Spring Wildflowers: A Third Grade Art Show
A “Picturing Writing” project from Ms. Tesoriero’s 3rd grade class, Northeast Elementary School, Ithaca, NY.
Meet the artists at an opening reception on Saturday, March 11 from 2:00 - 4:00 p.m. Light refreshments will be served.
All third grade students in Ithaca and Trumansburg Elementary schools participate in our Wildflower Explorations Program. This is part of the Kids Discover the Trail collaboration, which provides curriculum-based fieldtrips to the eight Discovery Trail sites. Volunteers of Cornell Botanic Gardens guide students through three wildflower activities in the classroom. Then each student is assigned a “detective mission” to learn about a specific native plant.
At school, students work on their wildflower detective mission learning clues for identifying their plant, reviewing their personal “Peterson First Guide to Wildflowers,” taking notes, and writing questions. After all this preparation, students are excited when visiting the Mundy Wildflower Garden to discover their flower and share their knowledge. To conclude their outing, they write a report and receive a “Mission Completed” stamp.
After their field trip, Ms. Tesoriero’s class took it one step further to enrich their learning across disciplines. Based on Beth Olshansky’s research and her book entitled “The Power of Pictures: Creating Literacy through Art,” students created detailed drawings of their wildflowers. Then each student wrote an acrostic poem using letters in their wildflower’s name.
The students used a watercolor wax resist painting technique with crayon to make their drawings.
Eighteen prints created by the students are on display through the end of April, 2017.