hope is the thing with feathers

Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all...
-Emily Dickinson

The second grade artists thought of this poem and the bird metaphor as they created a clay bird on which to place their own hopes! Above is a bird shaped collection of their hopes. I also did this project with my fifth grade advisory at the beginning of the year as a place to put their academic and personal hopes for the year. Something about stamping each letter of their hope into the clay really helps to strengthen the concept for them.



I was inspired to do this project after seeing Kristin Love's beautiful Poetry Birds. The second graders really responded to her use of texture and fluid shape.


I love the way Andrew creatively stamped in his name and his hope for more art in the world!








Hope for strong friendships.


Hope for quiet- from his sister:)


His original hope was to discover that dinosaurs really do still exist. After considering the space constraints, he shortened it to find.




I am always asking them to be brave artists so I was pleased to see some hopes to be brave!




Aashna was proud to share with us that her name means hope.

second grade bird sculptures

The second grade artists have finished up their bird watercolors and are now working on creating bird sculptures! Each bird actually started out using the pinch pot method in clay. The features of the birds were carefully pulled out and texture was added using various tools. The artists chose a piece of wood as the sculpture base and had to decide how their bird would balance. The clay birds were kiln fired, glazed, fired again, and then carefully perched. It was fun to see what kind of wood the children were drawn to- some organic and rough others smooth and geometric.



Last year I made a fun trip to the workshop of NCS family Willard Woodrights to collect pieces of scrap wood for the art room. They have a passionate interest in using reclaimed, locally harvested urban hardwood whenever possible and we are very fortunate to have these gorgeous pieces to use for our art projects. I love their philosophy and you can read more about what they do here.

second grade has gone to the birds!

The second grade artists worked so hard to create these beautiful detailed watercolor renderings of birds with a focus on line and color. They also learned about the artist/naturalist John James Audubon in The Boy Who Drew Birds by Jacqueline Davis.



This lovely book tells the story of John James Audubon as a young boy who diligently studies the habits of birds and discovers the secrets of small bird migration. Did you know that scientists used to think that small birds migrated to the moon, transformed into larger birds, or hibernated under water during the winter?!







We learned that John James Audubon had to shoot and stuff the birds in order to draw them so accurately. Fortunately no birds were harmed in the making of these watercolors! The second grade artists used photography to help them study the birds so closely.





John James Audubon was the first person in North America to band a bird in 1804 and the second graders were excited to make the connection to the Lewis and Clark expedition also starting that year!





We spent a lot of time talking about the visual characteristics of birds and played bird inspired Pictionary (which I used as a pre-assessment tool). They end up drawing well over 20 types of birds by the end of the hour! They did a great job using their spatial and interpersonal intelligences here.