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Scribble Kids traveled to France and learned about art, history and culture!

Here are some of my students (with signed photo releases) working hard on their projects

Hard at work!

Coloring a ‘Rose Window’

We learned about the Eiffel tower and Post-Impressionism today and studied a painting by Georges Seurat of the Eiffel Tower, which you can see below.

  Eiffel Tower, by Georges Seurat

We began our own Eiffel towers with a guided drawing in oil pastels.

Eiffel Tower Beginning Sketch

Then we added color mixing ‘dots’ just like Georges Seurat’s paint strokes. This created optical color mixing! Here are some of my student’s final art.. things got busy so I wasn’t able to photograph everything, unfortunately:

Eiffel Tower by Jeffrey, age 7

Eiffel Tower by Emelia, age 6

Eiffel Tower by Katie, age 7

Eiffel Tower by Samantha

Eiffel Tower by Gabby, age 6

Eiffel Tower by Avery, age 6

Eiffel Tower by Vivian, age 5

Eiffel Tower by Anne, age 6

We also worked on French poodles! Class was so busy I only got one photograph. Only half done here, but VERY cool!!

Poodle in progress

So cute and fluffy!

Here is the recipe the children sampled of French yogurt cake. It’s very easy to make.

French Yogurt Cake (Gateau au Yaourt)

Flour, baking powder, salt, sugar, lemon, Greek yogurt, vegetable oil, eggs, vanilla, butter

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1 cup sugar
1 tablespoon finely grated lemon zest
3/4 cup whole-milk Greek yogurt
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 large eggs
1/2 teaspoon vanilla

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Coat a standard (8 1/2 x 4 1/4″) loaf pan with nonstick vegetable oil spray.  Dust with flour; tap out excess.

Whisk 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, 2 tsp. baking powder and the kosher salt in a medium bowl.

Using your fingers, rub 1 cup sugar with the lemon zest in a large bowl until sugar is moist.  Add the yogurt, vegetable oil, eggs and vanilla;   whisk to blend.  Fold in dry ingredients just to blend.

Pour batter into prepared pan; smooth top.  Bake until top of cake is golden brown and a tester inserted into center comes out clean, 50 to 55 minutes.  Let cake cool in pan on a wire rack for 15 minutes.  Invert onto rack; let cool completely.

The post Scribble Kids France appeared first on Scribble Kids.

by Deborah Freedman

Click for full size.

Photo by Chris Randall (http://www.ilovenewhaven.org)

Deborah is giving away a signed copy of THE STORY OF FISH & SNAIL.

This prize will be given away at the conclusion of PiBoIdMo. You are eligible for this prize if:

1. You have registered for PiBoIdMo. TODAY IS THE LAST DAY TO DO SO!
2. You have commented ONCE ONLY on today’s post.
3. You have completed the PiBoIdMo challenge. (You will have to sign the PiBoIdMo Pledge at the end of the event.)

Good luck, everyone!

“NOW SEEDS, START GROWING!”
Frog came running up the path.
“What is all this noise?” he asked.
“My seeds will not grow,” said Toad.
“You are shouting too much,” said Frog. “These poor seeds are afraid to grow.”

“These poor seeds are afraid to grow.” Wait… seeds can be afraid to grow? I didn’t know that. I wonder if that is my problem. Are you talking to me too, Frog? Can stories be afraid to grow, too?

Maybe I am shouting too much: Now ideas, start GROWING—what will the critique buddies think? what will mr. agent, ms. editor think? what will bookstores, kirkus, random readers on goodreads think? what if I never, never have a good idea again? OMG! that really could happen! please, please, ideas—GROW, GROW, GROW!

Help—TOAD—I can’t stop the shouting! Where are you? What would YOU do?

Toad read a long story to his seeds.
All the next day Toad sang songs to his seeds.
And all the next day Toad read poems to his seeds.
And all the next day Toad played music for his seeds.
Then Toad felt very tired, and he fell asleep.

Oh! These all sound like easy things to do… thank you Toad, I will do them! I will read stories and poems and play music. And then maybe I will also look at art, and walk in the woods and stop on the footbridge to play Poohsticks. And then plant things, bake things, make things… make anything but books.

And then finally, I will lie on the couch and stare out the window, until… until there is no more shouting and it is quiet… except for some birds (what’s the gossip today, guys?), and a couple of squirrels (hey, what is the problem out there? stop bickering!), and my cat, Milo, snoring.

I will try all of these things because I have read, and read over many times again, FROG AND TOAD TOGETHER by Arnold Lobel, so I know that in “The Garden”—spoiler alert!!!—once Toad stops shouting, his seeds really do grow in the end. Hopefully, if I’m quiet and patient too, my ideas will stop being afraid to sprout, and if I have a good one—hooray!!—I will jot or sketch it down right away. And then, at last, I can reward myself by taking a lesson from the next chapter of Frog and Toad: “Cookies”.

Toad baked some cookies.
“These cookies smell very good,” said Toad.
He ate one.
“And they taste even better…”

Hey, did you have an idea today? Well then, have a cookie! And by the way, what do you do, to coax your ideas to grow?

Once-upon-a-time, Deborah Freedman was an architect, but now she prefers to build worlds in books. She is the author and illustrator of SCRIBBLE and BLUE CHICKEN, and THE STORY OF FISH AND SNAIL, to be published in June 2013, by Viking. Follow her adventures at Writes With Pictures or on Facebook and Twitter @DeborahFreedman.

And lucky you, it’s time to win something AGAIN! Deborah is giving away a signed copy of her book BLUE CHICKEN!

Just comment to be entered (one comment per person).

A winner will be randomly selected in one week.

Good luck!