesson, we were to reflect on our favorite vacation or a vacation we would want to go on. The basis of this project was making a three dimensional scene with a background, middle ground, and foreground. Our scene needed to include something in each of those places.  We also needed to include two different 3D objects (ex. tissue paper, popsicle sticks).





My scene was a boat going down a canal in Italy and the sidewalk and building that you would see.  I will be going to Italy next summer so this is a dream vacation of mine. 

This could be easily tied in with geography. The students could choose a place to research and create a three-dimensional scene depicting it.  The project could include important landmarks and aspects of the city.