Printing Robots

1st grade students recently created printed robots, using cardboard and recycled materials to print or stamp paint on paper. Many students connected this to the cityscape prints they made as Kindergarten students! 

To print, we dipped the cardboard into the paint, then pressed it down on the paper and lifted it up to make a mark. We connected out lines together to make shapes to form our robot's body. We focused on four different shapes that we have learned about: square, rectangle, circle and triangle. As a challenge, artists had to include all four shapes in their artwork at least once!

We thought carefully about what different parts we wanted to add to our robots and what shapes might work best. Students also focused on using the whole paper for their robot and making their robot nice and big! 

After our printed robots dried, the following week students used oil pastel to add color to their robot. This year we got some new metallic oil pastels, which added some shiny metallic color to our artwork! We focused on the robot's body and experimented with layering and blending oil pastel colors together. 

We also talked about what our robots could do. Some of the robots help with homework and chores, cleaning and tidying rooms, protecting people, gathering information and making our favorite dinners! 

After we were done with our robots, we shared our artwork with a partner during a turn & talk. We shared our robots jobs with our partners and also swapped artwork and were able to identify the four different shapes in our partner's artwork. Here are some of our robots and their special jobs, below:

Amar, 1st Grade (McIsaac)
"My robot protects me from bad guys."

Audrey, 1st Grade (Landay)
"My robot cleans up my toys."

Cailin, 1st Grade (Salvucci)
"My robot will keep my baby sister Lillian quiet at night."

Elena, 1st Grade (Salvucci)
"My robot washes the dishes."

Ethan, 1st Grade (Salvucci)
"My robot will do my homework."

Harrison, 1st Grade (Salvucci)
"My robot is my babysitter."

Inty, 1st Grade (Landay)
"My robot does my chores."

Jacob, 1st Grade (Talamas)
"My robot helps me find the bathroom."

Joel, 1st Grade (Salvucci)
"My robot helps me with my homework."

Kaleb, 1st Grade (Landay)
"My robot helps me with my homework."

Kaylie, 1st Grade (Mandile)
"My robot plays with people."

Lucy, 1st Grade (Massa)
"My robot does everything for me."

Mateo, 1st Grade (McIsaac)
"My robot is a police robot and chases bad guys."

Sorayah, 1st Grade (Mandile)
"My robot plays with people."

Zoe, 1st Grade (Massa)
"My robot makes me dinner."

Printing Robots

1st grade students recently created printed robots, using cardboard and recycled materials to print or stamp paint on paper. Many students connected this to the cityscape prints they made as Kindergarten students! To print, we dipped the cardboard into the paint, then pressed it down on the paper and lifted it up to make a mark. 

We connected out lines together to make shapes to form our robot's body. We thought carefully about what different parts we wanted to add to our robot. Students also focused on using the whole paper and make their robot nice and big! 

After our robots dried, the following week students used oil pastel to add color to their robot. We focused on the robot's body and experimented with layering and blending oil pastel colors together. 

We also talked about what our robots could do. Some of the robots help with homework and chores, clean your room, protect people, do cartwheels, and collect data for scientists at NASA! Here are some of our robots and their special jobs, below:

Carson, "My robot makes me dinner, like pasta with meat sauce." 
1st Grade (Torchio)

Graham, "My robot collects data for scientists at NASA." 
1st Grade (Massa)

James, "My robot helps me get out of bed in the morning." 
1st Grade (Mandile)

Lucas S., "My robot does everything!" 
1st Grade (Salvucci)

Mane,"My robot helps me do my homework."
1st Grade (Landay)

Bella, "My robot brings me to the pool."
1st Grade (Massa)

Noa, "My robot does cartwheels." 
1st Grade (Torchio)

Aideen, "My robot just sleeps." 
1st Grade (Salvucci)

Dalton,"My robot does everything I want."
1st Grade (Mandile)

Megan, "My robot cleans my room."
1st Grade (Massa)

Printed Robots

1st grade students recently created printed robots, using cardboard and recycled materials to print or stamp paint on paper. Many students connected this to the cityscape prints they made as Kindergarten students!

To print, we dipped the cardboard into the paint, then pressed it down on the paper and lifted it up to make a mark. We connected out lines together to make shapes to form our robot's body. 

We thought carefully about what different parts we wanted to add to our robot. Students also focused on using the whole paper and make their robot nice and big!

After our robots dried, the following week students used oil pastel to add color to their robot. We focused on the robot's body and experimented with layering and blending oil pastel colors together. 

We also talked about what our robots could do. Some of the robots help with homework, make food when you are hungry, protect people, dance, and help find things that are lost! We shared our colorful robots at the end of class. Here are some of our robots and their special jobs, below. 

Dylon, "My robot helps people who are lost" 
(Torchio)

Callan, "My robot helps the police" 
(Landay)

Jasmine,"My robot helps people"
(Landay)

Evelyn, "My robot does ballet"
(Landay)

Printed Lines + Shapes

We have been continuing our exploration of lines in PK, Kindergarten and 1st grade, and are now connecting them to make shapes. We used paint, but this time we did not use a paintbrush or water cups. Instead, we used a new technique: printing!

We learned to make lines and shapes using a cardboard tool. First we dipped it into paint, then pressed it onto our paper and lifted it up to make a mark. Dip, press, lift. We practiced printing for a few minutes before we thought about how we might make a picture using these lines and shapes. 

We noticed that we could connect the lines to make them into shapes, and make different lines by changing the way we put our marks down on our paper. 

In 1st grade, artists created busy cityscapes, with tall skyscrapers, apartment buildings, stores, cars, and even people. 

One student decided to include Fenway in his cityscape!

In second grade, we turned our lines and shapes into robots, using our active imaginations! We thought about how they could have square heads, multiple eyes, wheels on their feet, and springs for hair. One of them is even solar powered!

We had a lot of fun coming up with our own cityscapes and robots, using our printed lines and shapes to inspire our imaginations. The following class, we added color using tempera paint. We thought about how to make our colors bright to fill in our shapes, as well as the background.

Priya, 1st Grade

Lenna, 1st Grade

Alani, 2nd Grade