Scratch Art Fun in Grade 1

Posted on April 20, 2009 by artlessonsforkids

Ny'a's Horse

Scratch art is one of those lesson kids of all ages LOVE to do and although it’s very easy for us teachers to buy the ready made scratch art paper, I much prefer my students to learn from ‘scratch’ how to make make their own.

I gave out 9×12 white paper and crayons and told the kids they had to fill the whole paper with different colors and designs. I reminded them that for their paper to be ‘magic’ they needed to color in heavily and the only color they couldn’t use was BLACK! It’s amazing what happens when you use the word ‘magic‘. The kids get excited with anticipation and are just transported to their own creative space.

The finished designs were gorgeous and if I had been doing a lesson on lines and design this would have been just great. Next I gave out black crayons and told the the kids to cover their entire paper with black by coloring very heavily and trying to make sure no colors could be seen. They couldn’t believe they were covering up their designs! (Note: I used black india paint with a previous class and it was very hard for them to scratch out a picture so I think a black crayon works better and the effect is stunning.)

Next, I gave out scratching tools like some wooden stylus’ and explained that this tool would help them draw and color anything on their paper while they were ‘scratching’ out their design. I even made them blow on the tip of the tool for special effect.

The ‘ooohs’ and ‘aaahs’ are immediate as soon as they start to ‘draw’ and the vibrant colors start to appear magically before their eyes –this is priceless!

This lesson can be adapted to any age level so give it a go and forget about buying the ready made paper. This is more exciting and creative by far. Try to display them against a sunny window because the colors look shiny and they look gorgeous too!

Sebey's Scarab Beetle

Yasmin's Butterfly

Anisa's Penguin

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Cave Art Comes Alive!

Posted on March 15, 2009 by artlessonsforkids

There are certain units in art that take a life of it’s own and just GROW! Cave art is one of them. I decided to make this a Pre-K – Grade 5 theme. Displaying children’s work is so important to me so this had to be BIG! And how was I just going to achieve this? Re-creating a cave similar to the Lascaux Caves in France filled with all my students’ work of course! I wanted them to fully understand the importance of those early cave paintings as the first ever examples of art in history.

We first began by looking at actual prints of paintings from Lascaux and looking at the subject matter chosen by the cave people. There are plenty of good websites to show kids plus you tube has a ton of short videos and information.

Google image search is wonderful and I created a slideshow of many cave paintings. I also included petroglyphs so that my older grades could learn the difference between a pictograph (painted picture on a wall) and a petroglyph (carved/engraved picture on a rock or cave wall) because they would eventually make their own.

Pre-K and Kindergarten couldn’t wait to start drawing and painting their big animals and hunters. I saved quite a large amount of brown packing paper so everyone got a large piece of paper as their canvas. After a discussion of what animals were acceptable to draw the kids took right off.

I gave the older students the opportunity to stick their paper under the table to give them that feel of how the cave people painted. The panitings were painted and details were done with chalk pastels–all in earthy colors.

The paintings were finished by ‘signing’ their work with a stencil of their hand. Watered down paint was put into a spray bottle and the kids sprayed their hand to leave an outline.

Grades 1-5 made tools and weapons with cardboard and string. Their challenge was to make a tool that they think would have been useful for hunting or painting and they could only use string to put pieces together. This was a challenge for many of the kids because they immediately wanted glue sticks, tape, etc. When thias wasn’t option they had to ‘think’ and they came up with some great ideas!

tool-making1

Next up was learning about petroglyphs. Our school is surrounded by contruction at the moment so there were plenty of rocks to go around. These rocks were quite hard to carve into but after a little experimenting, the kids covered the rock faces with chalk pastels. On a piece of paper they drew a variety of animals and hunting scenes they wanted to copy onto their rock faces. Carving with an opened paper clip was perfect and the the petroglyphs were wonderful!

With all the paintings I then created a large cave outside my classroom in the hallway. I covered the side walls and the roof. The students helped put the tools and petroglyphs inside the cave and added the remaining tools and weapons on two nearby bulletin boards. We invited parents and kids to come at night time and the rule was to bring a flashlight! All the lights were turned off and everyone had a great time!

cave-side

weapons

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Pre-Kinder Shape Collage

Posted on February 18, 2009 by artlessonsforkids

Lessons for younger kids need to be fun, dynamic and full of suprises. The best thing about teaching Pre- K and Kinder is how excited the kids get when you teach them anything. Now if you make that ‘anything‘ fun then you have a hit!

My Pre-K class was reviewing shapes in their class so I planned the following lesson for them which they all loved. Plan for two lessons when you do this with Pre-K and Kindergarten and you can adapt this idea to other grade levels.

We started the lesson by remembering all the shapes Pre-K knew and learned in their classroom. Here I pretended to ‘forget‘ my shapes so they could teach me all the shapes again (they love doing this!). We shouted out the names and drew squares, rectangles, circles, diamonds, ovals, triangles, etc. in the air with big arm strokes.

Each student got a big plain colored paper and drew their favorite shapes (not too small, not too big) on the paper with a pencil. They outlined their shapes with a black crayon, colred them in and then cut them out.

The students chose a big colored paper, glued their shapes and transformed them by adding arms, legs, hats, ears, hair, feet, shoes, etc. Other details like the weather, houses, grass, flowers were also encouraged. This was a perfect lesson to review shapes and turn them into awesome art work!

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Torn Paper Lines

Posted on February 15, 2009 by artlessonsforkids

Here is a neat idea you can do the next time you need to teach LINES. Get your students to ‘feel‘ the lines by tearing out all sorts of lines using only their fingers and imagination!
IGive out 2 colored papers either to individual students or to pairs. In this lesson I gave out white and black paper because the contrast is quite dramatic but you can use any color combination such as a warm and cool color, complimentary colors, different shades, etc. Tell your students one color is for tearing lines out and the other is for glueing the lines on.
My grade three class worked in pairs. We discussed and reviewed the different kinds of lines and how to tear paper and give it the shape we want. Teach your students to gently make little tears and to use their thumb as a guide and ‘ruler‘. The students got into pairs and talked about which lines they wanted to tear. They placed the torn lines on the paper and decided on a nice composition. Here your students can place lines symmetrically or make a picture depending on the grade level. We went for a symmetrical composition because they were learning about this in math.

tearing lines

playing around with the lines for composition

Once the teams were happy with their lines the next step was to glue them down on the paper. They then were given the same colored paper and had to make the same or another design using the opposite color. If the students started with tearing white paper on black then they would do tearing black lines on white paper.
This lesson can be adapted to many grade levels and the result is quite lovely.

pasting1

Here is a slideshow of the lesson.

Lines Go Walking In Kindergarten!

Posted on December 3, 2008 by artlessonsforkids

I couldn’t resist not doing my previous lesson “Taking Lines for a Walk’ with my eager Kinder kids. We talked about lines and we looked for them in the classroom. We drew imaginary lines in the air and then they were ready for their art project.

Every child got a 18 x 12 piece of white paper and a black crayon. I explained to them that they would take their crayon on a wonderful adventure all over the paper. They can start on any edge of the paper and curl, twirl, curve, zig-zag all around the paper till you say “stop!” They nned to end their line and go off any edge of the paper. Here you need to watch what everyone is doing and make sure the lines don’t get crowded and messy on the paper. In other words, don’t drag this part of the lesson too long!

Taking a line for a walk

Next, tell your kids to color in some spaces with crayons and to fill in the areas with different lines they can think of such as dots, crosses, hatched lines, etc.

Coloring in some of the spaces

Next and final part of the lesson is to paint the paper with watered down tempera paints (stick to three colors max) or water colors. The result is fantastic and the kids will know everything about lines!

Painting in the rest of the spaces

Taking Lines for a Walk

Posted on November 30, 2008 by artlessonsforkids

This is gorgeous

This is a great lesson I did with grade one and three. I loved the results and the kids had a great time exploring lines.

It’s always good to review what a line is with your students and go over ‘line’ words such as vertical, zig-zag, diagnal, curved, curly, etc. Give your student a large 18 x 12 piece of paper and tell them they need to start at the top of their paper and take a line for a ‘walk’ by making their line wander off and make curls, zig-zags, etc and not just make a straight line. It’s important to remind them that the line must end back at the bottom of the page.

The next part of the lesson involves the students filling in the spaces between the lines. This is where you can adapt this lesson depending on the grade levels. My grade one class painted in each section by making their own hues and this was a great way to review and practice making colors with the primary colors. Once the paper was dry they went over their lines with a thick black marker.

Outlining with a thick black marker

I love how the markers bring out the lines and color

Grade three filled each section by making tints and shades of blue. The result was beautiful and they were all excited and happy with their finished work. Again, outlining each line with a thick black marker made the lines stick out.

I love the lines here!

Outlining with a black marker

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Lines All Around

Posted on November 30, 2008 by artlessonsforkids

Filling in spaces with different kinds of lines

I have started my next big unit on LINES as part of the Elements of Art Theme. It’s important for kids to have an understanding of these elements which will help them when they go and make their own art. By knowing what the seven elements (line, shape, form, color, value, texture and space) of art are, kids will appreciate that all the art in the world is done with one or more of these elements.

I choose to look at each element seperately so that my students can really get a good grasp of them and practice using them when making their own art work.

Start by telling your students that they will become a detective. This is a good time to define what a detective is and then tell them they will be a ‘line detective’ This is a hit with younger kids, grades 2 down. We first brainstorm all the lines we know and I let my kids come up to the smartboard and draw their lines. We them establish that a line is a mark made by a pointed tool such as a pencil, crayon, marker, paintbrush, tree branch, etc. For older kids you can get into more detail about what a line is. It’s important for kids to learn that lines can be vertical, horizontal, straight, diagnal, wavy, zig-zag and curved. Of course add more ‘line’ words to your list but these are essentially the basic lines to know.

Then give each student their sketchbook, a pencil, marker and a crayon and hunt for lines in the classroom. Once they find a line, they record it in their sketchbook by copying it. Once you have found some interesting lines in the classroom, go outside and record more lines.

Kids have a great time finding lines and it makes them aware of all the lines around them. When you come back to class discuss your findings and then show a slide show (that you previously made!) showing lines in nature such as leaves, buildings, birds, architecture, water ripple etc. Have your kids point to the lines they see and use the correct word: horizontal, curvy, zig-zag, vertical, etc.

Tints and Shades

Posted on November 23, 2008 by artlessonsforkids

Sample of tints and shades of red

I love teaching my students how to make tints and shades because it gives them the freedom to make their own colors and and they are always amazed how many colors they can make by using black or white and another color.

Since I am laying a foundation for color mixing the rule in my class is they must make a tint and shade of a primary color or if they want a secondary color they must mix it first. This reinforces mixing secondary colors.

Begin by explaining or reviewing what a tint and shade is. You can show a slideshow of art work that show tints or shades to show your kids what they are capable of doing. Introduce the word momochromatic colors to your older students.

Start by letting your students choose one hue to work with. On their plastic plate they should place a spoonful of white, black and 2 amounts of a the hue of their choice.

Grade three were given a white piece of paper and they cut out two big shapes. They were to show their pure hue gradually get lighter (tint) on one shape and gradullay get darker (shade) on the other shape. They could either start in the middle and work out or start on the outer edge of their shape and work in.

This is an example of a tint

This is an example of a shade

Grade five practised making tints and shades on a piece of paper and then drew a cityscape with curved buildings, to make their art work a little more interesting. Their challenge was to fill in all the white space of their drawing with tints and shades of the color they chose. If they chose a secondary color (orange, green or purple) they had to first mix it with the primary colors. This was a great project for them to because the final result is stunning and they really grasped the idea of tints and shades.

Filling in the design with tints and shades

Here are some examples of fabulous artwork done by making a tint or a shade of a color.

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Fractured Art

Posted on November 16, 2008 by artlessonsforkids

I am always trying to think of creative ways to reinforce some of the elements of art. Here is a great project that will help you do just that. Kids will learn or review, depending on the age level, lines, primary colors, shape, space and even value.

After discussing these elements, give your students a 12 x 18 piece of white paper, pencil and ruler. They are to make a mix of vertical, diagnal and horizontal lines that can either be straight, zig-zag or wavy. Once they have outlined their lines with a black crayon, they go to the painting station where there are paint cups with the primary colros waiting for them. Go over the routine of how to use a brush (wash your brush between colors) and starting with one primary color they paint diferent sections of their paper. Remind them that two same colors cannot be next to each other! Then they go onto the next primary color and so on.

Dividing the paper into sections

Once their painting is dry, they need to cut up their paper and keep the pieces in the same order they are cutting them because they will glue them down onto a large piece of black paper, kind of like a jig saw puzzle. When they glue them down, there remind them to keep a small space between strips.

Painting in each section

The final result is beautiful and the kids love to see them when they are finished. this project can be adapted to any age level. Instead of painting with the primary colors you could paint different shades or tints of a hue (color), use only warm or cool colors, complementary colors, etc. The possibilties are endless!

Color Wheels

Posted on November 16, 2008 by artlessonsforkids

Grade one color wheel

Teaching how a color wheel works is fun for kids and it teaches primary and secondary colors. I decided that all of my grades would make different kinds of color wheels. I am big on displays so I thought that it would look lovely for a final display.

Essentially, a color wheel is a tool to visually see the postion of the primary colors and the secondary colors which are mixed from red, yellow and blue. Experiment beforehand with this and have your students mix, mix mix! They love this and it’s important for them to get as much hands on experience because you learn so much more from DOING!

After the kids have mixed, explored and discovered, they are ready to make their own color wheels. Here are some samples of some of the color wheel my students made. Grade one made theirs the following way. I gave out pre- cut cardboard circles and then gave out a 9 x 12 piece of white paper which the students folded into 6 sections. Their instructions were to draw 3 identical shapes and paint them with the primary colors. The shapes needed to be simple with no details and just an outline. Then they made an outline of three other identical shapes. Their challenge was to make the secondary colors by mixing two primary colors together. They needed to make 3 new colors. I gave out plastic plates with some red, yellow and blue paint. Tip: plastic plates can be washed an re- used again and again!

They collected their water container, paint brush and protective paper for the table. It’s good to remind the students that they must keep their three colors ‘clean’ and can mix colors on another part of their plate. They must remember to wash their brush between colors using their water cup and dry their brush on the protective paper before mixing or changing colors. This is a routine that needs to be done over and over till they get it and it’s automatic.

Once they made their new colors (green, orange and purple), they painted their remaining shapes. I then gave out their cardboard circles and they made some lines on them for divisions and painted them in using black and white. When everything was dry, they glued their ‘primary color’ shapes at the 12 , 3 and 9 o’clock marks on their circles and the secondary colors inbetween the primary colors. Then they glued yarn between the primary and secondary colors.

With my grade two class we made color wheel pizzas. These were a lot of fun and the kids loved doing them. They also looked stunning once they were finished and displayed. See my display page for ideas. Anyway, after the kids experimented mixing colors and could tell me how to make the secondary colors, I gave them a giant pre-cut cardboard circle which they divied up into 6 sections. They colored the primary colors and secondary color sections with crayon and then had to fill in each section with ‘toppings’ which were different kinds of paper and magazine cut outs for each color. They brought in from home other toppings such as balloons, wrapping paper etc.. When they were finished , the students sprinkled each section with glitter ‘cheese’. The end result was gorgeous and delicious!