The Pumpkin Patch

At my campus, a church brings a small pumpkin patch for students to visit outside the campus. If this isn't possible or students are not sure what a pumpkin patch is, you can visit one online or visit one and take pictures for the students to view.

Materials: Computers, projector, printer, Kid Pix or other drawing/creativity software, word processing program, digital camera(s), USB cable to transfer images to computer.

Day 1 Preparation:
1. Teacher takes individual pictures of students or students could take turns taking a picture of each other. Student can pose in different ways: pretending to pick up a pumpkin, walking around, or pretending to hold a pumpkin.
2. Transfer the images to a location the students can get to.
3. (Optional) It could be quicker for the teacher to crop out the just the student image. You don't want to have the extra background and side parts of the image for the project. You just want the student.
4. (Optional) If this is for PreK-1st, save the student image into Kid Pix for them, so they will just need to draw their pumpkins on Day 3.

Day 2 Teacher Lesson:
Demonstrate to students how to use the drawing tools, how to switch colors, use of the erasers and any other basic tools they would need to use in the Kid Pix 4 program.
Students maybe interested in making pumpkins using the oval tool rather than by free-hand. Model how to use oval tool to make pumpkins and demonstrate how to use the fill bucket tool to color in the pumpkins. Model how to insert images and save. Students observe and then explore on their own in Kid Pix, if not too familiar with the program and the tools introduced.

Day 3 Review and Student Independent Work
Teacher reviews with students how to insert their image. If teacher did not crop out the student images during preparation, the teacher shows students how to erase extra parts of the picture that isn't needed.
Step 1: Students open Kid Pix 4, then insert their image, and align their body where they want it on the screen.
Step 2: If necessary, students erase the extra parts of their picture that is not needed; they need to make sure just their entire body is showing.
Step 3: At this point it would be good to save their project. (Reason...sometimes the students use the eraser that deletes everything on the screen. Having to insert their picture again and erase the extra part may take longer than expected.)
Step 4: Students use the drawing tools and colors to illustrate a picture of them in a pumpkin patch. Depending on their pose in their picture some students will need to draw a pumpkin in their hands or near their hands as if holding one or picking one.
Step 5: Once completed, you can have students save their work. If students are younger, you can have their print their work and write their sentences or paragraphs on another paper for Day 5.

Day 4 Writing Draft and Exporting Product
Have students draft a paragraph about the pumpkin patch or other writing prompt that they can add their image to. In Kid Pix 4, you can save/export their project as a JPEG. Have students insert their image into a Word document or other word processing program. Show students how to place the image either at the top or bottom of the page and to align center. Print the documents if students are writing on the actual page. You will save the documents if students are typing on the page.

Day 5: Writing
Students either write or type their paragraphs onto the word processing document.