2nd Grade

Expressions

Expressions is an interdisciplinary/language arts unit where students will explore the elements of art and gain knowledge on famous artists and their artistic styles. The second grade students will identify and practice using the elements of art and principles of design to generate artwork. The students will research and explore famous artists and how they used their gifts and talents to create their art. Finally, students will write a biography of an artist and create a self-portrait in the style of given artist. Students will integrate fine arts, social studies, math, and English to create their final projects.

We started the school year with a Team Building STEM Activity.

The Most Magnificent Thing

The Most Magnificent Thing by Ashley Spires is about creating amazing things and understanding that mistakes will be made along the way. It also shows how to regulate emotions to keep persevering through challenging situations. Second graders created their "most magnificent thing" out of Legos.

We started the Expressions Unit by creating a poster for the Elements of Art.

line & Albrecht Dürer

Henri Matisse was a french artist best known for his use of color and form.

QUEST students studied this artist and created artwork inspired by his use of positive and negative shapes.

Researching the Artist Henri Matisse

Using the Independent Investigation Method (IIM)

Drawing with scissors

Students were enriched with the artwork of Henri Matisse. Henri Matisse, was a French visual artist, known for his use of color. He excelled as a draftsmen, printmaker, sculptor, and painter. Students enjoyed creating their own artwork using colored paper and scissors to create pictures without drawing images or providing sketch work.

Charlotte Garcia

Dallas Whitaker

The Depth and Complexity Framework & tools empower students to be independent thinkers and creative problem-solvers.

multiple perspectives

Art naturally lends itself to observing multiple perspectives. After completing a shape hunt around the classroom, the students applied multiple perspectives when viewing the shapes they found. One perspective included noticing and identifying individual geometric shapes and another perspective was putting those shapes together to create a new shape or perspective.

Amazing Work!

Tissue Paper Trees incorporating the Tertiary Color Wheel

Color & Wassily Kandinsky

The students made color wheels using paint to observe primary and secondary colors. They also saw the effects of using tissue paper to identify other colors.

Kandinsky Circles

Charlotte

Dallas

Value & Georgia O'Keeffe

Ice Cream Cone Value Scales

Second grade GT students mixed paint to make ice cream of different values.

Exceptional Work!

Amazing Work!

Georgia O'Keeffe was an American modernist artist. She was known for her paintings of enlarged flowers, New York skyscrapers, and New Mexico landscapes.

QUEST students studied this artist and created artwork inspired by her use of value in her paintings of enlarged flowers.