The kids had a lot of fun with this multi stepped autumn project. First make salt dough, and find some leaves to make leaf imprints into the salt dough. Niamh got really creative and made a frog. Jude even got stuck in with the painting.
Niamh enjoyed putting the finishing touches on her frog - perhaps a paperweight ?
Niamh finishing it off with some modge podge. Which seals it off nicely and gives it a nice shine.
I always get soo excited when we learn a new art technique. This one is called Batik. Firstly the picture is drawn on material, and then the picture is glued with washable pva. The material and picture is then painted over with acrylic paint.
The end pictures - above is Eden's, below is Niamh's. Note how the tree is totally covered over. Once the painting is dry, the material is placed in hot water so that the glue(which covered the trees) comes off, and pulls the paint off with it. To reveal the lovely autumn tree pattern below. Niamh's tree.
We finally got some transparency paper so the girls could finish off the geckos they started a while ago. This was a really fun craft, as they had not done anything like this before. They made a colour wheel which went behind the picture and as they spin it the gecko changes colour. The transparency paper is for the geckos black markings.
On art day Eden also did a sketch of a Komodo Dragon, a reptile she is utterly fascinated with.
We continue with our Autumn inspiration for Art Day on Mondays. Eden and Niamh enjoyed doing these watercolour autumn trees, and finished off the leaves with acrylic paint. Niamh's painting.
We are implementing a new weekly routine. Each day of the week will be assigned a certain learning day. So Monday is Art Day, Tuesday is History Day, Wednesday is Geography Day, Thursday is Science Day and Friday is Foreign languages day. Of course the children will still do their maths, spelling, reading, english and music on a daily basis, it is just that when all of that is finished , we can then focus on one particular subject a day. We started the new routine last week and it worked fabulously well. Jude is studying air in Science, so for his Science day he got to do some fun experiments - of course everyone gets involved anyway.
In this experiment an empty bottle is place in a pot of boiling water. A coin is placed on top, and as the water heats the air in the bottle, the air expands and pushes the coin up making the clicking sounds. In this experiment a ping pong ball is dented. The dented ball is placed in a cup of hot water. The air inside the ball heats up, expands and pushes the dent out. Eden has been learning about conduction of heat. In this experiment she had to find out what material would conduct the heat the best. The three different materials(wood, plastic and metal) are placed in a cup of hot water and a blob of butter with a raisin is placed on the top. The heat travels up the materials, melts the butter and the raisin falls into the water.
We were told about this software from a friend who was sure our kids would enjoy it, and enjoy it they do!! It is simple programming language based interactive software which introduces children to simple logic in programs, like when, do, and repeat and x and y variables, and enables them to create the artistic as well as the programming elements. You can imagine Eden is in her element creating the art for the program functions to utilize. (This program reminds me of how much I enjoyed creating simple programs from age 9 or so, and I will be looking into introducing more hardcoding for the children too). We have always dabbled in geography in some shape or form, be it map work or learning about geological topics. Eden is self studied in rocks and minerals as it is a pet love of hers, and the kids have done various topics on things like weather and volcanoes etc, but I have felt the need to get a bit more organized with geography and find a fun and interactive curriculum. I like the one below and the kids have had fun with it already too, it increases general knowledge and brings in map work alongside, as always I am learning as much as the children.
I thought that we should grab the opportunity to do some autumn crafts, it is such an artistically evocative time of the year with so many crafting possibilities too. Ciara choosing some autumn colours. Niamh's finished autumn tree.
Eden wanted to experiment with the paints herself and come up with some lovely pictures.
First make salt dough, and find some leaves to make leaf imprints into the salt dough.
Niamh got really creative and made a frog.
Jude even got stuck in with the painting.
Niamh enjoyed putting the finishing touches on her frog - perhaps a paperweight ?
Niamh finishing it off with some modge podge.
Which seals it off nicely and gives it a nice shine.
Firstly the picture is drawn on material, and then the picture is glued with washable pva.
The material and picture is then painted over with acrylic paint.
The end pictures - above is Eden's, below is Niamh's. Note how the tree is totally covered over.
Once the painting is dry, the material is placed in hot water so that the glue(which covered the trees) comes off, and pulls the paint off with it.
To reveal the lovely autumn tree pattern below.
Niamh's tree.
On art day Eden also did a sketch of a Komodo Dragon, a reptile she is utterly fascinated with.
Niamh's painting.
Eden's painting
In this experiment a ping pong ball is dented.
The dented ball is placed in a cup of hot water.
The air inside the ball heats up, expands and pushes the dent out.
Eden has been learning about conduction of heat. In this experiment she had to find out what material would conduct the heat the best. The three different materials(wood, plastic and metal) are placed in a cup of hot water and a blob of butter with a raisin is placed on the top. The heat travels up the materials, melts the butter and the raisin falls into the water.
We have always dabbled in geography in some shape or form, be it map work or learning about geological topics. Eden is self studied in rocks and minerals as it is a pet love of hers, and the kids have done various topics on things like weather and volcanoes etc, but I have felt the need to get a bit more organized with geography and find a fun and interactive curriculum. I like the one below and the kids have had fun with it already too, it increases general knowledge and brings in map work alongside, as always I am learning as much as the children.
Ciara choosing some autumn colours.
Niamh's finished autumn tree.
