Trick or tReat!!!

If you didn’t know already, fall is my FAVORITE!!! All the colorful leaves, cooler weather (if we are lucky), football, spooky decor and pumpkins of every shape and form each lending so much personality. And fall lends so much learning tools for teaching art that it’s impossible to cover it all...but I always try. Pumpkins are such a great way to introduce Shape to elementary students. They come into my classroom with the basic knowledge of geometric shapes and then I get to introduce organic shapes that come from nature and our imagination. Pumpkins are fantastic organic shapes found in nature and are good practice for early learners because pumpkins come in all shapes and sizes and it helps us remember that our goal in art is not perfection, just like there is no perfect pumpkin. After students understand that there are two kinds of shapes, we can then apply both in our artwork by using our imagination in creating Jack-o-lanterns!

Pumpkins are also great shapes to introduce form to middle school students. The irregularities of pumpkins create more opportunities for shading and shadows in our attempt to create the illusion of 3 dimensions on our paper. Because my students pick up things so quickly, I decided to take our form discussion a step further. This year is my first year to teach Op Art and how artists can use lines, shapes, color and contrast to play tricks on the eyes. It has been such a treat to learn all the possible tricks we have up our artist sleeves...see what I did there?!?