Raise your hand if you love Pinterest! Oo Oo Me!! Over here!! 


 If you're like me, Pinterest has become your new best friend.  All of your wants, dreams, hopes and needs are compiled onto a virtual billboard.  I have over 2,000 pins. Will I ever get to them all? Probably not, but it sure was cool collecting them : )  Of all of the boards I've created, my Education board has been utilized the most.  I have found so many cool project ideas and have actually put them to use in my classroom in the last couple of weeks.  The best thing about these pins is all of the links I've found to amazing art teacher blogs.  They make mine look sick, but I'm working on that.  Below I've posted a couple of the projects I've found and my students work.  

Tree Birds, Blenda on Etsy

The image on the above is a mixed media piece by an artist named Blenda on etsy. I used her idea of painting over paper and had my eighth grade students create an Earth Day project, where they used newspaper instead of a map. The students also did a small amount of research and wrote up a short paragraph about the animal they chose.  Many of them came out better than anticipated and I scored brownie points with my principal for incorporating the writing :D  Click on her artwork to view her Etsy page.

Next I have a 3-D project made by my sixth grade students. Paper mache teacups! At first I thought maybe they would think it was a little weird, but came to find out they were excited! Ann Wood is the artist and she guides you step by step and even includes the pattern. So helpful! Click on Ann's teacups to view her webpage.

Paper Mache Teacups, Ann Wood

   


These are my students finished teacups. How adorable are these??!!!

Here's another :) This artwork is by Elizabeth Rosen, another Etsy artist. Elizabeth's piece inspired a project about abstraction and surrealism.  I explained the differences between what the two and had the students view examples.  Inside the rain drops the students created mini artworks that were abstract and combined them with the tree limb to make the overall artwork surreal. Click on the caption to view her Etsy page.

Abstract Rain Drops, Elizabeth Rosen

Student example to come. I didn't realize I didn't get any photos of these. Yikes!


























So as you can see Pinterest has been a fabulous tool for me. I highly recommend it. Through this site, I've connect with several other art teachers and not only have I found project ideas but I've been awesomely inspired by what others are doing. This year it quickly coming to a close but I can't wait to try out all of this new stuff next school year!