Armed with paint brushes and several colors of tempura paint, Linus Pauling Middle School sixth-graders Calli Layton and Maya Van Londen dabbed streaks of purple and red onto a papier-mache bird.

The pair painstakingly created their bird sculpture as part of a two-week art project that will result in giant mobile to be hung in the entryway at Linus Pauling. Working in pairs, all sixth-grade students at the school are participating in the effort, which will result in 120 brightly painted birds.

After about 20 minutes of diligent painting, Maya and Calli set aside their brushes in favor of a finger painting technique. Purple and white swirls covered the inanimate bird's back.

"It's just a lot of fun," Maya said of the project. "It seems in middle school the pressure of grades gets up a lot more. Nobody's looking over your shoulder saying 'You're not doing this right.' Just the teacher saying 'Good job!'"

Indeed, art instructor Joel Weinstein circulated around the classroom filled with 32 sixth-grade artists, offering praise as well as advice.

"Don't forget the bottom of the birds," he said. "That's the part people will see."

Weinstein's inspiration for the project came to him after he watched the movie "Winged Migration" a few years ago. When the idea of featuring art in the entryway at Linus Pauling was discussed as construction on the school was completed in 2004, he thought a bird mobile created by the students would be perfect.

"My teaching philosophy is that in a middle school, there should be middle- school artwork," he said. "These guys do wonderful stuff, and it should be there."

Three years later, his vision is being realized. Though the task of supervising and coordinating 240 sixth-graders as they work on the project might seem daunting, progress has been steady as they stuffed paper and tape onto cardboard forms, layered on papier mache, added primer and painted. Just one more step, varnishing the birds, needs to be done.

"I have been very excited about this project, and how it has been going," Weinstein said. "Like clockwork."

The sixth-graders had paint on their hands, arms and faces as they finished painting. Some birds looked natural - a carefully depicted owl in white, brown and tan; and some were fanciful - a multi-colored bird featuring a rainbow and spiral shapes on the wings.

"It's like a flying flamingo," said Collin Sanchez of the bird he was working on with classmate Nick Bartoli.

"We like the color pink," Nick added. "Pink is an awesome color."

As the boys attempted to paint all sides of the bird without getting too much pink paint on their hands, they explained why they are enjoying this project.

"We don't even get art," Collin said. "We don't even get electives until we're in seventh grade."

Asked if they will take art as an elective next year the boys responded with an resounding "Yes!"

"It's like being in elementary school again," Maya said, looking at the paint on her hands. "It's a good feeling to have."