I Like My Crayons Naked.

Today, we kicked off a Kinder lesson on Piet Mondrian.  We read Perfect Square by Michael Hall, which is a beautiful story about one square with unlimited possibilities.

The Kinder kiddos loved looking at images of Mondrian's impressionistic-looking work before his style was transformed forever into the pieces we recognize today.  

Before:

Trees Along a River, 1907-1908

As Mondrian continued to paint such naturescapes, he realized more and more how everything around us is made up of basic shapes and primary colors.  After this realization, his work truly began to shift.

After:

Composition with Red, Blue, and Yellow, 1930

The young artists started with one tracer of either a square, circle, or triangle, but had to PICK and STICK with whatever shape they selected from the very beginning.  So, if a student chose a square tracer, that was their one and only shape of the day.

After getting their papers, the Kindergarteners had to pick a black crayon from the teacher table and walk back to their seats to get tracing.  I noticed one little girl was still hanging around my teacher table and when I walked over to her, I noticed she was quickly peeling off her crayon paper.

Kinder:  (giggling embarrassedly)  Sorry, Miss D, but I like my crayons naked.

BEST QUOTE EVER.  In fact, that belongs on a t-shirt.

Here are our masterpieces in progress below:

I have an inkling these are going to be pretty Mondrian-licious when they are done.  Naked crayons and all.