Father's Day Art

Father’s Day Art

          Since our school year was extended, due to our 8 snow days, we will be in school right up until Father’s Day. This year I decided to have the kids paint a portrait of their dads. I always feel like I go all out for Mother’s Day; we plant flower seeds, make cards, and write about our moms. Somehow, I guess mainly because of the timing of the end of the school year, Father’s Day doesn’t get the attention it deserves. I started looking for ideas on TpT, but wasn’t sold on anything in particular, so I headed to Pinterest. After looking through 100s of pins (or at least it seemed like it) I came up empty handed. I then perused more art related pins, and decided on watercolor portraits.

          Fancy watercolor paper was donated by a student’s family (who’s very dear to my heart), which proved to be well worth it. And we had the brushes and watercolor disks at school. I had the kids draw their dads with pencil first, and then use oil pastels to go over their pencil lines. Then the kids were able to use the watercolors to paint.

Here are some shots of the kids working:

I was so impressed with their artwork- each student did a wonderful job and I know these will be a HUGE hit!

What did your students do for Father’s Day this year??

How-to Make a Root Beer Float

How-to Make Root Beer Floats

          I’m B-A-C-K!!! Well, sort of. I sincerely apologize for my extreme absence at Life in First! I wish I had some profound reason for my absence, but let’s just say we bought a house, I finished my Masters at Johns Hopkins, and obviously needed to still be a FANTASTIC teacher, thus my extended absence. I’ll fill in the gaps later… but tonight’s return post was inspired by the FUN how-to activity that took place in my classroom today: How-to Make Root Beer Floats!!

          We’ve been working on how-to writing since the beginning of May. My firstie friends wrote multiple how-to pieces of their choosing, selected one to publish, and then made their own how-to books. To celebrate their hard work and beautiful writing, we decided to make root beer floats. In the past, I’ve made PB&J sandwiches and s’mores, but with PB allergies and making s’mores for several years in a row, I offered a new choice to my kiddos. And let me just say…. IT WAS AWESOME!!

          I put together this recording sheet for my firsties to work on while enjoying their floats. 

Here’s one of my firsties enjoying her float J

Hard at work 

Enjoy!!