Hey, friends! I'm coming to you today with a lesson that has been rolling around in my head for a while. I know this time of the school year, so many of us focus on LINES and I thought this painting project, that could serve as a school-wide collaborative, would be perfect!
Like my more recent lesson videos, I'm doing a little bit of a teacher-talk at the start of the video to walk you through the prep process. There isn't much but I do think it's important.
I find that templates work great and just make one per table! Then the kids can add the tick marks so they know where to start and end their first lines. I think the mural would work best if those first lines were all the same. I decided to use a dark blue.
If you do this lesson and post on social media, please be sure and tag me, I'd love to see what you and your artists create! Please do not rewrite this lesson and sell on TPT as your own...I hate to say that every post but, it happens!
Fall is upon us, y'all! Thank goodness as I'm just about over these super hawt Tennessee temps! For the occasion, I thought I'd put together a big ole blog post of my very favorite lessons for fall. Some of these are advanced and would work well with older students too!
To find each of these lessons, just tap on the links. Nearly all of the lessons have a instructional video for your artists and some come with free downloads. As always, these are for you to use with your artists and I provide them for free. PLEASE do not reuse/repackage them and sell them as your own on TPT. I hate that I have to say that...but it happens.
Okay, grab those fall leaves and let's dive in!
Let's kick things off with this here sculpture lesson! These little pumpkins would be fun for any lil pumpkin to create and they are super easy! Sculpt in one class and paint the next. Done! Find the lesson here.
My students LOVED anything spooky! This lesson is inspired by a contemporary artist. I know your students will also love the paint smearing aspect of this project! Find it here.
My students LOVE drawing sheets and love creating silly characters! This sheet (and video!) is totally free! Have students practice draw along with me on a dry erase board before diving in on their own Candy Corn Characters. Find the video and this free download here.
Oh man! Did my students love this lesson! We used Gelli plates and Dollar Tree sunflowers to print these on bright and bold copy paper. To give them an Andy Warhol look, we used puffy paint for the outline. These are always show stoppers! You can find the lesson details here.
If you want to share printmaking with your students but don't want the mess...than have you ever tried Marker Printing?! It's so fun and easy! Check it out here, you'll be amazed!
To deck the halls with a little bit of spooky, why not try these big-eyed owls on for size? This lesson incoorporates weaving, collage, watercolor painting and more! You can find the lesson video and details here.
I'm a HUGE fan of Celluclay! For your older students, they could make a pumpkin head planter! Any plastic planter will work...or even a plastic water jug! All the details can be found here.
If not a pumpkin, how about a skull?! I loved making this big guy...and the spider palm plant at the top was just so funny! I think I need to add some eyes to him though, what do you think? All the details here!
Aliens and monsters are always fun to create during this time of the year. I love this lesson because students work BIG and use their bingo daubers (you know I love 'em!). You can check out the lesson details here.
Did someone mention monsters?! These Loud Mouth monsters are inspired by the artist Greg Mike. I also paired it with a lesson for students to have choice in what their monsters could be saying. You can find the handouts for this as well as the video here.
Here's a lesson I did every year because it was always such a hit!
Need a lesson on painting landscapes? I loved this one and each turned out so colorful and happy. We looked at many fall landscapes and the colors of the fall. You can find the lesson details here.
One of the most popular lessons on my blog is this one! When I did it, I used homemade Gelli plates which are a total pain to make! So if you have Gelli plates you'll love this lesson...and it will be so much easier! You can find the details here.
Need a fall collage lesson? I did this one with my first grade and they loved it! We painted, printed and collaged. You can check out the details here.
Need a fun fall weaving lesson? This is it! I would recommend this with small groups if you are working with children in second grade and younger. I did this with my third graders in the spring...so maybe, for this time of year, this would be best suited for fourth grade and up. Lesson here!
Last month, I released my latest children's book Scissors, Glue and YOU! While working on my book, I thought through everything I cover when teaching my students how to use these supplies. All of that info was poured into my book with large, bold visuals in a fun-to-read rhyming format.
To celebrate, I wanted to share with you my Top Ten Tips for using Scissors in the Art Room!
While this may seem like a bit of a dry subject, I promise you, this videos is PACKED with info from how to clean and sharpen your scissors to the difference between leftie and rightie scissors to how to build student hand strength and SO MUCH MORE! I had so much to share...I hope you like the format. I wanted to be super clear on each of these tips so that you and your young artists have success.
Because I share some of my favorite supplies, like these leftie scissors, I did include links to each in my video. If you don't see them in the copy of the video, I've got them for you here. Starting with these scissors for our left handed friends.
For students who may benefit from the loop scissors, these adjustable scissors are great. When the arrow is pointed toward the thumb opening, they provide a spring action. When the spring action is not needed, the arrow can be pointed toward the blade and the scissors will operate like traditional scissors. Check them out here.
These scissors can be used like table top scissors or by squeezing the handle. I like that the plastic case provents the blade of the scissors from harming young artists. You can see them in action in my video and check them out here.
In my art room, I had a couple of variations of these hand-over-hand scissors. They really helped my students who were learning how scissors work. You can check out these here.
Another tip I share is to teach our students to have a separate 'home base' for their scissors and glue. This keeps the scissors from getting glue on them and prevents our students from using scissors on a clogged glue bottle. This has happened in my art room too many times...I learned that keeping these two supplies on opposite ends of the work area works well.
In the video I also share that scissors storage can be expensive if you buy from the online retailers. If you have a limited budget, toilet paper tubes work great! You can even number the tubes and the scissors so students know exactly where to place them.
I also share how to clean and care for your student's scissors! Goo Gone is a great thing to have in the art room as it removes sticky tape and glue from scissors.
I hope you find the video helpful! It was a lot of fun to create...just for you and your artists!
So I admit, the title of this here blog post is a little self-congratulatory but...WOULD YOU LOOK AT THIS SCULPTURE?! And tell me that it's not super duper fun!
This lesson is one I came up with while i was playing around with cardboard for THIS cardboard sculpture lesson. While tinkering, I realized I could connect the cardboard to make faces...or busts. Then I even made little people (lesson coming soon!) and just had so much fun.
This lesson is perfect for the start of the school year when you are learning all about lines! It's a great pairing with Larry the Line, OF COURSE but also a book by my friend Barney Saltzburg, Crazy Hair Day!
The prep for this lesson involves the same supplies I used in my sculpture lesson. You'll need to cut some cardboard...but that's really about it! For links to the supplies I recommend, visit here.
Ready to dive in?! I share some trouble shooting tips in the beginning of the video just for you. You'll see that I did struggle using cardboard squares for the head that were larger than 6" squares. That proved to be too heavy for the pipecleaner, as you can see. That's why my guy has no neck! So...when working with your young artists, keep your cardboard at 5" squares or smaller!
If working with young children who struggle with cutting the cardboard, just have a ton of bits cut for them! Allow them to glue and I really recommend Elmer's Glue All for the best stick.
Of course, painting these would be fun (I do have a lesson on that coming soon!) but I chose to focus on lines. You do you! I'm sharing this lesson for you to take it and run with your artists!
If you are looking for the line sheet I use in the video, it's a free download! You can find it here!
Just a gentle reminder: I share these lessons because I want your students to have fun...and you to have a break! PLEASE do not recreate and/or sell my lessons on TPT. You do not have my permission and, sadly, it happens a lot. I mean, c'mon. That's just not cool.
Since I have been sharing so many LINE lessons on my blog lately (with more to come, yay!), I thought I'd create a blog post with ALL of my very favorite lessons on line. Consider this your one-stop-shop for all things Line-Lesson-y!
Of course, we have to kick things off with The Man, The Myth, The Legend: Larry the Line! All my line lessons begin with Larry so if you'd like to get yourself a copy of my book, you can do so here!
To kick things off, let's start in kindergarten! Right away, we dive into all things LINE by create a line sculpture on the very first day! By the third day, we are ready to put our line knowlege to work with these lines paintings.
Did you notice in the photo how nicely the artist was holding their paintbrush?! That's because they know all about The Paintbrush Ballerina! This method of teaching painting will totally change how your artists handle their brushes and paint.
After these structured paintings where we paint lines across out paper, we dive in with either watercolor or tempera cakes to add color. You can find this line unit here!
This line sculpture lesson is one of my all-time faves AND it's what I teach on my first day with kindergarten artists! I also recommend this lesson if you have to do a teaching demo for a job interview. It's always a hit with kids of all ages!
To take a look inside my art room on that very first day of art, you can watch me teach! Check it out here!
Of course, if you are on a cart or simply don't feel like busting out the paint at the start of the school year (don't blame ya!), you could always do a variation of the line lesson with tempera sticks!
Then you can finish 'em off with these wild and wacky line monsters! For that lesson, visit here.
And, of course, if you are doing collage with your students, you DEFINITELY need my new book Scissors, Glue and YOU!
One of my FAVORITE ways to teach lines is with Line-Making Stations! My artists CRANKED out so much artwork in just a couple of 30 minute art classes. Not only did they learn all about lines but a variety of ways to create them! You can read all about that and check out the video and handouts I created for the occasion here. Printed lines was a fave! They really popped with black and white paint on black and white paper. Stay tuned to how we used all of these pieces of art!
I created a couple of totally free downloads and my students used them to create a coded work of art! These were so fun to have on display for open house.
You could also...turn that sculpture into a HAT! I did my sculpture on a paper plate and then wore it like an artsy thinking cap! For the lesson video, visit here!
Keep the line sheet in a sheet protector and it's perfect as a center for those early finishers or for a line making station!
Looking for a Larry-themed lesson?! Then this new one from my blog is sure to be a hit! You can check it out (with video, of course!) here! Whatever you do, I hope you have fun AND I hope you have a wonderful long weekend. You've earned it, friends!
