Cool Colors Polar Bear Watercolor Lesson

A fun project that focuses on cool colors and watercolor techniques. 

You could also use oil pastels or chalk pastels without the glue.

 You can use black glue for a more dimensional look, or outline with Sharpies.  Black Glue makes it easier for your students to keep the colors within the areas and it looks like stained glass when finished.

You'll need:

Watercolor paper

Black Glue - regular white glue with black acrylic paint mixed into it.

Pencils

Brushes

Water

Paper towels

Watercolor paints, I use liquid watercolor

This polar bear is easy to draw - 

I start out with the head in the center of the paper - and make it about 2" tall.

I draw a line for the top of the head and a dot straight down from the middle of that line.

Then I join the edges of the lines to the dot with a slightly curved line.

This creates a curved upside down triangle.  I like to talk about how drawing is basically just combining shapes.

Add another curved line for the nose, curved lines for the ears and 2 ovals for the eyes.

Now two more curved lines from the tip of the nose for the bear's chest.

Two lines from about the center of the face to a little below the middle lines.

Add the bumps at the bottom of those lines for the paws and connect them to the outside lines.

Now add the back legs and paws with another curved line and a bump on the bottom.

I punched a 1 1/2" circle out of card stock as a pattern for the moon.

I then add some horizontal lines for the sky and mountains etc... and tell them to do the same in whatever shape they choose.

Have your students put the glue on the bear first so they can keep their hands out of the glue when applying the glue.  I have them practice with the glue before applying it to the bear just to get a feel for it.  It's easier to pull the glue towards them that to try and push it away from them.

Then go from top to bottom.

I have them stop here and let it dry overnight, then they add the claws and eyes with a sharpie and erase any extra pencil lines.

With a palette of blue, purple, magenta etc.. we start painting now that the glue is dry.

I show them how to do the graduated wash by starting with just clean water on their brush and painting the chest of the bear.  Then with just a bit of blue on the tip of their brush the go around the edges of the glue lines and let the color disperse in the water on the paper.  If they accidentally get too much blue they can blot their middle section with a tissue or towel. 

The moon is the same technique.

Now they can do washes of color in each section of their painting.

I demonstrated using undiluted color at the top of the area they're painting and then adding water to make it lighter going towards the bottom.  I like having a variation of shades in the washes of color, but I also tell them they can do it however they want.

Examples from a camp with 1st grade and up.

This is a challenging project, mostly because the glue is difficult to control, but when they get to the painting it is easy because the glue stops the colors from going where they don't want it.

Galaxy Unit Astronaut in Space Mixed Media Art Lesson

I taught this lesson to my 3rd grade students for their galaxy unit.  I borrowed the class photo and enlarged it on a color copier to get the faces for the spacesuits.  I used a 1 inch circle punch to cut out the faces before I taught the class.

There is a lot to do in this lesson so I pre cut the coffee filter circles to make the planets also.

You will need:
Coffee filters
Water Based markers
Sharpies
Spray bottle
Toothbrush
White Tempra paint
Black and White paper
Scissors
Glue sticks

I started out by showing them the project without anything glued down so that I could move things on and off my space background.  Showing them lots of possibilities.  Then I said we were going to make the planets and the space first so they could dry while we drew our astronauts step by step.

I brought in a large box to keep the white splatters from going everywhere.  They put their black paper in the box and then used a toothbrush dipped in white paint to make the stars.  I only needed one dip in the white paint to make all of my stars.  I used my index finger and brushed the bristles over the black paper to make the stars.  This is a quick activity.

I demonstrated both the stars and the planets, then divided the class in half and had them do the paint splatter stars or the marker planets.

The planets are made with coffee filters cut into circles.  I put these images of planets on the screen while they worked on theirs.  I told them they could make realistic planets or imaginary planets.

Color the planets with water based markers and then spray them with water from a spray bottle to blend the colors together and get a watercolor effect.  This is another quick activity - just suggesting shapes as they will all blend together.  

I had another station set up in the classroom with newspaper all over the table and 2 spray bottles.

They would spray their planet with a couple of sprays of water, put them on a dry newspaper and take them back to their table.

Once all of the students had their stars and planets at their table to dry we did a directed drawing of the astronauts.

I found the instructions for the astronauts on Pinterest:

https://10minutesofqualitytime.com/how-to-draw-an-astronaut/

We did the drawings step by step and the students did great - the biggest challenge for them was the boots, arms and gloves.

We started with a one inch circle that I had punched out of card stock which they traced to make a place for their photos later.

After they drew their astronaut I asked them to go over all their lines with a Sharpie and to color their astronaut any way they wanted.  They also needed to cut them out.  While they were finishing their astronaut I asked them to come and get their faces put on their astronaut.

I put these photos up on the screen while they finished their project.

They had access to more paper and pastels to add more objects or details to their composition.  We had already done Nebula so some of them chose to add those, some created black holes, others made a glowing sun or drew their moon.

It was a super busy project but the students were engaged the entire lesson and proud of their finished art!  I love what they came up with!

Examples:

Here are some examples without using photos:

Mixed Media Art Lesson Based on "The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind" and William Kamkwamba

Our Students are doing a unit on Global Inventors and coincidentally I watched the movie on Netflix about this young man.  At the age of 14 William figured out how to generate electricity bringing light and pumping water to his small starving village in Africa.  

I Love the illustrations in the book by Elizabeth Zunon - she used oil paint and paper collage.

Every year we do some Eric Carle projects and students create bright tempra painted paper with patterns for Eric Carle Collage.  This worked our perfect for this project, but you could use patterned scrapbook paper, tissue paper, wall paper, etc...

We read the book, watched a few short videos on You Tube about William and then got started.

Supplies:

9 X 12" White paper

Collage paper

Glue sticks

Oil Pastels

Colored Pencils

Sharpies

Pencils

Scissors

They were asked to create a pencil sketch with whatever parts of the story they wanted to illustrate.

I tried to show several things in mine - theirs were simpler.

Next add the collage paper in a few places before using the oil pastels.

Once you have your paper glued on begin adding the rest of the details.

I mentioned that the oil pastels can mix with other colors and also that smaller details should be done with the colored pencils or sharpies.

It was challenging for them to get their ideas on paper, but I think they did a great job!  They also enjoyed having choices of materials to use.

 The water is coming from the windmill - symbolically - What a great idea!

Some finished 3rd and 4th Grade Art:

A successful and fun mash up of the freedom to use unrealistic colors like Eric Carle and their Imagination and Symbolism inspired by William's story and Elizabeth Zunon's illustrations!