Poppy Portraits

Every year I try to come up with a new art project for Remembrance Day.

This is the one we did this year.

This was with Grade 1 and it worked very well.













MATERIALS REQUIRED:

- paper for painting, we used watercolour for background and regular white paper for our poppies
- disk tempera paint in blue, yellow, and red
- oil pastels
- black and grey crayons 
- scissors and glue
- masking tape
- black paper, black buttons and poppy seeds
- printed paper with our remembrance day words

PROCEDURE:

I prepped art boards for all the students.  I taped off a border and then a section where the table will be.

We took oil pastels in dark blue, light blue and white and I had them draw circles in the large section of the paper.

Some were very ordered and precise with rows of circles and some just scribbled circles all over.  I found the scribbled circles tended to look better.

The students then painted the large section with blue disk tempera paint.




Set aside too dry.

While our background dries I gave them some extra paper.  One I crimped with my crimper for texture.

On the other piece I had them draw circles again with black and/or grey crayon.

We painted these papers.  I used red disk tempera for the paper with the crayon circles and red acrylic for the crimped.

I was trying to get 2 different shades of red.

Set aside too dry.

Back to the background.  I took the tape where the table is and moved it up so it was on the edge of the blue background.

Now with yellow disk tempera we painted in the table.

I made up sheets of repeating words in different fonts and sizes.  They were all related to Remembrance Day.


We painted them with some watery grey paint.  This is to make it less stark and darken the value (colour value) of this component.

Set aside too dry.

On the back of the paper with the words we draw out a vase.

Cut it out and glue into place on the background.  Make sure it is touching the table.

On the back of our red poppy paper we draw some poppies and cut them out.

You want at least 3.

Before we glue them on we use green pastel and draw in the stems and one or two leaves.

If they are different heights it looks better.



Glue poppies on.

For the centers we used 3 different materials:

- black paper
- black buttons
- poppy seeds

This gave each of them an interesting look and lots of discussion, especially about the poppy seeds.

Finally we outlined our vases with black oil pastel and smudged it a bit.

This helped to visually bring the vase forward in the composition.

That's it.  Great job Grade 1!


Gail

Snowy Church or Village

So I found a picture on Pinterest of kids painting these snowy village paintings but no directions so I broke it down for you.  Many thanks to the original art teacher for such a great idea :)


I especially like how it is just on a piece of blue construction paper.

I also did a snowy church scene.





















MATERIALS REQUIRED:

- blue construction paper
- white pencil crayon
- white liquid tempera or acrylic paint
- gold and/or silver liquid tempera or acrylic paint for embellishment
- paper for template
- dark blue oil pastel
- white chalk

PROCEDURE:

Cut some houses and a church out of paper.  You can use a ruler to measure.  With younger students you might want to make a few of these up ahead of time.  Use manila tag or pasteboard so they will last thru multiple uses.

Tape these down just briefly for the next few steps.

Using white paint, thin with a little water if needed, splatter on stars.

A splatter box works really well.

Paint a full moon, you can just use your finger, that's the easiest.

With the white pencil crayon trace around the houses.

Leave them stuck down for the next step.

Paint the ground.  Just a few strokes you don't want to totally paint this in.

I added a little light blue paint as well.


Let paint dry for a few minutes.

Remove the paper houses.


Add some smoke by drawing little circles in chalk and then smudging it a bit.  Don't worry about chimneys we will add them later.

Add a little chalk around the moon and smudge for a glow.

Using a dark blue oil pastel add some tree branches.

Draw in windows and doors with your pencil crayons.

Using white paint paint snow on the roofs.  You can add some to the top of the windows and doors.

Paint in a few snowy fir trees.

Start at the top.






Add a few paint strokes, don't worry about the blue paper showing thru those are the shadows.

Work your way down.

Keep going until it looks something like this.

Finally add a little gold and/or silver paint for Christmas lights and tree decorations.


The hardest part will be holding back.....just a little bling is the most effective.













That's it.

See you soon.

Gail

3D Fluttering Butterfly

Looking for something bright and fun for your last bulletin board....why not these fluttering butterflies.

Made from 2 butterflies to look like it's fluttering off your display.
















MATERIALS REQUIRED:

- nice painting paper for background, I use Sunworks white construction paper.  It's not really construction paper but a great drawing paper.  You could also use 90lb wc paper.
- white cardstock
- disk tempera paint
- green, red, white and yellow acrylic or liquid tempera
- paper scraps, book pages, brown kraft paper, recycling
- coloured cardstock scraps
- pipe cleaner
- tacky glue
- oil pastels or crayons
- optional: rubbing alcohol and eye dropper

PROCEDURE:

Tape background paper to art board.

Draw in a rough horizon line.

Paint in your sky with blue disk tempera.  I wanted to give it some texture, like all the fluff flying around right now from trees and dandelions.

So while it is wet I take an eye dropper and some rubbing alcohol.

Drop onto your wet paint.  It creates this effect.  Don't panic if it looks a little brown or grey in the center of the drop.  That will dry and go away.

This technique also works with acrylic paint but the secret is having wet watery paint.  Brush on a little bit of water to your wet acrylic to get it to work.

Paint in the green grass.  Set aside to dry.

Take your scraps of paper and tear some strips.

Glue onto a sheet of white cardstock.  This will be your extra grass.

Let glue set up for a while.

When set,  paint with acrylic or liquid tempera.  You want the paint thin enough you can still read the words of the text.

Set aside to dry.

While your papers are drying take a 1/2 sheet of copier paper and a 1/2 sheet of cardstock.

Sketch your butterfly shape.  You want 2 the same size. You could draw one, cut it out and then trace around it or use a template.

I added some oil pastel.  You could also use wax crayon.

Paint with disk tempera.

Paint the back of the cardstock one as well.

When the background and grass paper are dry start cutting out strips (pointy at top) and glue onto your background.

I added some extra details to my butterflies with scraps of coloured cardstock and.....

a little extra paint just to jazz them up a bit.

Glue the copier paper butterfly into place on the background.

Bend 1/2 a pipe cleaner and glue in place for the antennae.

take the cardstock butterfly and fold in half.

Run some glue on that fold line.

Stick into center of other butterfly. Let it set up for awhile and then close the fold a bit again.  You want to keep a nice flutter to it.

That's it.

See you next time.

Gail