Falling Back Self Portraits in Grade Five

Posted on July 7, 2009 by artlessonsforkids

I saw this idea in Oodles of Art and thought I would give it a try with my grade five class. I gave out 18×24 white paper and we discussed what someone falling back might look like from a bird’s eye.

Next, everyone thought about a place they might like to ‘fall back ‘ into. It could be a real setting or make-believe.

Once everyone had chosen their background they were ready to begin drawing. They took off their shoes and outlined them at the bottom of the page- their shoe bottom should show the detailed texture found on the bottom of their shoe. Next they outlined their hands with open fingers on the sides of the paper. Have the students work in pairs with the outlining part of the lesson.

Finally the kids added their head and body and all of the details. They outlined their work with a black marker and colored in with pencils and crayons or oil pastels. A watered down paint wash was added to the background.

Pretty neat huh?

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Tape Art in Grade Two

Posted on July 3, 2009 by artlessonsforkids

The school was giving away some potted plants and I was more than happy to give them a home in my classroom. I have big windows with plenty of light and plants are a great subject for drawing, observations etc. If any of your students finish their work early you can always send them off to get a plant and draw it!

My grade two students were learning about plants in science so this was a great opportunity to integrate art with their science curriculum. I placed different pots along the tables and gave out 12×18 sized paper for everyone. The object of the lesson was to observe the plant, make an outline drawing and ‘color‘ in the still life drawing with colored tape. They started by drawing the pot. If you do this lesson, make sure the kids ‘sketch‘ their drawings so if they need to erase dark something, dark pencil lines aren’t left behind!

Once they were happy with their outline which had to include the pot, the pot’s rim and the plants and flowers they were ready to color in with the tape. Everyone chose a color for their pot and stuck and overlapped pieces of tape to cover the pot area. Next they chose another color for the rim and finally other tape colors for the leaves and flowers. Make sure your students use different colored tape for the different areas such as the base of the pot, the rim, the flowers, buds, leaves, details on the leaves etc. Encourage your students to stick down the tape and to tear off pieces as well as cut them with scissors.

When they were finished, they added a detail to the face of the pot such as a heart, sun etc and with colored pencils lightly drew a background and table for their potted plant. Make sure it is lightly drawn so the pot remains the focus.

I loved how they turned out, don’t you? If you want to see more pictures then click here to see the slide show I created for this lesson.

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Stained Glass Art in Pre-K

Posted on June 30, 2009 by artlessonsforkids

I save absolutely everything because I know that sooner or later I will be inspired to use it with a lesson. This is what happened with the vinyl packages that my art aprons came in. Instead of ending up in the garbage I cut them open at the seams and suddenly they were now ‘glass’ for a stained glass project I had in mind with my Pre-K class.

I gave my students a paper cut to the exact size of the vinyl sheet with a frame I made with markers and we talked about each others favorite animals or favorite things. The students then drew their animals or things such as flowers, lions, pumas, etc. within the frame and outlined it with a black marker. I placed the vinyl sheet on top and outlined their pictures with a black sharpie marker. While I was doing this with each child, everyone else colored their pictures while they waited for everyone’s vinyl sheet to be traced.

Next I showed them the ‘magic‘ paint (Plaid Gallery Glass window color) and showed everyone how to squeeze just the right amount to color in their pictures. I also demonstrated that an easy way to fill color into an area is to ‘squeeze and color in circles‘ -as the paint comes out they spread it around with the circular movements.

This was tricky at first but the kids got the hang of it in no time. Let them add quite a bit of paint and if the colors run into each other or go out of the lines a bit, all the better-the effect is wonderful!

When these dried the kids then put some dots and designs around the border to finish up. The beauty of vinyl is that it sticks to a glass surface quite easily and if you dampen the back a little it sticks even better.