Leonard and the Flying Boy by Laurence Anholt

Welcome to Fantastic Fiction Friday!

Today’s pick is Leonard and the Flying Boy by Laurence Anholt, another book in the Anholt’s Artists series.

Zoro is a dutiful student of Leonardo da Vinci. He mixes paints and cleans brushes for Leonardo. Salai, another student, is not so well-behaved. He steals, cheats, and lies, but Leonardo loves him anyway.

While Leonardo is painting the Mona Lisa, Salai steals his flying machine and convinces Zoro to test it out. The boys take the flying machine to the top of a tall mountain and strap Zoro in for his flight.

Anholt’s illustrations are mixed with Leonardo da Vinci’s sketches and paintings. This allows readers to see Leonardo’s own designs for the flying machine, as well as designs for some of his other inventions.

I had chosen a different book for this week’s Fantastic Fiction Friday but today I had the pleasure of reading Leonardo and the Flying Boy with a group of 2nd graders. They loved it as much as I did. The book also inspired us to think of inventions of our own, just like Leonardo da Vinci did. The students drew pictures of their inventions and then shared their ideas. Maybe Leonardo and the Flying Boy with inspire you, too.

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Create Your Own Soap Bubble Art

Today’s project was inspired by Jean Simeon Chardin’s Soap Bubble (below), which I showed you yesterday. I had so much fun with this one. I hope you will, too.
Supplies Needed:

Washable kids paint
Plastic cups
Drinking straws
Bubble soap
Paper

Go outside!

I’m going to say that again. Put on an old t-shirt and go outside. This project can be messy.
Pour a little bubble soap into a few plastic cups. You’ll want one cup for each color. Mix in a squirt of paint. This isn’t a science. The more paint you mix in, the darker the colors will be, but keep in mind that if you add too much paint your mixture will no longer create bubbles.

Lighter colors, like pink, don’t show up as well as darker colors, no matter how much paint you add. You might want to stick with colors like blue, red, green, and purple. Experiment with as many colors as you want.

Dip a straw into a color. Do not suck up the bubble soap. You want as little soap as possible on the end (and you don’t want to drink soapy paint!).

Blow bubbles onto your sheet of paper. I laid my paper in the grass, sat next to it, and let the breeze blow the bubbles onto the paper. If you have a friend to create bubble art with, take turns catching the bubbles with the paper.
The longer the bubble sits on the paper before popping, the darker the ring of color will be. I found that larger bubbles popped more quickly than smaller bubbles.
When you like the way your painting looks, let it dry. The colors get very light when they dry.

Younger kids can enjoy this project as well. Just use bubble wands instead of straws and be prepared for a bigger mess. Bubble wands blow way more bubbles at a time than straws do.

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Jean Simeon Chardin

Jean Simeon Chardin was born in France in 1699. He lived in Paris all his life. He rarely travelled and when he did, he did not go far.

Chardin apprenticed with two painters of history before earning his way into the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture.

In 1737, Chardin showed his work at the Paris Salon, the official exhibition of art in France, for many years. He was very involved in the Salon. He went to meetings and helped organize shows.

Even though Chardin’s artwork was different from most art of the time, a lot of people liked his worked. Other artists admired his art and the King of France even paid him to paint.
As Chardin grew old, his eyesight got worse and worse. Eventually he couldn’t paint in his realistic style anymore. In his old age, Chardin created pastel drawings instead, like Self Portrait with Easel (above). They weren’t popular at the time but they are now. Chardin died in 1779.

During the mid-1700s, Rococo art was in style. These paintings were very decorative. There had curving shapes and soft colors. Rococo paintings often included mythological scenes or scenes of wealthy people having fun. Chardin did not paint in this style.
As you can see, Chardin didn’t use bright colors. He chose subdued colors, like browns, tan, copper, and deep red, instead. His paintings were so realistic that other artists of the time were amazed by his talent. Chardin painted still-lifes of food or kitchen items, like The Silver Goblet (above), and paintings of middle-class people. Girl with Racket and Shuttlecock (below) shows a girl getting ready to play badminton. Boy with Playing Cards (below) shows a boy setting up cards the way we sometimes set up dominos.

I especially like Soap Bubbles, which is shown at the top of this page. The bubble wand may look different than what we’re used to, but even in the 1700s kids enjoyed blowing bubbles.

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Sidney E. King's Jamestown

I posted recently about Charles Wilson Peale. He painted portraits of lots of important early Americans, such as George Washington, John Adams, and Lewis and Clark. Today, travel even further back in time to learn about the first English successful English settlement in the New World, Jamestown.

The links on this page will take you to paintings by Sidney E. King. In the 1950s, King painted a series of pictures of early 1600s Jamestown. These paintings can help us to understand what Jamestown looked like, how the settlers lived, and what the settlers did.

* * * * *

When the English settled Jamestown in 1607, it became the first lasting English settlement in the New World. The English had tried to build colonies in several other places but failed.

After five months at sea, three English ships, the Susan Constant, the Discovery, and the Godspeed, landed at Jamestown. Jamestown must have looked strange to the English settlers. The land was wild and Native Americans, who were very different than the English, lived in the area.

The settlers built homes at Jamestown and tried to get used to colonial life. It wasn’t easy. Most of the settlers did not have experience building houses or growing food. They also weren’t prepared for the cold Virginia winter. In 1607, 104 settlers arrived in Jamestown; by the end of the first winter, only 38 remained.

Ship-loads of settlers arrived in Jamestown, but they were no more prepared for life in the New World than the settlers who were already there. If the colonists didn’t have enough trouble, their relationship with the Natives Americans was only getting worse.

In 1610, another English ship arrived at Jamestown. It carried supplies that the colonists badly needed.

Many colonists died, but over time the settlement at Jamestown began to grow and the colonists began to plant on land that was being used by Native Americans. One of the crops that the settlers planted was tobacco (which is used to make cigarettes). The Native Americans were not happy that the settlers were taking over their land. This caused even more problems between the settlers and the Native Americans.

You may remember learning about Pocahontas. You probably learned that she saved Captain John Smith from her father. You may also have heard that she and John Smith got married. It’s possible that she saved him from her father, but she did not marry him. Pocahontas married a different colonist. His name was John Rolfe.

Pocahontas did help the colonists. It was because of Pocahontas that the Native Americans allowed the settlers to stay at Jamestown. After John Rolfe and Pocahontas got married, the colonists and the Native Americans enjoyed peace for awhile.

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Draw Your Own Underwater Scene

This is a simple way to make your fish look like they really are swimming underwater.

Supplies Needed:

Blue construction paper
Washable markers
Spray bottle with water

Cover your workspace and gather your materials.

Begin by drawing an underwater scene in pencil. Your picture could include a school of fish, a shark, a dolphin, an octopus, a starfish, or anything else you can imagine. Below is the inspiration for my drawing. My mom took this picture underwater last year and I love it!
In marker, draw lots of blue water lines around your pencil drawing. Then, spray some water on your picture so the blue lines run a little.
Let the paper dry.

Go over your pencil lines with marker until your underwater scene is complete. I encourage you to include lots of different underwater creatures in your drawing. You might even choose to make up your own animals.
I love that the water lines look wet and smudgy. If you want your lines to run more, use blue copy paper instead of construction paper.

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