"I made this for you!"

Oftentimes in the Adamah classroom, we find children making different art projects to bring home for Mom, Dad, siblings and other family members.  Today, we thought we'd try something different.  When the children arrived in the classroom, they found art materials and a bowl full of small slips of paper, each with the name of another child in the classroom.  As they came to the art table, the children pulled a classmate's name out of the bowl, and made a picture for that person -- with markers, crayons, hole-punchers and stickers.  We're collecting the pictures until each person has one, then we'll mail them to each friend. 

The children were thoughtful about the art projects, too.  Hayley thought about which color paper Graham would like before she selected blue.  Samantha asked Hayley, (who was sitting right with her!) what color paper she'd like.  Hayley said, "Pink!"  And the girls continued the conversation, about what Hayley might like Samantha to draw, until Samantha finished the whole picture for her friend.

Olivia was excited to pull Sally's name, and chose purple marker on purple paper, because she decided that Sally would really like that.

Tile Collage

The Adamah class has been inspired by the changing colors of fall and all of the beautiful nature surrounding us.  Today, we used a combination of natural materials (kernels of native corn) and non-natural materials (sparkly stickers, plastic bottle caps, rubber bands, etc.) and used clear glue to decorate tiles.  The students took their time making decisions about what materials to use, as they used Q-tips and clear glue to make their creations.  Each tile was unique and beautiful, and we look forward to displaying them in the classroom.

So Many Ways to Paint

Kayla shows us her hands while finger painting.

 

Grace and Hannah scratch the finger painted surface with tongue depressors.

 

Making hand prints.

Children need lots of time and the opportunity to have activities repeated more than once in order for them to  master the skills. There are so many exciting ways to paint and create art. Finger painting is a tactile experience while using brushes or tongue depressors is yet another method of expression. Hand printing is a basic form of printing.   

 

Thankful for God

This week the Ruach class will haave a very special honor at Shabbat. We are going to share one thing we are thankful for and then open the ark. 

Today during circle we talked about what we are thankful for on Shabbat and the class together said, "God!!" Maria and I were surprised and impressed that so much of the class felt passionate about being thankful for God.

Now what we knew what we were thankful for, we had to figure out his to depict God visually. 

We talked about why we are thankful for God and Eliana and Jack both said that they are thankful for God because God created the world. This inspired a whirlwind of conversations about all the beautiful natural things God created.

We then got to work. Eliana cut a blue circle to depicted the world. Lilah began to work on some foam clouds and Jacob colored a sun. They created a scene if the world that depicts both day and night. We went on a hunt for sparkles so that our moon and stars could shine! Jacob created a beach and Ben worked hard to make sure that we included the arctic circle and icebergs. Mia made sure we added birds! It was so neat to hear their ideas and watch them quickly be one realities as many voices were heard and children worked together to have thir ideas fit in with the whole class project. Their ideas and insigts about God are facinating and growing. I am eager to see what they add to our creation tomorrow!

Inspired

Today we found a challenge waiting for the Etzim and Adamah children when we arrived on the playground!  "Can you use natural materials to make art?".  Jillian, Olivia, Lily, and Ben said "yes we can!".   After requesting paper and glue they set about collecting "yellow leaves only." Definitely more to come on this exploration!

Kohavim September Self Portraits

On Monday, each child visited the art table to create their first self-portrait for the year. The children used mirrors to notice the details and features of their faces and selected crayons to represent what they look like. Creating a self portrait provides an opportunity to use observational and representational skills. As the children looked in the mirror and drew their self-portrait they had so many wonderful comments! Come visit Kohavim and view the Self-Portrait display complete with their drawings, photos, and comments!  

The crown jewels

Serious jewelers at work!  Not only did the Shamayim children create one of a kind pieces, they strengthened their finger and hand muscles along the way!!

A Rainbow of Leaves

On Monday, Kohavim began to notice the leaves on our playground have begun to change colors. After collecting a few different colors, we decided to make a rainbow with our leaves. Molly organized the leaves from by color from brown, to red, to yellow, to light green, and then dark green. What a beautiful rainbow! You might want to collect some leaves from your backyard and try making a rainbow of leaves at home.

Finger Paint!

You might not imagine that this table started out with different colored puddles of finger paint when the children arrived in the Adamah class this morning.  But we spent a lot of time moving the paint with our fingers as we experimented with mixing colors.  Eventually, we just enjoyed the feel of the squishy paint between our fingers, as we made finger and hand patterns on the table.

I made a Challah Man!

On Friday, the kindergartners participated in a Shabbat tradition: baking challah! Some children enjoyed squeezing and feeling the sticky challah dough, some braided the dough, but Jacob had another idea. He carefully separated his dough into small pieces which he used to construct a challah person! He discovered that challah dough was a unique art medium that he could use to sculpt a person. We will be baking challah every Friday in Kindergarten Enrichment. We hope you enjoyed the sweet challah the children made on Friday! 

Etzim Enjoys Clays!

Today the Etzim class got a chance to talk about, and then play with clay! I  joined their circle and  explained to them that throughout the year we will be doing different kinds of art together.
We talked about all the different art we like:

Hillary, Sydney, Nicholas and Ellen like to paint
Abby likes coloring
Bella and Lindsey like Markers
Julia and Jillian like Rainbow Crayons
Olivia likes Playdough

Olivia gave us a great opening to talk about playdough. We talked about we use our hands we play with playdough and what playdough feels like.  Then we talked about clay. Some of the class had worked with clay before but not all. We imagined that we had clay in our hands and practiced rolling the clay into a ball. Then we practiced rolling it into a snake. Then we pretended to pinch the play dough and lastly we pretended to make it flat like a pancake.

After we talked about different ways to experience clay we gave each child a chance to just explore clay. they LOVED it. The class worked for about twenty minutes just poking, rolling and enjoying having their own clay to manipulate.

Jacob made a rock: "I just rolled the clay into a ball like this"
Rachel made a pancake: "I smushed it with my hands and belly"
Lindsey made a cookie, "I made dots on the top. You make it flatter with your fingers."

I loved having the chance to watch them explore and I am looking forward to continuing our clay study soon! Thanks Etzim for welcoming me, I can't wait to come back!

Exploring Clay with Sasha

Is it harder than playdough? Is it sticky? I like pinching! These were some of the comments and questions put forth during our time with our Atelierista, Sasha. Today Sasha introduced clay to our classroom. The children touched, smelled, kneaded, and molded with great enthusiasm. We look forward to further exploration with this material and with Sasha!

Learning from "mistakes"

Today on the playground Rosie took a piece of paper and a purple marker and made a dot. But she pressed so hard on the paper that she made a hole in the paper! She didn't want a paper with a hole in it so she took another piece. 

We looked at the paper with the hole and reflected on how she made it. She told me that when she was coloring she pressed hard and then there was a hole! 

I told her that it is helpful to keep this experience in mind because sometimes, we might want a hole in our paper and other times we might not. 

After a bit, I looked over at Rosie's drawing and saw that she had created something beautiful and that the paper had TWO holes in it! 

I asked her what she made and she informed me that she had created a, "hot air balloon kitty" and that she pressed down with her marker to make two holes for the eyes!

I thought it was so neat that Rosie transformed her idea that hole in paper were "bad" and that she decided to use this technique to create something beautiful and meaningful for her! 

Creative Exploration

I spent part of my morning on the playground today working with kids who were coloring their parent's hopes and wishes for their year. I happened to have a bottle of glue with me and it attracted Ben who wondered to the table. Ben had no intreats in coloring but loved the glue so I let him explore with the glue for awhile. He dripped it on to the paper and used both the glue cap and his fingers to spread the glue around. He had nothing to glue but the process of glueing and the tactile experience of the sticky substance was captivating and he enjoyed doing this for a while. 

After awhile he seemed done with glueing and I asked him if he wanted to glue something to his paper, we didn't have any collage supplies so I modeled how to rip paper. His eyes lit up with excitement.  He than began to rip, which was not an easy task. He used coordination and fine motor skills to rip each stip. Sometimes he struggled, yet he felt a sense of accomplishment when he finally was able to tear the paper. He then returned to glueing but this time his mission was to use the glue as an adhesive for his torn paper, strip by strip he glued until all the glue was covered. 

His final step was taking a "Batman black" marker and coloring his collage. I was so impressed by the amount of time, and focus Ben took to create his collage. Through this creation process he experienced different mediums, used different muscles groups and really took to a step-by step exploratory creative process. 

As an atelierista I seek to find these moments of discovery and document exploration and learning through art. Ben was able to use the medium of glue to inspire a whole collaging process which captivated him for over twenty minutes.  When kids go though the discovery process on their own they feel accomplished knowing that they too have the ability to create. 

Painting with frozen paint!

Kayla ,Hannah and Grace enjoyed painting with frozen paint on a stick. Kayla painted until the paint cube melted! Hannah drew a big circle on her paper and proceeded to color it in, first with the red, then the blue and last the white.

It's so simple and lots of fun! Try it at home with the whole family!

Bubbles! Bubbles!

There were bubbles everywhere today... Bailey could not wait to immerse herself in the pool filled with bubbles! Alex, Kayla and Hannah had a great time making bubble prints with water colors , wands, and bubbles!

Bicycles and Traffic Signals

With the excitement and fun of our Bike Rodeo this morning, we painted circles to create our own bicycle wheels. It will take several days this week to complete our bicycles. 

The children are cutting and gluing  traffic lights with Liz.

 

Julia and Eliana are hanging the traffic lights in our classroom.

Finger-paint fun!

Today the children had the opportunity to finger-paint! We covered the table with white butcher paper. We made sure we had plenty of room for each child's work space and big arm movements. It was a joy to see the children explore with the paint and color.

I asked a few open ended questions as they moved their tiny little fingers, pushing the paint up and down, side to side and in a circular motion all over the white butcher paper. "How does the paint feel?" Grace said, "Cold." "What colors do you see?" Hannah's response, "lemon".

Check out our colorful mural hanging on the bulletin board in the classroom! Finger-paint is slippery, slick, cool, sticky, vibrant, and bold! We look forward to more encounters with finger-paint later in the week!

What are we thankful for in 3 D

Shabbat is here. We celebrate in community always mindful of what we have to be thankful for. On this Friday we heard children express gratitude for "God, trees , daisies, toys-submarines-cars, snowmen, basketball, summer, birthdays, juice, snakes, lions, Shabbat, Ninjas, sushi, family , and sisters. We decided to provide children with the opportunity to express their ideas using clay. It was beautiful to witness the dedication to details and how the clay was transformed as their ideas emerged . Here are just a few examples . Eli said he was thankful for Shabbat. He stared his journey of expression with those concrete items we see, candles, challah, and kiddush cup. As he was forming the candle holders he stood and looked and then said that God lived in his candle. He then proceeded to represent his image .

Making A Banner

The Haifa class spent the morning working very hard on our Shalom Party banner. We experimented with Sharpies and rubbing alcohol to see what happens when they are mixed on fabric. The end result is a beautiful piece filled with running ink! We traced quarters with Sharpies and then used eye droppers to drop the rubbing alcohol on the fabric.

We are very excited for you to see the end result next week!

-Alison and Sauci