To start off the new school year very strong, Kindergarten students created these awesomely adorable multimedia snails.
We began by learning about lines. There are many different sorts of lines, straight lines, curvy lines, curly lines, and spiral lines. After practicing drawing spiral lines many times, students created a snail shell by using oil pastels to draw a very large spiral to fill their paper. Next, they took on the task of filling the spiral with their name repeating. This was a great exercise for Kinders to practice writing their name and also created an interesting pattern throughout the shell.
After adding a head and tail with oil pastel as well, students used watercolor paints to make a colorful, fun snail. They were very excited as they watched the watercolor and oil pastel resist and the drawings showed through the paint.
Once the snails were done, students carefully cut around the snail and glued it onto a blue (or black) piece of paper and drew some clouds. Before adding the 'dirt' and 'grass,' we discussed texture. Texture is what something feels like or what it looks like it feels like. Kinders recognized that puppies may feel "soft, "fuzzy," and "squishy" whereas a tree bark may feel "rough," "hard," and "bumpy." They glued down cut pieces of paper to create a dirty and grassy texture.
The favorite part of the project was probably adding the finishing touch of the silly goggley eyes. What I have learned is that googley eyes make a kindergarten student a very, very happy student.