In the Art Room: Charley Harper-Inspired Fawn Collage

If you follow me on Instagram, then you've seen me share my teacher sample of this Charley Harper-inspired lesson. I filmed the demo a week or more ago...and finally got around to editing it and posting it to my YouTube channel. My plan is to do a series of woodland animal videos inspired by Harper...we'll see how many I manage to complete. I have a tendency to be a pokey lil puppy. 

But enough about that, let's get to the lesson video:

Now, like I said, this is the second in a series of Harper-inspired lessons. In case you missed it, the other lesson is a mash-up of van Gogh's Starry Night and Harper. You can find it here. In this lesson, I'm using the same supplies as I did in the raccoon project. Here's the list:

* Faber-Castell Oil Pastels Full disclosure: I work with Faber-Castell frequently and create lessons for them using their supplies. That being said, I do enjoy their oil pastels for a couple of big reasons: they are sturdy. Unlike many other oil pastels I use, they don't break as often. They don't roll! I love that we aren't constantly chasing after them rolling off the tables. AND they are big...some oil pastels are very small and hard to hold for my students. Not to mention, they wear through them quickly. For all those reasons...and the fact that the colors are fabulous...I would definitely recommend these oil pastels.

* Brown Watercolor Paint This is for the light wash used on the raccoon.

* Texture Rubbing Plates or Burlap Don't have texture plates? Burlap makes for a great rubbing surface!

* Construction Paper I love Tru-Ray because the paper doesn't fade and seems stronger than most.

* Tempera Paint 

* Tempera Cakes My new favorite discovery: painting with tempera cakes on construction paper. Like, whut?! The colors stay true and I just love it! 

 I just had a GREAT couple of questions thrown my way after sharing this lesson on YouTube:

Fabulous questions, don't you think? Here's my response...

May I have a soapbox moment? I'm aware that there are art teachers who do not like guided drawing instruction. I've grown tired of folks speaking of the right and wrong ways to teach art. I'm also super leery of those who speak as though they have all the art teacherin' answers. Here's a secret: they don't. NONE OF US DO. We're all working with our students everyday, listening to them and trying to figure out how to best teach this amazing creative process to them. There are many different ways to teach art...and it's good to dabble in them all. But it's no good to put the methods of other art teachers down. Okay, soapbox moment over and out.

I will keep you posted on how these Harper-inspired projects progress! Until then...

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In the Art Room: Charley Harper and van Gogh Mash Up!

Hey, friends! I'm excited to share this fun lesson that I've started with my sweet second grade kiddos. Before fall break, I had a couple of classes that were ahead of the pack so I decided to introduce them to Charley Harper (a fave of mine) and a little guided drawing. THEY LOVED IT! They were so excited about their wee raccoons that I decided to create a lesson from their drawings. Feel free to use this lesson in your art teacherin' and creating world...all I ask is that you give me a shout out when you share on your favorite social medial. This helps folks find their way back here to enjoy the lesson as well. 

 For this project, we are using a ton of different media! Here's what we are using:

* Faber-Castell Oil Pastels Full disclosure: I work with Faber-Castell frequently and create lessons for them using their supplies. That being said, I do enjoy their oil pastels for a couple of big reasons: they are sturdy. Unlike many other oil pastels I use, they don't break as often. They don't roll! I love that we aren't constantly chasing after them rolling off the tables. AND they are big...some oil pastels are very small and hard to hold for my students. Not to mention, they wear through them quickly. For all those reasons...and the fact that the colors are fabulous...I would definitely recommend these oil pastels.

* Brown Watercolor Paint This is for the light wash used on the raccoon.

* Texture Rubbing Plates or Burlap Don't have texture plates? Burlap makes for a great rubbing surface!

* Construction Paper I love Tru-Ray because the paper doesn't fade and seems stronger than most.

* Tempera Paint 

* Tempera Cakes My new favorite discovery: painting with tempera cakes on construction paper. Like, whut?! The colors stay true and I just love it! 

I will say this about my latest videos: I'm trying ot make them shorter. For my second grade, I only see them for 30 minutes so I need to keep instructional time brief. 

 Here's a breakdown of the lesson in 30 minute increments: 

Day #1: Drawing the raccoon together. After enjoying some fun Nat Geo videos about raccoons, of course!

Day #2: Light wash over raccoon and paint scrapping for the tree.

Day #3: Creating the sky background. Rubbing and painting with tempera cakes. 

Day #4: Assembling our collage!

 By the way, I am thinking of having each of my four second grade classes create a different woodland animal collage inspired by Harper. So stay tuned for more! I'll be certain to keep you posted on how these beauties turn out. 

 So far, so cute! And what a fun way to review the elements of art. 

 Sharing with the kids information about raccoons also got them inspired to create. I'm telling you, Nat Geo is where it's at!

One of my sweet students did tell me at the end of art class that her raccoon was "not my best work". Bless. The beauty of having a recorded video is that the kids can follow along and make another one the next art class! When drawing together, I very rarely let them start over...it's an important time to teach about a Beautiful Oops! And for them to let go of the notion that their artwork must be perfect. I always tell them that the following art class, if they are still unhappy, they can try again. Often times, they keep their original creation.

Can't wait to see these little bandits complete! 

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