JH Shaded Portraits

I'm pretty sure I've written about this before, but I'm always pleased by the success that I want to share again!

My JH students were to choose a famous person they wanted to do a shaded drawing of using a grid.  For many of them, this was the first time for a grid and for serious shading.  They rose to the challenge and did a great job!

We focused on the contour lines and getting the shapes right by using a grid system.  I'm a fan of the grid, only because for a lot of my students it "clicks" and that is such a great thing to see.  They are proud of what they have done and see the success which is awesome.  I think that it is a great tool for them to know how to use.  We spent a good week preparing our photos, paper, and drawing the contour lines in the drawing.  We then spent another full week shading.  I demonstrate some tips and tricks for them and we discuss the differences in shading pencils.

I got some pretty great results:

Country Singer...I can't remember the name

Weird Al Yankovic

Taylor Swift

Michael Jordan

One of my JH boys who has struggled with a lot of projects made the comment the other day when they handed these projects in that this was the best project we had done so far!  I was very pleased and proud of this statement, first because who it came from and second because this was a really challenging project and my kids stepped it up!  What a proud moment :)

Perspective and 5th Grade!

I've never done anything with perspective younger than my 7th and 8th grade students, but I decided after seeing my HS students struggle with it more than I expected to give it a try.  My 5th graders stepped up and rocked it!  I showed them how I would do my last name using 1 point perspective and they loved how it looked!  I explained how it worked and that it would probably be a challenging project but I believed they could do it...and they did!

My students first chose either their first or last name, most of the decisions came easily based on the number of letters.  We focused on creating block or bubble letters and spreading them across the page.  This step alone in itself was a challenge for many, but we kept working at it until we got it.  Then we added the point and using a ruler connected each letter to the dot in the appropriate areas.  My students had an understanding that I would be coming around to check everyone's work, so they needed to be patient.  While they were waiting for me to come around and answer questions and check their work, I encouraged them to ask the people at their table to see if they could figure out their questions together.  After they finished, students added color with colored pencils.

Here are some results...not too shabby for 5th grade! :)