Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Posted by Cindy on August 31, 2009
Here are the resources that have been in my sidebar for our August artist study. Henri Rousseau is in the sidebar for September
Paul Cezanne
The Mount Sainte-Victoire
Still-life with Apples
House and Trees
Boy in a Red Waistcoat
Lesson Ideas
Math Lesson for Older Students
Books We’ll Read
Posted by Cindy on August 28, 2009
I admit that wildflowers are quite possibly my favorite of all nature studies. I’m always in awe of God’s creativeness, beauty and majesty through such delicate little things like wildflowers. I’m also amazed at how each season presents me with new flowers that I’ve never noticed before – each with awesome characteristics that are different from any other flower.
A field of wildflowers can move me, while a single wildflower observed closely makes me marvel at the constant, yet diverse design that makes a flower a flower. And to think that wildflowers are “planted by God” reminds me that He cares about me enough to bring me flowers!
I have posted at Shining Dawn Books about this week’s identification walk. I hope you’ll take a minute to hop over there and read An Abundance of Wildflowers as it’s somewhat of a continuation of this post.
Last week, we took a very up-close and personal look at wildflowers through comparisons and dissection. There was no long nature walk involved – only long enough to collect several flower samples to bring back inside. Since the yard wasn’t off limits for picking, the kiddos brought in a couple of flowers that aren’t considered wild. No matter, it made for a great opportunity to discuss the difference between the two!
The first activity was to compare two completely different flowers for similarities and differences. This is another of the notebooking pages that comes with the Wonderful Wildflowers NaturExplorers unit.
The second activity was flower dissection to identify all the parts of a flower.
We own a very old dissection kit that made the dissection not only easy, but exciting for the kids.
We were able to see the ovules (eggs) in the ovary on this hollyhock (not a wildflower).
Eli always gets in on the action!
The third activity was drawing the cross-section of a flower and labeling all the parts.
And the final activity was to complete a watercolor still-life of wildflowers. We have been studying Cezanne, who painted several still-life works, so this tied art and nature study together quite well. And to get composer study in the mix, we listened to a CD of Chopin (our composer of the month.)
“Wildflowers in the Rain”
Posted by Cindy on May 11, 2009
Well, I shamefully admit that you may see Cezanne in the sidebar again next school year. We finished up school around the middle of April and when we were done, we were DONE! Artist and composer study didn’t happen. The way I look at it – I’m one step ahead of the game as the new school year approaches! LOL
Here are the sidebar references for Cezanne for your sake and mine!
Paul Cezanne
The Mount Sainte-Victoire
Still-life with Apples
House and Trees
Boy in a Red Waistcoat
Lesson Ideas
Math Lesson for Older Students
Books We’ll Read
Posted by Cindy on May 4, 2009
Our homeschool group visited the Cincinnati Art Museum last week. What a wonderful trip!! We knew we’d see art and hoped we find art by a famous artist or two, but had no idea how many famous artist’s works they have. I’ve included a BUNCH of pictures, but this only scratches the surface of treasures we found! And even better – the trip was FREE!
(Sorry for the slant to the pictures. The only way to take a decent picture without an awful glare was to take it from the side. And these pictures don’t do the artwork one bit of justice!)
Really from Egypt!
Matteo di Giovanni
Grant Wood
Charles Russell
Theodore Rousseau
Van Gogh – My Favorite!!
Claude Monet
Mary Cassatt – My Second Favorite!
Pierre Auguste Renior
Paul Cezanne
Pablo Picasso
Marc Chagall
Andy Warhol
Joan Miro
I’m ready to go back and take more time to really observe the art – without a two year old would help! Fair warning – if you decide to go, realize there are nudes and it’s hard to avoid them.
Posted by Cindy on March 27, 2009
We just finished up our study of Van Gogh. As usual, I’m adding the resources from my sidebar into a post for future reference. April is our last artist study for the school year. (Yep, we’re almost finished with school – and looking forward to a nice, long summer break!!) We’ll be studying Cezanne. Those resources will be in the sidebar soon.
Lesson Ideas
Sunflowers
Starry Night
Apricot Trees in Blossom
Almond Tree in Blossom
Blossoming Almond Tree
I chose the three paintings above for the purpose of learning to draw trees this spring as they begin to blossom.
Books We Read
Here’s the last art/nature project of the Van Gogh month. After doing picture studies of the spring trees above, we went outside to find trees and bushes in bloom and the kiddos completed their own spring artwork.
