mother's day brooches part 3

mother's day brooches part 2

See what I mean? Gorgeous! I would totally wear one of these. I should make one for myself.

 

The bling came from my jewelry junk drawer. Craft store beads, sequins, woold balls, costume jewelry that had been dissasembled, you name it! I grabbed a couple of handfuls from the drawer and popped them into a bag for us to work from at school. I dumped the whole happy mess onto one of our trays and passed out empty applesauce/mini chobani containers for the kiddos to select what they wanted to add to their flower. Once they had their selections and I was ready for them, they came over to the hot melt glue table. Some of the children can handle the glue gun, others need/want help. We plopped a puddle of hot glue onto the center of the flower then we dumped our cup of happy onto the whole shebang. We ended up with some amazing bits of goodness. Before they added their bling, I had glued pinbacks to the backs of the flowers. When everything was ready, the children wrapped up their pins by rolling them in tissue paper and placing into a small bag. That day we also had a school function in the evening and it was so delightful to see all of the moms show up with their pins on!

mother's day brooches part 1

This year for Mother's Day I wanted to try something that could be worn outside of Mother's Day and landed on a painted floral pin.

I cut our a variety of flower shapes in different sizes with the idea that the children would select their pieces, smallest to largest...staple them together, then add paint before blinging them out with all sorts of sparkly goodness. This last unpainted flower was my sample. 

We used liquid watercolor to paint the flowers. I demonstrated how to wet the flower by submerging it into a tray of water. A few of the kiddos really got a kick out of that part, so they would paint their flower, submerge it to rinse it off, then paint again.

They came out even better than I had imagined! I think my favorites are of the flowers that got rinsed multiple times. The layers of color are so pretty. Stay tuned to see how they all turned out! I can't remember if I got photos of the children adding their bling or not but I do have final product pics!

paint with straws

apple leaf crayon resists

Leaf rubbings are nothing new. I remember doing them when  I was small. For our two week unit on all things apple, I brought in some leaves from my apple tree to see if we could pull of some pretty ghostie rubbings.

Along with apple leaves, I brought in nasturtium, grape, and blackberry. The leaves looked quite pretty in our basket. A few may have even made their way to the play dough table. To begin, gather up an assortment of leaves and set them within reach of your kiddo(s). Use a sturdy white paper, we used watercolor paper purchased from Michael's from their creatology line. Next up, set up your watercolors. We used liquid watercolors at their full strength in small baby food jars. I prefer the liquid water colors for their vibrancy but you can also use a caked water color set. While I did have the leaves, paper, and crayons all set up, I asked each child what two colors they would like to use for their painting. The first kiddo said pink and purple and well...if you know kiddos it is how easily they want what their buddy has so most of our rubbings are with the same colors. We used white crayons for this project and the  rubbings are really pretty. I purchased a box of white crayons a few years ago. I cannot remember where I found them but I would try online if you are looking.

Each kiddo selected a leaf or two and placed them on the table in front of them. They then placed the paper over the leaves. Many found that they would have to rearrange leaves and/or paper a bit to accommodate everything. After that I did demo how to use the side of the crayon. We talked about pushing it like a broom. Some of the kiddos needed a little extra help to get the pressure right to pick up the details of the leaves. All of the children exclaimed over not being able to see anything.

After your kiddo has used their crayon for the rubbing, remove the leaves and get to painting. One tip for this is to use smaller cuts of paper. Smaller kiddos have a trying time covering all that white space so I will often cut larger sheets of paper into smaller sizes often mixing it up with skinny pieces, squares, rectangles, etc. This way they get to choose what shape and how small or large their art will be. We used small watercolor brushes to apply the paint and there was a lot of "oooohing" and "aaahhhing". It was really sweet.

Hang to dry and display in a pretty space. We're putting our small paintings into our classroom journals but I think these would make lovely cards or gifts. Don't you?

On the flip side, you can paint the leaves and press them onto your paper as well (which is was my assistant did with all the puddles of watercolor on the table). Super swoony!

mini watercolors with preschoolers

The children painted up these mini masterpieces to go along with our Mother's Day gifts. I cannot post enough how much I love liquid watercolors and kiddos!

We do a lot of painting in my classroom. Much of the time what begins as a glorious riot of color ends as a thick blob of brown. Even the watercolors tend to get so crazy-mixed on their paper that the color is one big muddy mess and the paper has been carved into by the immense pressure three year olds feel a paintbrush needs to have applied to it. This is a process that most all children who paint go through and it while it needs to be played out I also feel young ones can learn and develop gentle nuances when it comes to painting special pictures or with special materials.

I manage this by introducing with awe in my voice how very special the paint or paintbrush or even paper is. These mini masterpieces were created using liquid watercolor fro Colorations. The brushes used were your run-of-the-mill classroom brushes but the paper, aah the paper is super fancy heavy weight watercolor paper (I cannot remember the weight or the name). I only bring out the special paper for special projects and the children know this and treat it with much reverence. By keeping the size of the paper small, the children can focus on creating their masterpiece without tiring out attempting to cover the entire surface of their paper. Before we begin we talk about colors and wonder what the receiver's favorite color is (this is a really great exercise in thinking about others and what they might like. There are many a-ha moments when the children realize that they like pink but their Mom may like yellow. There is a great deal of dialog that follows when we talk about what others may like or enjoy). From there we talk about cool colors or warm colors and develop a two to three color palette that when mixed will not be muddy. When we paint on our watercolor paper I do not water down the liquid watercolors but allow them to be used in their full strength. We place the colors into a small white plastic paint palette which we only use alongside our special paper. Their creations never fail to make me swoon. I cannot wait to delve into the special materials with my new group of students!

fizzy ice fun in the classroom

 

Back in May we had some seriously hot weather for our town. The kiddos got a bit lethargic and so I brought out a class favorite and added a bit of ice to the mix.

 The kiddos love mixing colors and experimenting with baking soda and vinegar. They spent about 30 minutes noodling around. We began with ice cubes and watercolor and then a couple of drops of vinegar was added along with a smattering of baking soda. There were a lot of Oooooohs and Aaaaaaahs.

They become so involved they don't even complain about the scent of the vinegar. They were also completely happy with their first color choice and did not ask for other colors like they usually do. Yay for science!

diy: rainbow clothespins

For our week of rainbow I dyed up a batch of wooden clothespins using the same method I use for dying pasta.

While I was at it, I dyed large craft sticks and small wooden cubes as well. These are not colorfast and do bleed onto paper and play dough when wet (maybe they would be colorfast if I had added rubbing alcohol). But that's okay, I think that only adds to their charm. 

 

 I set the rainbow pins up on one of my favorite trays along with a wooden storage box made of a thin veneer. I hoped the children would figure out that they could balance the clothespin on the side of the box and they did! I made multiples of each color so that they could sort or arrange as they wished.

Some of the children noticed that all of the colors of the rainbow were represented. Others counted out how many pins there were. The clothespins migrated all over the classroom but mostly they were balanced on the edge of the box. Fun!

bubble print trucks

 

We were reading Truck by Donald Crews and I wanted some sort of truck art/craft. We had already painted with cars both on paper and on tinfoil so I thought pulling our our rainbow bowls and adding liquid watercolor, soap, and water to the mix would be fun.We used bendy straws to create our bubbles and yes, we did have a young'un suck the soap right up but do you know what? He spit it out and looked at me with his lips all blue and I said "Ah, you got soap in your mouth." He nodded and I asked if he remembered how to blow bubbles using our bubble wand. After he nodded I explained again that we were going to blow through the straws to push air into our mixture. The air would help create bubbles and that once we got a nice hill of bubbles we would plop our paper on top to create a print. He was unsure and dubious of it it so I say with him and demonstrated how you can feel the air come out of the bottom of the straw. After a few tries he tried it again and was SO EXCITED to create bubbles! I know some people prefer to poke a hole in the straw to prevent kiddos from drinking up soap but I find once they do they work really hard and not doing it again. I use a gentle soap from J.R, Watkins and our liquid watercolor is non-toxic. I also make sure to use clean containers for those kiddos that just have to taste it. Here's what you need:

*small containers

*about a half cup of water per container

*hefty squirt of liquid watercolor (you can also use powdered tempera)

*squirt or two of liquid dish soap

*straw per kiddo

*large white paper cut into the shape of a truck

*plastic/vinyl tablecloth optional (it gets messy)

I used our small rainbow cups so offered up six different colors in rainbow order. There was a lot of dialogue and negotiation between the kiddos to see who would work at which bowl first.

Step 1. Set out bowls with water, soap, and watercolor

Step 2. Hand kiddos straws and explain that you will be BLOWING air through the straw not sucking up/drinking the bubble solution. If you need to demo do so. Have the kiddos blow into the straws while placing hteir pother hand underneath. Ask what they feel.

Step 3. Place a truck shape near each kiddo or set aside and wait for when they are ready. I drew my trucks freehand but you may be able to find templates online. You can use rectangular paper or any shape you like. We did trucks because we were on week two of a transportation unit.

Step 4. Have kiddos blow their bubbles. Before it gets too crazy make sure they know that first they will make their prints then they can get all wacky with blowing the biggest bubble mountains ever.

Step 5. When the children are ready, hand them their truck shape and tell them to place it over their bubble mountain. Many will be thrilled with the results and continue over and over again. Some not so much but that's okay too.

Hang trucks to dry for display or take home. This bubble explorations gets super messy so do not do this on carpet. You may even wish to do this outside. Once the kiddos were finished with their prints, I was loathe to waste the watercolor in the bowls so turned the activity into another fun project....photos soon!