Dazzling Dinosaurs Art Project

My first grade students absolutely love this lesson. For an art teacher, pulling out chalk pastel is always a bit dicey. You just never know if they'll get more chalk on their hands than on the art work. I always throw caution to the wind and let 'em at it. To me, there is nothing more adorable than watching chubby little fingers wade through a cloud of chalk dust. I demonstrate two very simple dinosaurs. Basically, they are drawn the same way, just with the head in different places. Encourage the kids to add spikes, bony plates, horns, etc. Of course, you'll always get a dino expert in the class who will insist upon proper anatomy details. I usually bring this kid up to the front of the class to explain-away.
Here are a few helpful teaching tips:

• Draw the dino with a black oil pastel
• Limit sky to one color
• Limit ground to one color
• After filling in with chalk, outline again with a black oil pastel
• Tap excess chalk on the edge of table and onto the floor instead of blowing it onto another child's artwork
• Spray artwork with hairspray to set

Have fun!

Chalk Pastel Flowers for Sixth Grade

I teach this lesson every year. It's fast; only takes 2-55 minute sessions, reinforces blending skills and offers practice on still developing fine motor skills.
Supplies:
Chalk Pastels
12" x 18" black drawing paper
1 bottle of white school glue per student

Step One:
Display a variety of flower pictures (old calendars are great) on the white board and talk about the elements of a flower. By sixth grade, these kids already know, but go over it again.
I show the kids how to properly use a glue bottle for "drawing". See my explanation here.
Before I go on, let me give you an option. You can either have the children draw their flowers with a pencil or have them skip this step and draw immediately with glue.
I recommend the latter. Kids with pencils (especially older kids) tend to become perfectionist; drawing the tiniest of details. This is fantastic, but it won't work with this lesson. The bigger the drawing, the better. The less detail, the better. So having said that, go directly to glue.

Step Two:
Begin with the centers of the flowers. That could mean one large center or two or three smaller centers scattered around the paper. Then, beginning on the left (if you are right handed), begin adding petals.
Once the entire paper is covered with beautiful, white flowers, lay the paper on a flat surface. Drying racks with a slant will not work!

Step Three:
This part is easy. Bring out the beautiful pastels and get to work. I encourage the kids to push the chalk up next to the rigid glue line and then blend into the paper using just one finger. Watch the kids work. If too much black paper is showing through, then they aren't applying enough chalk.

Chalk tips to avoid never wanting to work with chalk again.

• Have the kids hold up ONE finger. Tell them that this is their tool. Do not use more than one finger to blend.
• To clear their paper of chalk dust, have them hold their paper vertically and tap the paper onto the edge of the desk and onto the floor. Hey, it's better than on their clothes.
• Set a damp face cloth or rag on each of the tables. The kids who can't stand the dry, dusty feeling of chalk dust can wipe their fingers when they feel the need. Just make sure it's not too wet.
  

Finally, if you can, spray the picture with hair spray. This is not a perfect fixative, but it's cheap and works relatively well. Some years, I laminate chalk drawings. The colors become more vibrant, but if your school is impacted by budget cuts, sometimes a laminator isn't available!

Planets and Galaxy Project for Fifth Grade

Inspired by the Spheres in Space lesson over at Art Project for Kids, I adapted it to include a sparkly galaxy and cut-out planets.

Step 1: Fold a 12" x 18" white paper in half. Using various sized round containers, trace 5-6 circles onto the sheet of paper (only half the sheet). Cut out circles and use remaining paper as a mat to protect the table.
Step 2: Color and blend colored chalk onto circles, blending right off the edges.
Step 3: Using white chalk, color in one edge of the circle to create a highlight. Blend with fingers. Then, with black chalk, color the opposite side (working with the round edges) creating a shadow.
Step 4: Splatter paint a 12" x 18" sheet of black paper. I like to offer glitter paint as well as white paint as options.
Step 5: Glue planets to galaxy.

Chalk Pastel Lizards for Fifth Grade

Leapin' Lizards!
One way or another, I try to fit in a lesson involving my least favorite species of all...lizards. Hate finding them in my backyard, but I admit, they're way too fun to draw.

For this lesson, I demonstrate my strategy for drawing lizards on the white board. This is the key to the success of the piece. You don't have to draw well, but it helps to draw things in order.

Step 1: With a black oil pastel, draw a circle for the eye.
Step 2: In front of the eye, draw a line curving up and over the eye and down along the neck and back. Don't stop there!Bring the all the way down curving around below the body to form a tail.
Step 3: Go back to the start of this line (up by the head) and draw a line down and around to form the belly. The belly should stop at the tail.
Step 4: Put in the legs. Go right over the belly line.
Step 5: Add branch, decorations and leaves.

Now, bring out the chalk pastels and let the kids go wild. The more colors the better. Of course, the final step is to take the black oil pastel and go over all the original black lines again. This is the key for really making the piece stand out.

Glue and Chalk Tropical Bird Lesson

Drawing with glue has always been a favorite art project with my students. It really doesn't matter what the subject is: the technique is the same and the results are always spectacular.
I've always used black construction paper for the background, feeling that the chalk contrasts better than with any other color.
Of course, glue is messy and hard to control, so here are my tips you can share with your child or students:

Drawing with Glue

1. Pretend the tip of the glue bottle is a pencil lead. Instead of holding the glue bottle in the air and allowing the drip, drip, drip of the glue to splatter your paper, touch the tip directly onto the paper. Give a little squeeze and let the glue flow in an even line.
2. Pulling the glue bottle towards you is always better than pushing the bottle away from you.
3. If the drawing is complicated (i.e. fish, bird, etc.) use a soft lead pencil to lightly draw the subject onto the black paper first. If drawing something simple, let's say a flower, then let the glue bottle lead the way.
4. Draw BIG. This step is important, so I'll repeat it. Draw BIG.
5. Don't worry about big puddles of glue or in one particular case, footprints from an absent minded parent walking across the art that is innocently lying on the floor waiting to dry...it'll add texture and by gone it, tons of interest.

For a full set of instructions, please check out the project: Under-the-Sea Chalk and Glue drawing.

Under-the-Sea Chalk and Glue Drawings

I discovered this lesson while browsing through the Artsonia site recently. Gulf Elementary in Cape Coral, Florida displayed this beautiful Under-the-Sea chalk art on their school page. Although no lesson plans accompanied the piece, I experimented and came up with my own.
I used this lesson for fourth grade students but could be used for a fifth and sixth as well. For younger grades, use an easier subject matter (maybe penguins or sunflowers) and the results will be equally as grand.




The instructions are going to be brief because my christmas decorations are calling to me...

Step 1: I pass out sample drawings of various sea life...dolphins, sharks, sea turtles, seahorses, fish, etc.
Tip: Coloring books that you find at craft stores are especially helpful drawing aids. I demonstrate the basic principals in drawing the fish (I use the "shape" philosophy) and try to cover at leastthree different types (oval fish, elongated dolphins and round turtles). I encourage the kids to draw big, actually, I insist they draw big as they can because the glue will be applied next...

Step 2: Each student receives one piece of 12 x 18 black construction paper, a pencil, eraser and a bottle of white school glue.
I demonstrate the technique for the tracing pencil lines with the glue. Basically, I tell them to use the glue bottle as they would a pencil. The orange tip is like the lead: touch the paper, don't hover above it and hope for the best.
After drawing their fish, sea turtle, etc (only one please!), they trace their pencil lines with the glue. Lay papers flat on the floor until dry. This marks the end of Part I.
Tip: If you have a drying rack that has a slight tilt, it's wise to lay the pieces on the floor until the glue "sets", then you can rack 'em up.
Tip #2: Be careful the kids (or any wayward parent helper) doesn't track footprints over the art. Yes, this happed to me.

Step 3:
Using chalk pastel, the kids color in their fish, seaweed and the ocean. I emphasize that the top of their picture should be a light colored ocean and the bottom should be dark. Gradations of blue are used to achieve this subtlety in the sun's filtration.

Step 4: I demonstrate how to add highlights with white chalk and tones with black chalk. I give them the "black pastel is powerful, so control it" speech and let the kids experiment with the highlighting.

Step 5: The children now add details such as scales, patterns, lines, gills to their pictures using chalk and without blending their lines in.