Sunflowers

We are still studying the Sunflower State, Kansas, and when I think of sunflowers, I think of Vincent van Gogh.  Camille and the Sunflowers, A story about Vincent van Gogh by Laurence Anholt, is a picture book based on an actual encounter and real people.  The book tells the story of a boy named Camille who became friends with a lonely and unknown painter who is now recognized as a great artist.  The story is very sweet and includes some great life lessons about how to treat people who may be different. 

This book is a fantastic introduction to the works of van Gogh.  The watercolor illustrations are beautiful, and we love the reproductions of vanGogh's most famous paintings.  C was introduced to van Gogh's work in art class this past year, and he really enjoyed reading this book.  R enjoyed the book too.  C came up with our art project after we read this book.  This is the third time C has presented an art lesson, and I love watching how much he enjoys teaching art.

C and R dipped chalk in water and drew on construction paper, making their own sunflowers.

R drew these sunflowers:

If you look closely, you can see that she drew a sun (yellow circle with lines extending all around) and colored the middle brown.  That is truly a "sun"flower.

Here is C's art:

The blue and purple thing in the upper right corner is a butterfly.  C's sunflowers came out great. He really enjoys drawing.

I am linking this post to stArt at A Mommy's Adventures.  Hop on over there to read more blog posts about books and art.

The Sunflower State

Kansas is the sunflower state.  (Snow White appears to be having a crazy reaction to the sunflower seeds in this photo; her eyes are about to pop out of her head!)  We had this "Grow Your Own Sunflower Kit" so we decided to try it out while we are studying Kansas.  I hope the seeds will grow, but I have no idea how long this kit has been sitting around so we will see what happens. 

Before planting the seeds, we compared the sunflower seeds we were snacking on to the sunflower seeds we planted.

We also read Big Yellow Sunflower by Frances Barry and This is the Sunflower by Lola M. Schaefer.

A sunflower craft seemed necessary, so C and R scrunched yellow, brown, and green tissue paper and glued it to the sunflower outlines I drew for them.

If our sunflowers don't grow, we will at least have pretty tissue paper sunflowers!

Kansas

We have finally started our next state of study for our Fifty States Project.  R has been asking to learn about Kansas for a while now because she is a big fan of the movie, The Wizard of Oz.

After locating Kansas on our map of the United States, we read The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, A Commemorative Pop-up by L. Frank Baum and Robert Sabuda and Farmer Brown Goes Round and Round by Teri Sloat.   

Farmer Brown Goes Round and Round is a cute book about a farmer and his animals getting caught in a tornado.  When they drop back to earth, pigs are mooing, goats are meowing, and Farmer Brown is cock-a-doodle-dooing.  C and R both thought this book was very funny.

I thought it would be fun to create a mini tornado in a jar.  C and R were both completely unimpressed with this experiment.  I hope our other Kansas projects are more successful.