Welcome to Lines, Dots, and Doodles. This is the place for students, parents, and teachers to find out what has been going on in my art class. I have included pictures of my student's artwork and basic explanations of the projects. I hope when you leave this blog, you feel inspired to create. Feel free to browse this blog and borrow any of my art lessons.


Sunday, September 25, 2011

Starry Night, 2nd Grade

Everyone loves Van Gogh's Starry Night, and I have done many art projects based on it. Here is my latest one.
This project is really very simple. I had my students draw stars and wind with oil pastels. Next, we used liquid watercolors to paint the sky. Lastly, students drew a city onto black paper, which was then cut out and glued to their painting.
I just love these! My second graders did a great job.

Saturday, September 24, 2011

Pinterest is AWESOME!

I have seen many people talk about Pinterest, but I never understood the point. However, now that I have joined, I just LOVE it. For a visual person like me, I just love logging in, and looking at the many pictures. Such a wonderful source of inspiration. Plus, I now have a way to save the many ideas I find on other blogs. Never again, will I find a great idea, and forget where I found it.
I don't have many things posted yet, but hopefully I will soon. If you are on Pinterest, follow me at; http://pinterest.com/jvanders/


By the way: The picture at the top has nothing to do with this post. Just thought this post needed some color, so I posted one of my paintings.

Blue and White Vases, 3rd Grade

I found this wonderful idea on Deep Space Sparkle. I began this lesson by showing students many examples of Blue and White Chinese Vases. The vase was cut out of white paper, and then we used blue paint to paint the designs. After this, I demonstrated different ways to paint a flower. I told my students that each painting had to have at least ten flowers. The flowers were limited to blue, yellow, and white. These turned out beautiful! I am so proud of my students.

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Name Mandala

I have seen this lesson posted on many sites before, but always thought it looked complicated. However, after seeing wonderful step by step instructions on Art Lessons From Belgium, I decided it was time to try this with my fourth graders.
This lesson wasn't hard at all, and I ended up with wonderful results. The hardest part was getting the students to write their name large enough. If they do not write their name large, the letters will not connect to each other. If you need detail directions, they are on Art Lessons from Belgium.
I think these turned out great.

Saturday, September 10, 2011

Paper Masks, 5th Grade

This is one of my favorite lessons, and I do this with my fifth graders every year. This is a wonderful lesson to teach symmetry. I just LOVE how these turned out.