Spring Time Art & Preparing for Summer Break

The end of a school year is always tough. The connections made with my students between myself and them and them with each other is hard to ignore and I received many hugs and gifts on the last day of school.

Our final project in the art class was a fun one. I bought each student a canvas board (cheaper than a stretched canvas and more durable for littles, just fyi) and gave them two options. The idea was to have them paint a spring time portrait of an animal of some kind, however, though free time drawing and painting is fun, sometimes the projects don't end up impressing parents and I end up with complaints about the lack of structure. So! Their options were, draw either a bunny or a snake in pencil on the canvas board, trace with a sharpie marker (if you wonder why the tracing happens, it's so that the detail and the drawing doesn't get lost in the painting process), and then paint! These animal portraits turned out great. I especially love the googly eyes on some of the snakes. Bonus: canvas boards tend to dry quickly when painted with kid friendly tempera paint. They were able to take these projects home the day they were made and it made for happy kids.

Student Art 2016-2017

I know I'm going back a little bit but these projects are some of my favorites that we did in class.

 This is a big collaborative project that my art students did together. They loved picking out the "warm" colors for the body of the lion versus the "cold" colors for the mane and tail. I always think that collaborative projects are going to be messy and result in chaos but this one was a big hit. I drew an outline of a lion on a large sheet of paper and gave them cut pieces of construction paper and glue sticks. They went to town! 

This is another American Girl project from the 2016-17 school year. The kids created teepees from paper, colored them and then added them to a landscape made from Crayola Model Magic (that stuff is magical, let me tell you).

These two adorable penguin sculptures were created in my Art Around the World class back in 2016-17. The class was a mixture of art and geography and that week we were talking about Antarctica. Our book of the day was "The Penguin Who Hated the Cold", a lovely addition to this craft. Again, Crayola Model Magic saved the day with these sculptures.

The snowy months wouldn't have been the same without these sock snowmen. This was hands down one of my favorite projects. I bought a package of mens socks (tall ones), cut off the end (not the toe end) and we stuffed the remainder of the sock full of rice. We added a rubberband for the neck and to seal off the top of the head (the hat on the snowmen is the piece we cut off previously) and then hot glued faces, buttons and ribbons on.



 This project was another one that my Art Around the World students completed using, you guessed it, Crayola Model Magic. I outlined South America on a piece of cardstock and the kids spread the clay within the outline, creating dips and rises to portray the geographical landscape. Paint, let dry and they were ready to go!






Along with out South American studies, my art and geography students created toucans! I loved this project. We used paper plates, paint, markers, tissue paper and glue. It was fantastic. Our paper plate can be seen being used for a beak and a wing while the rest of the body was paper.







 When there are girls present, like in the American Girl class, you can't go wrong with beads and buttons of all kinds. The "sidekick" to that year's American Girl was a cat, so I drew cat outlines and they decorated them the way they wanted.

I loved this project as well. The American Girl class celebrated Easter with little resurection gardens. The cave or tomb was made from little pots laid on the side. We added a rock for the large stone and I got little crosses off Amazon for super cheap. The kids added the rest. Rocks for a path, flowers, sticks and grass.
The bunny jars were also a fun project. We painted mason jars with white paint and added paper ears to the top.

Student Art 2017-18

I've been particularly proud of my students this year. The 2017-18 school year was a rough one. I was on maternity leave for two months (luckily our Christmas break was in there along with a snow day so I technically only missed 5 weeks, not 8) and the flu outbreak this last winter was insane. However, I am very proud of my students for sticking with it and applying themselves to the fullest degree of their ability.

Mother's Day was in reality gloomy and rainy, but my students brightened up their parents' day with hand print sunshine cards using a mixture of yellow and orange tempera paint and writing sweet notes with sharpie markers. 

 One of the most memorable projects we did this year was portraits of a loved one. The question I asked my students was, "Who in your life is the most awesome, the most fun and the greatest being?" The result was mothers, uncles, friends, grandpas and uncles and of course... family pets.

 This most recent project was also one to remember. There has been so much rain lately that the tv and radio stations are overloaded with flood warnings. However, for those of us who live near wetlands, we have these hoppy little dudes hanging around and the kids were very eager to put their skills to the test and paint a likeness.

This project was created in my American Girl class. We've studied American Girl Kaya, a young girl from the Nez Perce tribe and this project came about as a way of showing my students what Kaya's village would've looked like. They loved using Crayola Model Magic to create their villages. We also added some rocks and painted to complete the look.

 This project was during the flu outbreak, so my classes had a low student count. However, the three students that did manage to make it to class had a blast making examples of art inspired by Andy Warhol (the Campbell Soup artist, if that rings a bell). Repetition and crazy colors were the name of the game and hand prints are always a win.

Last but not least, I wanted to include an honorable mention from the 2016-17 school year. We had a special project where the students could paint whatever they wanted on a stretched canvas (a HUGE hit) and this student chose to do a painting of horses running through water, inspired by my own piece Wild and Free that I completed for ArtPrize 2015. (You can check that out here: Wild and Free by Brittany Rudd.) This nine year old student was so unsure and scared and had so much self doubt about her talents and abilities that year, but her face said it all when she showed me her finished project. Absolutely stunning.

About Me

Hi! My name is Brittany. I grew up in southwest Michigan and was homeschooled from 2nd grade until I graduated high school. From there, I went to a local community college and earned my Associates of Applied Science degree, majoring in illustration and fine arts. In 2012, I married my best friend, Andrew, and after many jobs, three apartments, six cars and one house, we are settled not far from my hometown on a 5 acre wooded lot in the middle of nowhere. Andrew is a civil engineer at a local engineer/survey/architecture firm and I am an elementary tutor at a local homeschool co-cop. We have two dogs and ten chickens. And last December 2017 we welcomed our first child, a boy we named Dawson. Life is good. But definitely busy! Which is why I decided to set up this blog, not only for myself for future reference for upcoming classes, but also for you in case you're busy and you need a quick, messy (or not) project to satisfy your kids' craziness. Anyway, welcome! Let the adventure begin!