Year 3

Term 1

We started off our unit of work by reading the first chapter in Vincent’s Starry Night and Other Stories by Michael Bird which talks about the first artists who lived around 50,000 years ago. We then looked at some pictures and videos about Lion Man, an ancient carved sculpture believed to be around 40,000 years old. We did some experimental drawings of Lion Man in our books using different materials.

The following lesson we created a sculpture of Lion Man using clay. We discussed the materials that the original sculpture would be made out of and agreed that if it had been made out of clay, it would not have lasted 40,000 years.

We then looked at the difference between tints (adding white) and shade (adding black) and we experimented using paints to create different shades of brown. We also looked at some anatomy drawings of animals and drew a skeleton of a woolly mammoth. We also talked about how Stone Age artists would have used the shapes in the cave walls to plan where the animals would need to be painted. We had a go at drawing on the playground and underneath the table tops so that we would experience the difficulties that Stone Age artists would have had when they decorated the caves.

Finally, we learnt how to make some paper look old, by rubbing some chalk on it and repeatedly screwing it up and flattening it out. We had the choice of materials to create our own ‘cave art’ and used the techniques that we had learnt throughout the term.

Term 2

This term we were given the challenge to research and make our own Christmas stocking. First of all we researched stockings and looked at the kinds of pictures they have on them. We had to think about the design criteria and wrote a list of what we would need for a stocking. We all agreed that they needed to be strong to hold all the presents, they must not have any holes other than the one at the neck, they needed to be big enough to fit enough items in them and finally they needed to
look good.

We looked at clipart pictures to help us with our designs but we also used our imaginations so we had ideas like a Christmas cat too. Once we had designed the stockings we used pre-cut stocking pieces to practice threading needles and getting the hang of sewing in and out of the holes to join the pieces together.

We then had to draw our designs on pieces of paper, cut them out and use these as templates to draw around so that we could cut the pieces out of felt. Once these were cut out we sewed on the additional pieces such as the baubles on the Christmas trees and the buttons on the snowmen. Finally most of us used fabric glue to attach them onto our stockings (a few of us challenged ourselves to sew them on) and we also added some sequins for that extra Christmas sparkle!

Our finished stockings looked fabulous and Mrs Clarkson and Mrs Benfield were very proud of us. We got a class certificate for our perseverance for learning to thread needles and we all took our stockings home ready for Santa to come and fill up!

Term 3

This term we have been learning about volcanoes. We looked at a collage created by artist, Autumn Pearson and discussed the materials that she used to create the volcano. We experimented with some of these ideas so had a go at layering different materials, using modelling paste, paper mache, splatting paints etc and then we were ready to start making our own volcanoes.

First we looked at some photographs of volcanoes and decided which shape we wanted to use. We then had to think about the use of colour to express an idea or emotion. We talked about how the use of colour could affect how we feel about the art work and decided what time of the day we wanted to portray and the mood of the picture.

We then started building up our work by using different materials to add texture. We looked at how paper can be rolled up, screwed up or flattened to create different effects and some of us used modelling paste to make our volcanoes more textured. Once we had finished this we painted the background first and then the foreground and finally added coloured rice, straw and splattered paint to make them look really dramatic.

Term 4

Term 5

Term 6