Warhol, Monet,Tu Bish'vat, and Cooking

Andy Warhol created "pop art", making art about people or objects from popular culture.   We asked the kids what they considered popular...Charlotte said Hannah Montana".

Zoey's answer was "Coocoo's".  You can see she is beginning her Warhol inspired art by drawing a picture of herself.

Noor and Suri answered at exactly the same time...the moon sand!

Briana said, "the Perot Museum."
Here are some other answers.
Patrick - center time
Govind - Mustangs (the car)
Daniel - playing the drums
Jake - magnatiles
Amelia - spaghetti
Emma - shoes
Saul - the science museum
Alex - slides at the park

We are beginning to paint like Claude Monet, the fabulous impressionist artist.  Monet used very short brush strokes so we have taught the children a new technique.  You can see how Emma is starting her tree.  She first used a shade of brown but left space in between her strokes.  Then she mixed a new shade of brown and is filling in the spaces.

Alex is adding grass to his painting using short upward strokes.  He too mixed different shades of one color , in this case, green.

You can see the thoughtful way Patrick is applying his paint.  He was one of the first to do a "Monet" and the entire class cheered when they saw his finished painting.  Patrick beamed, and everyone realized they could create  Monet inspired art too.

Some of the children chose to kneel...

while others sat on the stool.

Some made trees with wildly swaying branches.

And some got really close to the action!

Every child approached this process with their own vision of color selection and tree shape.

And they are all magnificent!   Come in to see the Monet gallery in our room.    We hope this whets your appetite for the Feb. 8 ART SHOW!

We took time out from art to go to a Tu B'Shevat Seder, led by Jennifer.   You can see the plates are divided into 3 sections to represent the different types of fruits we eat at this Seder.  Blueberries, grapes and even olives were popular but we don't think anyone but the teachers ate the figs!

Now we are in culinary arts, prepping the ingredients for our flatbread roll-up.  Suri  is peeling carrots....

Emma and Briana are working together to grate cabbage.

Alex and Daniel are scooping and mashing avocado.

We had such a variety of activities this whole week.  You can see the underlying intent is always for the children to  (among other things!) work together cooperatively,  strengthen their fine motor abilities, and enjoy their time learning about the world!

A quick note from Sharon:  Thank you for my birthday party and gifts.  Even wearing the boa and tiara  was not as bad as I'd thought! 

Leaves Are Falling Down.....Crunch !

On Thursday in gan, we divided the children into two groups. One group raked the leaves into a large pile. The boys used their gross motor skills to pull their rakes through the leaves. What a great workout!

Kim took the other group of children to trim the loofahs off the vines.

There were plenty of loofahs ready for trimming. Using gross and fine motor skills and visual perception skills, the children had to look for loofahs that were dry and ready for harvesting.

The children compared the size and texture of their loofahs. "Mine is big, rough, bumpy,long and heavy." Look for the loofahs at the spring Shuk. The children were pleased to know that the loofahs would be for sale."Maybe, we can buy them for our families."

After their jobs were completed, Heidi asked the children if they were ready for some fun? "What are we going to do?" "Jump into the leaves!"  "Yeah, we are ready!"  Enjoy the pictures as each of your children used their own technique for jumping in the leaves. "Crunch!!!"

After everyone jumped, Heidi asked the children if they could make the leaves rain.

Brown leaves are falling down, Brown leaves are falling down.  All over the girls and boys, and all over the ground. 

                                              It's raining leaves ! ! !

Klee, Seraut, MLK, Frittata, and Tu Bish'vat

Paul Klee was a Swiss artist whose paintings often contain many different areas of dots, lines and corners.   The children created their own edible masterpieces here.

Pretzel sticks became lines and corners.

Craisins and blueberries were used for dots on our flat bread canvas.

Emma and Alex both spent some time designing!

When snack was over, the children used crayons to make their lines and dots.

Suri was intrigued by this picture and intently studied it.

Everyone interpreted  the "directions" in their own way.

Many beautiful watercolor paints to further inspire.

You can find your child's "Paul Klee" painting outside our room, complete with interesting titles!

Georges Seurat was a French artist who invented a new method of painting,  pointillism.   He put small dots of various colors together and the viewer's eye does the work of blending the  dots into a new color.

Saul is very deliberate in his choice of colors.

Govind knew right from the start he wanted to paint a hot dog!   His pointillism inspired art work, along with  his classmates, is also outside on the bulletin board!

In Culinary Arts, Cheryl had all the ingredients to make a spinach frittata.

 With all the cooking this year, the girls have become very adept at cutting!

The boys and Zoey  were asked to tear the spinach into small pieces. Great for fine motor skills!

The frittata  was ready! It smelled and looked delicious. We were excited to see how many of the children enjoyed the frittata.

In gan, we discussed Tu Bish'vat. After talking about the roots, bark, branches and leaves, we went outside to do tree rubbings.  The girls chose a large tree with a thick bark to do their rubbings.

Alex found a tree with different trunk sizes to do his rubbing.

This was the smallest tree in the courtyard.  The children were able to compare their rubbings from the largest  tree.  This activity was a fun way for the children to explore and learn about trees and celebrate Tu Bish'vat.

To introduce our discussion on Martin Luther King, we gave just the girls a sticker.   At first the boys sat very patiently, waiting for their turn.  

When it became clear we were not going to give the boys a sticker, they were not pleased.  You can see that Daniel is even turning his head away from the picture!  Jake said "You skipped me!"  Even the girls were somewhat surprised, since all the children know we are always fair.  

Eventually our discussion turned to how each group felt, and then we tied that into Martin Luther King and his dream of equality for everyone.  The bus is the prop we used to tell the story of Rosa Parks and her decision not to sit in the back of the bus.

We were thrilled when the children decided to retell the story on their own in centers.    They might not remember specific names or events, but we hope the children internalized some of Dr. King's message.