Same animal, different colours

Made by a student of grade 1

You need:

1. two white drawing sheets A4 size
2. oil pastels
3. liquid water colour
4. brush
5. jar with water

A lesson about cool and warm colours.

Draw an animal on a white drawing sheet. Be sure it's not too small. Ask the teacher to make a copy of this drawing. Colour the first animal with oil pastels in warm colours, the second one in cool colours. Paint the background with liquid water colour, using warm and cool colours as well.

Paste both drawings below or next to each other on a large white sheet. 

In the style of David Hockney

I found this terrific lesson on the blog 'Use your coloured pencils' of Anne Farrell. I used this lesson to tell about artist David Hockney and his swimming pool paintings.

You need:

1. white drawing sheet A4 size
2. coloured paper for background 
3. oil pastels
4. liquid water colour, blue and green
5. brush
6. jar with water

The successful British artist David Hockney was born in 1937 in Bradford, England. He studied at the Royal Academy in London. His first works were anecdotal and ironic. In 1964 Hockney moved to California, where he developed a more realistic way of painting. The main themes at this time, are pools, landscapes and portraits.

From 1966 David Hockney increasingly used photographs for his paintings. He made ​​collages containing just photographs. After 1980, Hockney's work became a more expressionistic character. His work shows influences of Picasso Besides paintings, Hockney also makes drawings and etchings. 

Look at artwork of David Hockney, especially those with swimming pools. Discuss with the students how people look like under water - flowing hair, lighter skin. What causes the shimmering
surfaces on the water and what do they look like?

The students draw one or more people in swimsuits and colour them with oil pastels. Use white oil pastel to draw a water pattern in the background, consisting of wavy horizontal, vertical and diagonal lines.
Paint the picture with blue and/or green diluted coloured ink. The swimmers and the white lines will not resist the ink.

Artworks made by students of grade 4

Sunflower batik

You need:

1. white drawing sheet A4 size
2. oil pastels
3. pencil
4. tempera paint brown or black
5. liquid soap
6. brushes

Draw some sunflowers on the sheet and on the edges. Colour them with oilpastels, press heavily. Wrinkle the sheet into a ball; make sure the picture is on the inside.

Smooth the paper out. Use black or brown tempera with a tiny bit of liquid handsoap, and paint over the entire paper.

Then rinse the paper under cool water. The paint sticks in the little crinkle wrinkles giving it that batik look.

Leave the work to dry and press it flat between two books.

Made by students of grade 4

Sunflowers in five different materials

You need:

1. sunflowers or pictures of them
2. white drawing sheet A1 size, cut in strips of 30 by 65 cm
3. five different colouring materials, like colour pencils, tempera paint, watercolour paint, oil pastels, crayons, coloured ink, aquarell pencils etc.
4. brushes
5. pencil, ruler
6. coloured paper
7. scissors

Look with the students at some sunflowers or pictures of them. How thick is the stem, what can you tell about the leaves, how are the petals divided, what colours do you see in the heart of the flower, etc.

Divide the sheet with thin lines into five strips of 13 cm high. Draw some sunflowers. Make sure the flowers themselves are drawn at the demarcation of the strips. Make sure too that in each compartment at least half a sunflower or leave is drawn.

Choose five different colour materials. Use in every compartment a different material. Consider yourself the order of the materials, for example from bright (markers) to less bright (aquarelle pencils).

Paste the work on a coloured background. Or cut the five compartments and paste them with some space between on a coloured background.

Made by students of grade 5

African adire

Made by a student of grade 4

You need:

1. white drawing paper A4 size
2. crayons
3. liquid watercolour
4. brush
5. ruler
6. pencil

Yoruba women in Nigeria make a type of resist-dyed cloth that they call adire. They make some adire by folding, tying, and/or stitching cloth with raffia before dyeing. This is called adire oniko, after the word for raffia, iko. They also make another type, adire eleko, by painting or stenciling designs on the cloth with starch. Both types are dyed in indigo, a natural blue dye.

The dye-resistant starch can be either painted freehand or stenciled onto the fabric. When freehand painting, the artist usually paints a grid of squares or rectangles onto the fabric first. Then she fills these squares with geometric and representational motifs.

Stenciled patterns are even more diverse. New motifs, both geometric and representational, are constantly being created. They can include everything from simple shapes to elephants, keys, letters, and skyscrapers. The metal stencils are made by men, who sell them to the female adire artists.

Show some pictures of african adire and discuss them. Show African symbols and talk about their meanings.

Students use pencil and ruler to divide their sheets in squares of 5 by 5 cm. Draw with a yellow or white crayon symbols and/or patterns in these squares. Paint the sheet using coloured ink.

ATC's from Australia

We received an envelope full of the most beautiful artist trading cards from Anna Pietrolungo and her students on Essendon North Primary School, Australia. The envelope came just in time, because my 6th graders will leave our school this week.
Thanks a lot Anna, for these beautiful cards. My students were very excited and will get one of these cards on their last day of school.

Filled with fruit

Made by a student of grade 3

You need:

1. white drawing sheet A4 size
2. oil pastels

Choose four fruits and draw many of them on the drawing sheet. The fruit should overlap. Colour them with oil pastels and outline with black.

Three spring flowers, three materials

 

Made by students of grade 3

You need:

1. three white drawing sheets 10 by 10 cm
2. coloured origami sheets 12 by 12 cm
3. coloured cardboard 14 by 38 cm
4. tempera paint
5. brushes
6. crayons
7. colour pencils
8. tulips, daffodils, bluebonnets or pictures of them
9. glue

Students scetch three different spring flowers on three sheets of 10 by 10 cm: bluebonnet, tulip and daffodil. Colour the flowers with three different materials: crayons, tempera paint and colour pencils. Paste the drawings on coloured origami sheets and paste them then on coloured cardboard.

Easter eggs with lines

You need:

1. cardboard egg shape 10 cm high
2. pencil
3. white drawing sheet
4. several colour materials, like markers, colour pencils, crayons, chalk pastel 
5. coloured paper 20 by 14 cm
6. gekleurd papier 14 cm hoog, 20 cm breed
7. glue
8. scissors
9. fine black marker 

What kind of lines do we know? Let students draw them on the blackboard: straight - horizontal, vertical, diagonal; angular, like zig-zag and curved lines.
Students have to make four Easter eggs. Ouline the template with a pencil. Draw straight lines in the first egg, curved lines in the second one and zig-zag lines in the third one. The fourth egg may is made with lines of their own choice. Trace the lines with a fine black marker. Colour them with four different materials: colour pencils, markers, chalk pastel and crayons. Cut the eggs and paste them on a coloured sheet.

Made by students of grade 3

Charming chicken

Made by a student of grade 5

You need:

1. blue and yellow construction paper A4 size
2. oil pastels
3. glue

Draw a chicken on blue construction paper, using the tutorial on How to draw a chicken. Make it a charming chicken by colouring it in bright colours. Mix colours to create smooth transitions. Draw a horizon line and colour the ground. Draw somethin on the horizon line, Teken een horizonlijn en kleur de grond. Teken iets op de horizonlijn, for example a fence or a farm. 
Tear the edges of the blue sheet away and paste the chicken on a yellow undersheet. Draw eggs around it.

Made by students of grade 6

Patterned hearts like Jim Dine

You need:

1. drawing sheet A5 size
2. crayons
3. liquid water colour
4. brush

Fold the sheet of paper into quarters. Cut a heart out of a piece in the hearts: Trace this heart four times with a pencil. Draw patterns in the hearts with crayons: stripes, circles, zigzag lines etc. Draw different patterns around the hearts.

Paint the whole sheet with liquid watercolour. The crayon will resist the ink.

Searching for the chameleon

You need:

1. white drawing sheet A4 size
2. oil pastels
3. scissors
4. small pieces of foam
5. double sided tape

Start the lesson with this poem about a chameleon.

Has anyone seen my chameleon this morning?

He has to be hiding somewhere.

He asked me if we could play hide-and-go-seek,

and then disappeared into thin air.

I've looked high and low in the yard and the house

and it seems like he's nowhere around.

He's probably hiding right out in the open

but doesn't yet want to be found.

I'm guessing he looks like a leaf on a bush

or the back of a sofa or chair.

He could be disguised as a book or a bagel.

Regardless, I don't think it's fair.

If you come across my chameleon, please tell him

I give up. He beat me today.

He's clearly the champion at hiding so, next time,

it's my turn to pick what we play.

Kenn Nesbitt

Draw shapes of your choice on the sheet. Leave about 1 cm white between the shapes. Colour them with three or four different colours of oil pastels.

Draw a chameleon on another sheet and colour it the same way as the first sheet: coloured shapes with one cm white between them. Cut it out with a one cm white around it. Use small pieces of foam and double side tape to paste the chameleon on the background. The chameleon will be slightly higher.

All artworks are made by students of grade 6

Artist Trading Cards

Some weeks before Christmas, I was contacted by Amy Baldwin, art teacher at St. Pauls Lutheran School in Millington (Michigan). She wrote me she was a fan of my weblog. We emailed for a while, wondering if we could do a little project together. I read about exchanging ATC's on many art blogs, so I proposed to let our students make those little cards for eachother. This seemed to her very nice, so we got started!

Amy's students made ATC's for my students, my Dutch students did the same for hers. A couple of days before Christmas I sent an envelope filled with 50 ATC's of my 23 students to Millington.

Yesterday we received the big envelope, full of ATC's! How exciting for my students to get those beautiful cards from the other side of the world! They admired the cards and were surprised about the Dutch words on some of them. Thank you very much Amy and thank you all, St. Paul's students!

Come on, let's make a snowman!

You need:

1. blue construction paper A4 size
2. oil pastels
3. pencil
4. white tempera
5. brush

Students sketch a part of a snowman on blue paper. Sketch the hat and scarf and other items too. By choosing an incomplete snowman, students are forced to draw big. An additional advantage is that there remains some to imagine, because wwhat would your snowman look like if he filled the complete sheet?

Tell students that they begin to colour with white. This is to prevent the other colors will mix with white, and to be sure the white crayons will remain white! When the artwork is ready, outline everything with black oil pastel. Paint snowflakes around the snowman with white tempera paint and a sturdy brush.

Made by students of 10-11 years old

Cityscape at night

You need:

1. black construction paper 20 by 20 cm
2. oil pastel
3. white tempera paint
4. some drops of dishwashing detergent
5. brush

Students draw the outline of simple houses on black paper. Behind the high ones, in the front the lower ones. Colour the houses with oil pastel. Draw and colour a behind the houses. Mix some drops of dishwashing detergent with tempera paint. This keeps the paint to stick to the oily chalk. Outline the houses and moon with the white paint. Finally paint windows and doors.

April showers will bring us flowers

You need:

1. white drawing sheet
2. water colour paint
3. ruler
4. white crayon or oil pastel
5. paint brush
6. water

Characteristicly Dutch weather in spring is a weather type with showers, alternated with sunny periods. Those typical spring showers are called 'Maartse buien' (March Showers) in Holland, while English meteorologists speak about 'April showers who bring us flowers'. In this lesson children will draw typical spring flowers (tulips, daffodils etc.) during a rain shower.
Sketch some spring flowers on a white sheet. Make sure your lines are extremely thin. Use your ruler to draw white crayon lines with about one centimeter between them. Make sure your crayon has a sharp point. Paint your drawing with watercolour paint. Use a lot of water to make bright colours. The crayon will resist the water paint, so your shower will be very clear!

Valentine's day (with Jim Dine)

You need:

1. white paper 20 by 20 cm
2. cardboard 10 by 10 cm
3. pencil and ruler
4. scissors
5. glue
6. colour pencils
7. oil pastel crayons
8. chalk pastel
9. salt
10. tempera paint
11. different kinds of coloured paper (ribbed cardboard, tissue paper, crepe paper etc.)
12. watercolour paint
13. brushes
14. markers
15. red or pink paper for background

Jin Dine, born in 1935 in Cincinatti, is a sculptor and popart artist. Hearts, ties and tools are recurrent themes in his art. Let children learn about Jim Dine by showing and discussing his artworks. Because of upcoming Valentine's day a lesson about hearts today! Basic colours are red and white (and making pink of these of course!).

Children get a sheet from 20 by 20 cm. They have to divide this sheet with ruler and pencil into four squares from 10 by 10 cm. Fold the little cardboard and draw a heart against the fold. Cut it out. Trace this heart in the four squares. Divide the different colouring supplies on different tables. Stimulate children to experiment with these materials. What happens when I sprinkle salt in watercolour paint? How can I make my heart pop up from the paper? Can I combine chalk pastel and oilpastel? What happens when I sprinkle water on tissuepaper? Students have to colour their hearts and backgrounds by using as many supplies and techniques as possible. While doing this, kids may walk around through the classroom(s) and choose the place where the art supplies of their choice are. The only restriction is: when all chairs are occupied, you have to choose another supply first. When the four hearts are ready, they have to be pasted on a red or pink background.

All artworks are made by children of 10-12 years old

Snowman close ups

Made by Charmaine, 11 years old

You need:

1. grey drawing paper cut in pieces from 15 by 15 cm
2. oil pastels
3. glue
4. scissors
5. coloured cardboard

Children get three pieces of grey drawing paper. They have to draw the same snowmen face or part of the face from different points of view: frontal, of the side, from above, from the bottom, upside down etc. The snowmen must be coloured with oil pastels. Of course the colours of all drawings have to be the same. Outline everything with black oil pastel.
Glue the three snowmen close ups on a matching coloured cardboard.

Snowman close ups, by children of 11-12 years old

Puzzle trees

You need:

1. black paper A4 size
2. black paper 23 by 32 cm
3. oilpastel crayons
4. scissors and glue

Students draw with a pencil on a black A4 sheet a simple mountain landscape under the moon. Colour it with oilpastel crayons and outline the mountains and moon with black crayon. Show the students that the colour of the air around the moon is lighter. Use white and yellow to brighten up blue colours, or black to darken them. Make sure your colours in the air will blend.

When colouring is finished, turn around the sheet. Draw a tree on the back, with five branches: one tho the right, one to the right edge of the paper, one to the middle above, one to the left edge of the sheet and one to the left. Branches have to be small at the end and wide near to the trunk. You've got six puzzlepieces now. Cut them out and place them on the larger black sheet. Use the cut tree to check if your pieces lie well. Pate all parts on the black sheet, exept the tree of course. Maybe you can do something fun with it?

Cow's day

You need:

1. white drawing sheet A3 size
2. construction paper for background
3. tempera paint or oilpastels

When the cows are back in the meadows in spring, we should draw them! We look at photographs and paintings of cows. Using the website ‘how to draw a cow’ , children draw a cow in the meadow. Of course with a typical Dutch cloudy sky. Colour the drawing with oilpastels or tempera paint. Tell the kids that the meadow shouldn't be a simple green rectangle. They should use different colours. And: grass is growing up!