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!