Fourth Grade

Autumn Still-life

This is the culmination of the 4th grade unit on drawing. [See Google slides below] The first lesson was on contour drawing and blind contour drawing, to learn how to train your hand to follow what your eye sees. The second week they looked at how to use a pencil for shading and how to tint and highlight in black and white. The third class focused on shading a sphere and the cast shadow. The fourth week we practiced tinting and shading primary and secondary colors with oil pastels. In the fifth class we drew a pumpkin together, looking at one on on our tables. The sixth class we added color to the pumpkin, looking at light and shadow. In the next classes the students begin to work more independently on their autumn still-life adding a second squash and a background to their composition.

End of the 2024-25 school year

Clay Pockets

The project for the forth graders was to create a clay pocket that is decorated with patterns, decorations or objects that are added on or incised into the clay. The pockets are made from clay slabs with pinched or slipped seams, should be stable and secure and have a hole in them so they can be fixed to a wall. They are bisque fired, glazed, and fired a second time. Students learn how to roll out an even clay slab, various ways to form a clay pocket and how to use crumpled paper to hold the pocket open when the clay was wet. They design original pockets and problem-solve to make them functional.

Explosion Books!

As snow days interfered with finishing projects, some fourth grade classes made Explosion Books until everyone was ready for clay. Other classes may have time later in the year. Explosion books are a type of art book made with paper folding, cardboard and two drawings, one a black and white Zentangle drawing and the other a pattern in color. The pictures below illustrate the process.

Wire Figures

For this project, 4th graders start out looking at how to draw a full figure using figure proportions for an adult and a child their age. We look at how that is different from how figures are commonly drawn by children. Next they are introduced to gesture drawing, using a quick drawing of body parts in proportion to capture the movement of a person. They look at how a person actually bends and try to draw what they actually see. They have a chance to be both model and artist.

Then we focus on their final project of creating a wire figure in motion. They look at how other artists have portrayed a figure with wire first and then begin to form their own in aluminum wire. Copper wire is added to give a hint as to what the figure is doing more exactly.

Stitch and Stuff Snow People

Fourth graders are making stuffed snow people from burlap or monk cloth. They baste around 3 consecutively smaller circles of fabric. Then they pull the yarn tighter as they add stuffing, creating the 3 rounds for a snow person. they attach the three rounds together with a low temperature glue gun. After, they use sticks, foam, buttons, material and other collage materials to individualize their snow people using a glue gun.