Hot Air Balloon Watercolour Painting

This is a lovely summer art project that just evokes happiness! It's a great lesson to teach the art element of SPACE. Students followed THIS tutorial, from Art Projects for Kids. Then they outlined in Sharpie and coloured with watercolour or pencil crayons, or both!

I taught this to Grades 4-6.

 

Plasticine Mood "Paintings"

This is a gorgeous abstract art lesson inspired by a lesson found on the Studio Sprout website. 

It uses the artist Bernice Bing as a starting point for looking at abstract expressionistic art inspired by emotions. 

I keep my plasticine stored on zip lock bags by colour. 

I pre-cut small squares of cardboard for students to work on. They were asked to think of an emotion relevant to them and try to choose colours that they felt matched that feeling. Then, in a loose and expressive way, they smeared and played with the plasticine and applied it to the cardboard however they pleased. 

Grade 4-6 artworks! I love how expressive they all turned out. 

 

Oil Pastel Sgraffito Ornaments

This is a colourful project my Grade 4/5 class just finished up last week. 

I was inspired by THIS VIDEO by Mari from Finland. She is SO SO talented and her Finnish accent is so relaxing to listen to!

I printed out a sheet of various shaped ornaments. Students learned about the sgraffito technique (an art technique where you scratch through a top layer of colored coating  to reveal a different colored layer underneath). They coloured each ornament with a light coloured oil pastel first. Then they layered on a darker colour. Using a wooden skewer, they scratched out different patterns.

They created a background on black paper- they did either ribbons with bows or evergreen boughs. Most went with evergreen boughs! Cut out the ornaments and glue stick them onto the black paper.

 

Dali Inspired Surrealist Animals

Here's a popular Dali inspired lesson based on his painting "The Elephants" from 1948. Students chose any animal they wanted and stretcheeeeed the legs nice and long. I always love how funny these turn out! See the steps previously posted HERE.

Work from Grade 4-6 students: