Mayo's Masterpieces: Creating with Carle

This week we were introduced to author and illustrator, Eric Carle. Mr. Carle makes his own paper for his illustrations. So our week began with an early Monday morning covered in paint!

We used this one of a kind paper to make another class big book. CSD, CSD, What Do You See? was, of course, inspired by Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? This is the first book Eric Carle illustrated although his friend, Bill Martin was the author. Illustrating this book led him down the path to being the author and illustrator that we love today! Here is Ashley's page illustrating "Ms. Joy in her office looking at me."

Students tried their hand at drawing stars after reading Draw Me a Star. We used painted foil to collage these a la Eric Carle. Here is Gavin's star.

The students noticed that Eric Carle must love nature. Many of his books have things in nature as their main characters. The Tiny Seed inspired us to go outside and plant some seeds of our own. Little Cloud inspired us to make some clouds of our own out of shaving creme.

Of course, St. Patrick's Day was this week. The leprechauns indeed visited our room. Some of the students left traps hoping to catch one or two. Instead of a Leprechaun, our traps contained a note from the leprechauns which led us on a treasure hunt around the classroom. Our hunt concluded with the discovery of a music box filled with good luck coins. It was great fun and quite exciting. We enjoyed reading some Seasonal Tomie DePaola books filled with leprechauns, fairies, and giants. Then, students created their own imaginary creature imagining what it might look like, where it might live, and what it might eat. Here are Michaela's fairy and Johnny's standing guard around our treasure and note.

Carle Crazy? Here are some links you may want to visit:
Home to all things Carle http://www.eric-carle.com/
The blog of the man himself!http://ericcarleblog.blogspot.com/
Video of Eric Carle reading on Mister Roger's Neighborhood http://pbskids.org/rogers/video_readingTogether.html
Eric Carle books and stuffed animals at Kohl's! http://www.kohlscorporation.com/communityrelations/Community02.htm

Thanks to our readers for the week!