Tuesday, December 13, 2011

2011 Reading Fair Projects

Last week Henry and Grant both participated in their school's Reading Fair. We ended up deciding on two Eric Carle books, The Mixed-up Chameleon for Grant and A House for Hermit Crab for Henry. Before the boys started their projects, I did a little research online and found some really great slideshows on the Eric Carl website that show how he illustrates his books. After watching the slideshows, we decided to let the boys make part of their boards like Eric Carle makes his books! I don't have any pictures of the process mostly because Henry and Grant did most of the work in the afternoons and it was too dark for good pics...but also because I was too busy trying to keep Eli from running through all the wet paint to take pictures:)
 To make the Chameleon and the Hermit Crab, Jason fashioned a homemade projector out of a work light and a few cardboard boxes. I traced the cover of the book onto a piece of plastic and put it on the projector, then the boys traced the Chameleon and the Hermit Crab onto some white paper using the projector to make them just the right size for their project boards. After they finished tracing, Henry and Grant cut each section of their animal out and made a sort of stencil to use on the colored paper that they had painted. Henry also got to do some splatter painting to make the sand for his board...I think that may have been his favorite part because of how messy it was:)
The boys didn't win anything at the Reading Fair, but they had a ton of fun reading some great books and learning to illustrate like Eric Carle! I think we may have a few more Eric Carle books in our reading fair future!

12 comments:

  1. They didn't win!!!??? Those post boards are AMAZING!!! You guys did an amazing job :)

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  2. Those are awesome! Love how colorful everything is. :) Nice work!

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  3. They did GREAT! Such colorful and BIG boards!

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  4. i remember this book! i need to go find it for my kids now. what a fabulous project. great job!!!

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  5. How could they not have won?! Those are fantastic projects!!!! I am very impressed.

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  6. Just came across your blog, and LOVE it! I wondered if you would be interested in guest posting over at Sassy Babies Blog. If you are interested, please email me at trappedandscreaming at gmail dot com. We would love to have you! Thanks!

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  7. Wow that turned out amazing. I'm shocked you guys didn't win.

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  8. OMGosh! They are both great!! The winners most have been pretty incredible since the boys's didn't make the cut and they look so good.

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  9. Those are great projects/boards!! I've never heard of a reading fair before...but I'm very familiar with Science and History Fair thanks to Kayla. ;-)

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