, originally uploaded by hello megan.

A vibrant window display is just the thing to cheer up a ’spring’ classroom. I love the effect Megan has achieved with this one.
As you can see in this detail it’s collaged from magazines

Megan says:

Before class, I cut the rainbow shape out of a roll of white paper and marked the 7 color divisions. I had my class (2nd) mark which colors went where and gave them magazines to cut out any great examples of each color. Each table was assigned a color, and put their cutouts into a bowl. From there any class that had a free minute of two dug into those bowls and glued the pics on in their spot.

So you can see it’s pretty straight-forward. It really does count as a quick and easy classroom display!
I’ve done rainbows on windows before particularly with Key Stage 1 groups. The groups each did a colour. We painted the window with the following mixture:

Washable Window Paint

Tempera Paints (powdered or premixed)
Clear washing-up liquid (lemon ones work ok, green ones can make colours a bit off)

Mix powdered paint with the liquid till it is about as thick as house paint. With premixed paints just mix in a smallamount of washing-up liquid. Do not make it too runny or it will drip!

Mark out your colour areas with a dry wipe marker pen.

Let each colour dry before adding the next one.

Use masking tape to protect the window frame and be sure to spread newspaper around to protect the area.

To remove paint or touch up mistakes just wipe it off with a dry paper towel. Do not try using a wet towel or it will be a real mess!!

I think I like Megan’s way better anyway!

Animals display, originally uploaded by loulrc.

This is a delightful Key Stage 1 wall display on the topic of animals. The children have been provided with some basic templates for each animal and a limited range of colours and simple patterns. In this case stripes and spots.

Organisation

It’s easy to set up a classroom to do this sort of lesson either as a whole class activity or, my favourite, for rotating groups. If you go for groups you just need to set up one table for painting. A TA can cover this while the teacher works with the rest of the class on related work, perhaps a writing task. Each group or table works on one animal. Six to eight children is ideal.

You need:

A newspaper covered table
Aprons
Paint brushes
A limited toning paint palate (3 tones of one colour + white) for each animal. Aim to have one between two. (Egg boxes work well as paint containers if you don’t have enough)
Pre-cut animal templates. Simple shapes work best. (I’ve got some of these tucked away somewhere as pdfs. I’ll add them soon- watch out for updates)

Talk About It

Before you start any painting talk about patterns. Demonstrate the effect you want them to use and get them to tell what sort of pattern you are making. Lots of opportunity for vocabulary extension and speaking and listening here.
Keep up the good work once they start painting by providing a commentary and encouraging a dialogue about what they are doing. Draw attention to children who are really concentrating and working well.

The Background

The background could be made from painted strips. If you have more groups than you have animals this works quite well. Otherwise the whole class can help you collage strips of tissue or crepe paper. Tear them rather than cut for a more interesting effect.

The 3d Effect

One of the best things about this display is the way the monkeys are leaning out of it. This gives a really strong 3d effect. Doing it this way does mean a little extra work. The monkeys will need to be painted on one side, left to dry and then painted on the other. Attach them at the top of the display to avoid them being torn by over-enthusiastic viewers

Kites, originally uploaded by LindaH.

Here’s a lovely classroom display idea for a windy March afternoon in Keystage 1:
The background was done onto sheets of A3 white paper with a technique called “bagging”. It’s messy

You need

Music - optional but fun

Instructions

Crumple up a carrier bag to make a ball, dip it in the dark blue paint, push it down on the flat bit of the paint tray (if you’ve used one) or onto some newspaper to remove some of the paint and then print onto the paper by dabbing it quickly. You want the bag fairly dry, not overloaded with paint.

I said it was messy!

When all done and dry select best ones for background. Lettering can either be cut from spare sheets or clouds can be cut to show background through.

The same technique can be used with shades of grey to make clouds.

Or even surf

Sunflower display, originally uploaded by LindaH.

I’m going to do a series of posts highlighting classroom displays for spring over the next week or so. I love this cheery display, it’s an ideal spring display and could be adapted in a number of ways to include class work if used in an older classroom.

All the things on this display were been made by children (oldest is age 4) and their parents. The families worked with the school learning mentors as part of the family learning initiative.

The butterflies and bees can be seen in more detail here:

Julie, a learning mentor said:

The butterflies proved rather addictive and were great fun to make . Originally the learning mentors made them for a craft stall at the school fair.

The butterflies were made from clothes pegs and tissue paper squares. Bee wings were made by drawing round children’s feet on wax paper.

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Classroom dragon, originally uploaded by hale_popoki.

This was the first ever display on the Classroom Displays blog and I thought I’d revive it as it remains one of the best I’ve seen for Chinese New Year.
Tina said this display was:

used in our multicultural performance today.
(After school I removed the grip sticks and hung the dragon up in the classroom.)
The body is made of paper plates all strung together….one plate for each student (and one for me) Each plate has a self-portrait drawing on it

She also adds some important advice:

If you do try it, I’d suggest NOT using tissue paper for the dragon scales. It wrinkles too easily, especially if little ones are handling it.
Our school colors are red and gold, and the quickest way for me to get the red and gold paper on short notice was to go to the gift wrap section of the local Walgreen’s! However, gold was only available in gift wrap tissue. On the plus side, I used the school die-cutter to cut out the dragon scales, and that was done quickly using the thin tissue paper.
I think this school year I will try to shop around for inexpensive red and gold wrapping paper around Christmas time. =)
It took me a lot longer than I thought to string all those plates together (and I crossed my fingers that it wouldn’t fall apart as the students paraded across the stage with it! It didn’t……phew!)

I’d love to have seen it in action! If you do decide to copy it please let me know here. I’d like to see other people’s interpretations of the dragon.