Chinese New Year 2016: The Year of the MONKEY

February provides a wealth of integrated arts inspiration for Art Teachers! February 8th (2016) is Chinese New Year--the Year of the Monkey. Here are some of the projects from my site that I've done with my students over the years along with some resources and projects from the interweb that I love. 

My previous posts:

Chinese Calligraphy Placemats/Posters

Easy Paper Lanterns

Dragon Puppets

Projects I LOVE from around the web:

• Simple dragon puppet from Red Ted's Art Blog
• These simple banners (no original link--just a photo). Sorry, I love anything with crepe paper streamers!
• Thumbprint Lanterns from Let's Go Fly a Kite (you gotta look at this one--so cool!)
• Chinese Dragon Puppets from Olive Art!! Do You???
• Fingerprint Cherry Blossom Lantern (with FREE Printable) from Imagination Box

And a recipes to enjoy:

Rainbow Chicken Fried Rice

Resources I've used:

• "China: DK Eyewitness Books," by Poppy Sebag-Montefiore (A nice overview of China and Chinese culture. The book has some clear, beautiful images of calligraphy, writing, and dragon costumes).

• "Gung Hay Fat Choy," by June Behrens (This is a great nonfiction book that has lots of pictures and info about Chinese New Year. I love the pictures of the dragons used in the Dragon Dance).

• "Moonbeams, Dumplings & Dragon Boats," by Nina Simonds, Leslie Swartz & The Children's Museum, Boston (A wonderful book of Chinese holiday tales, activities and recipes).

• "The Boy Who Painted Dragons,"by Demi (All of Demi's books are beautiful! This artist has been known to paint with a mouse's whisker! She's also created books on Mother Theresa, Mary and Jesus).

• "The Kid's Multicultural Art Book," by Alexandra M. Terzian (This is a great go-to book for a number of crafts from around the world. A must for an art teacher's personal collection. I love the whole series of art books for children by this publisher).

• "The Paper Dragon," by Marguerite W. Davol (LOVE this book! And artist saves his village from a dragon by using creativity and intelligence. A great book!)

• "You Can Write Chinese," by Kurt Wiese (A bit dated, but the way the information about Chinese symbols is presented is wonderful and very kid-friendly).

• A China Family Adventure. http://www.china-family-adventure.com/chinese-writing-symbols.html (Accessed January 2012) This site has a section entitled, "Learning Chinese Writing Symbols for Kids" that has some wonderful, clear images of chinese calligraphy and a nice chart that shows the evolution of a few Chinese characters (this is where you will see that the original Chinese character for rain looks like rain falling from a cloud)

• Chinese Calligraphy By Kids. http://library.thinkquest.org/3614/intro.htm (Accessed January 2012) A wonderful website by two elementary girls that is very child-friendly and has a ton of wonderful information about Chinese calligraphy, great picture examples and explanation of some symbols and the combination of symbols. Lovely!

Happy New Year--A Calendar Idea For You!

Every year I teach a couple of art classes after school where the students create gifts for giving. I try to have them create projects based on common giftable items such as jewelry, mugs, homemade games, and calendars. This year's calendar took the origami quilt idea and used the same samurai helmet motifs around a year-at-a-glance calendar.

My students busily created their projects in a day-long workshop, but these calendars were saved for last, just in case they couldn't finish them in class, they could take them home and do them on their own. So here's how to make them:

Origami Calendar

Supplies Needed:

• 12 pieces of 6" square origami paper (6 prints and 6 solids)
• A (size) year at a glance calendar (ours was from: www.yourmomhatesthis.com)
• Glue stick
• One 12" x 12" piece of paper for the background (we used scrapbook paper)
• One 12" x 12" sheet protector (the size used in scrapbooking)

Directions:

1. Use the origami paper to make 12 samurai hats. If you need directions for this, go to the links in my Origami Quilts post (about halfway down the post).

2. If the little flaps of your finished samurai helmets aren't laying flat, use the glue stick to tack them down. This isn't necessary, but it looks neater if the flaps are flat.

3. Glue the calendar to the center of the 12" x 12" background using the glue stick.

4. Arrange the samurai hats around the calendar in a pleasing pattern. Use the image for reference, if desired. Glue the samurai helmets to the background using the glue stick.

5. Slide the finished calendar into the sheet protector with the ring holes of the sheet protector at the top of the calendar, so that you can hang it up. This calendar can also be placed in a 12" x 12" frame for a more finished and permanent display (12" square frames can be found at craft stores for a few dollars).

Enjoy! And HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Easy Paper Lanterns

Here's an easy way to decorate for your Chinese New Year Celebration! These paper lanterns take two sheets of paper, some cutting and stapling and you're done! Make a few to hang around your dining room for January 23rd, Chinese New Year 2012! 

Supplies Needed:

• 1 9" x 12" sheet construction paper, yellow
• 1 9" x 12" sheet construction paper, red (red is the color of joy)
• 1 1" strip of paper for handle, any color
• Ruler
• Scissors
• Pencil
• Stapler

Directions:

1. Beginning with a short side of the yellow paper, roll up the paper to make a tube that is roughly 3" in diameter. Secure with a couple of staples (or you could use glue stick or tape).

2. Fold the red piece of paper in half lengthwise (like a hot dog bun). Use the ruler to draw a 1" line along the long edge that is not the folded edge. Use the scissors to make a series of cuts from the folded edge stopping at the pencil line you made. These cuts should be spaced about 1/2" apart. Make sure that you begin the cuts at the folded end and stop at your line that is 1" from the opposite edge.

3. Unfold the red piece of paper. Wrap the red piece of paper around the yellow tube about 1" down from the top. Secure the red paper to the tube using a couple of staples. Do the same by wrapping and securing the red paper about 1" up from the bottom of the yellow tube. That will make the red paper bow out and create the effect of a lantern with glowing yellow light within.

4. Secure a 1" paper strip to the top of the lantern. 

You are done! These look pretty hanging from the ceiling or lined up along the center of the table.

Dragon Puppets

Gung Hay Fat Choy! Happy New Year!

Chinese New Year falls on Monday, January 23rd this year, the Year of the Dragon! In previous years I have had my art students create Dragon puppets and lanterns in honor of the holiday. This year, I'm going to post a couple of related projects so your family can mix and match and have a celebration of your own! These projects are appropriate for a variety of ages, have fun!

Dragon Puppets:

I have made dragon puppets in the past, but I really wanted to try creating the version I saw in Family Fun Magazine about a year ago. They are elaborate (in terms of kid crafts), but worth the work since they definitely have a "WOW" factor! You can find the directions here.

A quick note: I don't usually have projects where children create carbon-copies of the same craft, but these dragons we created in class look very much the same since I didn't have four weeks to let the children all do unique dragons in terms of color and body, etc. Someday maybe I can allow a bit more choice, but for now I chose the colors they would do. 

Here are some suggestions I have when doing this project with a group:

• Enlist some grown-up help. I had one helper (besides me) for 10 children. We don't have water in our room, so I think I would grab a bucket of water so that no one was leaving to refill water buckets. Have an empty bucket for dumping dirty water into.
• Precut the egg cartons in the sections.
• Precut the fabric into rectangles.
• Create stations to break the craft down into manageable pieces. I had a station for painting the eyes, a station for painting the mouth, and a station for painting the fabric body. When the children were done all of the painting they could go to the cutting station and cut out all of their "extra" pieces like the eyebrows, etc.
• At each station, have step-by-step instructions for the specific piece they are creating at that station with a finished example of that piece (not the whole dragon).
• Have grown-ups in charge of dispensing paint.
• Create a drying area. I laid out sections of newspaper and wrote each child's name on a section. When they were done a piece of their dragon, they could put it onto the newspaper with their name on it to dry. This kept all of their pieces together and I could quickly see what each child needed to finish before class ended.
• Allow for drying time. It would be great if you could leave the pieces to dry overnight. I don't have space for this since the room I use needs to be empty when I leave. Use a cardboard tray to move and store the pieces between classes if you have to move them.
• Paint during one session, assemble during another. You could even make this a three (or four) part class if you had time. 
• Photocopy the chin and tail templates directly onto the colors of paper you want to use. I also needed the children to cut multiple shapes at the same time, but cutting many layers of paper can be too tricky (and time consuming) for some. I stapled the paper together through the shapes they should be cutting out. This held the layers together so they could cut them out. Once the shapes were cut out, I removed the staples (the holes left behind are small).
• On assembly day, work with 2 children at a time to assemble the finished dragons while the rest of the class does something else (maybe Chinese calligraphy?). It is a nightmare to try to walk more than two children through assembly process. Call in another grown-up if need be to speed the process along.
• Cover everything with newspaper and have everyone (including grown-up helpers) wear aprons. I was painted on a couple of times yesterday by accident :-)
• Don't use good paintbrushes for this. Due to the nature of this craft the paint gets ground into the brushes no matter what you do. Encourage the children to place the brushes back in the water when they are done painting so the paint doesn't dry on the brushes (especially if using acrylics).

Despite all of these warnings, I really did love this craft! I think it is totally worth doing and would be very manageable with a small group or single child. Just plan ahead and take your time! ENJOY!