Students in Ms. Stengl's class at Alice Birney are creating personal art based on memories and learning about abstract art.  They have been practicing abstracting images through simplifying, exaggerating and distorting the original image.   After their first iteration, students shared their work and got feedback from classmates:
​-you could take out some details to simplify the people
-maybe make the ball bigger to exaggerate something on the field
-add lots of colors to the background
-you can make the arms wiggly
-you could exaggerate the Golden Gate Bridge
-you filled in the space but make the background a different color than that guy or make that guy a different color
-add more fins to your shark
-less details, simplify it
-you could make his eyebrows bigger
-you might want some more shapes, it looks like all background
-it's okay if it doesn't look like a thing, that's not good or bad

When creating their final artwork, students have many considerations.  They can use the feedback from peers.  They might keep elements of their first iterations or change something about their work that didn't work well for them.  
It is exciting to see their creativity and the diversity in their work.

One of the best things about creative education is reimagining curriculum in collaboration with others.  A fourth-grade teacher came to me with a California Missions project she had done in the past.  The project had worked okay in the past, but she wanted it to be more creative and original on the part of the students.  She also hoped it could be more integrated with the social studies and/or English Language Arts.  We are still brainstorming ideas with each other and here are some initial thoughts.

 Her previous project had students trace a photo of a mission.  This created a class full of almost identical images. I suggested a 'viewfinder' approach.  A viewfinder is a rectangular opening in a piece of cardboard that allows the artist to crop or reframe the scene-zooming into one area for artistic effect.  Even if a whole class of students used the same original image, it is unlikely any two students will crop the new scene in exactly the same way.  This process emphasizes the Creative Skills of "Envision-Imagine multiple possibilities" and "Create-Make something original" as well as "Engage-Make it yours". For a demo project, I cut a viewfinder from a piece of cardstock, but empty slide frames are ideal viewfinders.  The demo project shown here is done in oil pastel with a watercolor wash, but any medium is suitable.

We're still brainstorming integration concepts for this project.  For example, what if students not only used 'point of view' for creating the visual artwork, but also used 'point of view' when writing?  How would poetry sound from the viewpoints of those affected by the California missions?   How would the colors, mood and tone change in the artwork change when viewed from an Indigenous viewpoint as opposed to a Catholic missionary viewpoint?   Could students collaborate to create a two-voice poem with separate artworks that represent each voice?  

Step 1: Students use the viewfinder to find the scene they would like for their composition.  Here concepts of symmetry and balance can be useful and natural discussions.  

Step 2: Use the proportion of the viewfinder opening to create a similar sized canvas.  In my case, the viewfinder opening was 2cm x 3 cm or a 2:3 ratio.  I set up the canvas as 10 cm x 15 cm to preserve this 2:3 ratio.  This can be done by the teacher if the mathematics is outside the grade level of the student.  If the canvas is a different ratio, the final artwork will be distorted which can be interesting.  

Step 3: Set up a grid.  Since this image was so simple, I cut the space in half vertically and horizontally creating 4 quadrants.  If the image was more challenging (a portrait, for example), smaller sections might be needed. For example, 6 vertical divisions and 4 horizontal divisions.  As shown below, the original image has 4 quadrants and the larger canvas also has 4 corresponding quadrants. 

Step 4: Draw the image lightly on the canvas.  Here is where the grid can come in handy.  For example, the building had a dark line exactly on the horizontal division line, and the tree occupied the entire bottom right hand quadrant, the building is about 2/3 the way across the left-hand quadrants, etc.  

Step 4: Erase the quadrant division lines from the canvas and complete the image using the media of your choice.  In my case, I used oil pastels and then a wash of watercolor to fill the white spaces on the paper.  To emphasize the hard edges of the architecture, I used a cardstock 'blocker' to create the straight edges of the building and the curve of the archway.

Step 5: Add framing, poetry or reflection.  How artwork is displayed often determines how it is perceived.  The artwork is perceived as a thinking activity when writing, revisions, reflection and curriculum are part of the display. 

Students in third grade at Grant School created art with chalk pastels.  They used techniques like distortion, simplification or exaggeration to abstract images from significant memories.  

Fourth grade students in Mr. Magnuson's class studied the abstract art of Wassily Kandinsky.  They looked at examples of abstract art made by other fourth graders.  Here's what they had to say about abstract art:
-can't tell what it is
-it's fun because you can't recognize all the things
-emotional
-random
-exciting
-confusing
-a way to show your feelings
-hallucinating, like it's moving with shadows
-it can be beautiful
-can be an escape from stressful reality
-illusions and nauseous
-if you're going through something, you can get it out
-it can have images you can recognize but are distorted
-a gateway to freedom
-it has things that might remind you of something but reminds someone else of something else
-images you can recognize but they are distorted


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