December 10th 2012

This week Ms. Cook wrapped up her work with the children’s exploration with painting. Throughout this semester the children have been working very hard on finding ways of moving their bodies to manipulate paint within a picture.  

The children began this exploration by using materials to see how they can move in order to manipulate the paint on the paper.  This idea expanded when they began describing what types of lines they can make while influencing their different materials. After using a variety of materials the children had a good grasp on how to make these types of lines such as, straight, swirly, and dotted. This idea expanded when the children became interested in making pictures with these lines. I provided them with pictures to look at and see how they can make lines like these in a picture to help expand their own thinking and evolve their paintings. We practiced several types of lines and how they are considered a separate unit and can be followed across the picture. The children began showing knowledge of how to make paintings with individual lines. It was then we added color and talked about how paintings can also have many different colors but you can see each color and not overlapping each other. 

From the parents help with paintings during curriculum night, the students were able to see a variety of ways they are able to paint by using all the lines we have been studying. After describing these pictures the students were able to come up with ideas of their own to put into their works. Some students made a house out of lines and dots. Another student made a picture out of a rocket ship. There were also flowers made by the students and some clouds.  

From this the children began coming up with their own ideas of what they would like to paint and how they can use our lines to make these pictures. This project will be continued during the next semester with the students to further enhance their knowledge of lines and how they are used to create works of art.