Exploring Plasticine - Inspiration From Barbara Reid

Picture a tree - what do you see?

From bare branches tracing the sky to an explosion of colour, a place for adventure or a friend to shelter us from the sun - a tree can be so many things.

As part of celebrating each child as an artist in our classroom, we decided to combine art with our exploration of a Big Idea of changes in our local environment. Our inquiry continues as we have tracked a tree in our school yard all year long from fall, into winter and now from spring into the beginning of summer.

Our Plasticine Provocation:

After reading Barbara Reid's latest book entitled Picture a Tree, our students began asking questions related to the pictures they saw in the story. "Are they paintings?," "Are they drawings?," "How did she do it?" are only some of the questions that came from our students. With this interest, we decided to show the artists in our classrooms how Barbara Reid creates her storybook illustrations with plasticine through the "Simple Tree" short video clips found on her website. Our student artists then planned their own creative interpretations of the book. They then took their plans and created their artistic works.

A Raving Review:

After our Principal helped celebrate our students' artistic achievements by visiting our gallery and taking pictures, he decided to send Barbara Reid an email informing her of their creations! Surprisingly, we received a quick response:

Hello Mr. C,

What a beautiful start to the day! Thank you very much for sending me the link to the gorgeous artwork by your kindergarten students. I love creating books, but it is enthusiastic teachers, librarians and parents who put them into readers hands and bring the pages to life. Plasticine is an excellent medium for exploration and creativity, I’m delighted that your students had the opportunity to work with it. Please share my congratulations with the teachers and artists, their work will inspire me on my current project!

Best regards and happy reading,

Barbara

Take a look at how we made our students' learning visible through the art of plasticine!