This year's theme for NAIDOC Week is 'Because of Her, We Can!' My Year 5 students created these yarn paintings inspired by the paintings of indigenous West Australian women. Some of the artists we researched were Biddee Baadjo, Queenie McKenzie, Eubena Nampitjin, Jill Jack, Kim West Napurrula, Nada Rawlins, Marcia Purdie, Rosie Goodjie and Stumpy Brown. Yarn paintings or nierika, are traditionally made by the Huichol people of Mexico. I hadn't attempted this before with students and I was surprised by how well they did. We used only pieces of card and a glue stick.      ..read more

My Grade 3s created these happy little spiders in rainbow webs inspired by this activity on Artsonia by Gateway Elementary. This is a great activity for Halloween but one that kids enjoy any time of year. They first learned to create a pattern using line to draw their web. Students then used coloured pencils, crayons and textas to colour the different areas inside their web.  Once they had completed colouring their web students created their own spider by making a mini pompom. Making a mini pompom using a fork is a great little textile activity for this age group. If you haven't seen th ..read more

  This lesson was inspired by the leaf paintings featured here at Paul J. Gelinas Junior High School. My grade 4 students created our version of these paintings by drawing a large outline of a leaf on their page using pencil. They then divided the shape using one central line and then used lines to create smaller areas of shape.  Students were then asked to choose one colour paint of their choice as well as black and white and then painted the divided areas using as many tints and shades of their chosen colour as they could mix. Once painted they used a thick black marker to retrace ..read more

  These landscape drawings were created by grade 3 students. We discussed different types of landscapes, the difference between warm and cool colours and different line types they could explore. Students then created their drawings in pencil, outlined in fineliner and used coloured textas or markers to add colour ..read more

This is a simple sculpture project my grade ones completed a while back. We used Model Magic in order to complete all the sculpting in one day. Although I don't use this product often, this air drying modelling material does allow students to model, add textures and to press bits like the shells, pipe cleaners and googly eyes directly into the clay. The next lesson we were able to paint using tempera paints and enhance details with permanent marker.   ..read more

I have completed Autumn tree collages with students before (see HERE and HERE) however this time I have added a print-making element which also adds more texture.  We began by drawing a large circle on the top half of our paper. This acted as a guide for creating the foliage. Students were given the option of many pieces of coloured tissue paper and were asked to use only the warm colours for their collage. They tore their paper into small pieces and glued onto their paper, overlapping to create new shapes and colours. We then brushed a thin paste over the collage to smooth down any bum ..read more

 My grade 5 students created these masks a couple of years ago. I plan to do them again this year as they turned out really well and the kids really enjoyed making them. This project was inspired by this post from 'Scrumdilly-Do', where you can also find instructions. During the Mexican celebration of the Day of the Dead (Día de los Muertos), decorative or edible skulls or 'calaveras' are made from either sugar or clay. Small sugar skulls represent the children who have passed away, while the larger sugar skulls represent the adults. These celebrations take place over the 1st and 2nd of ..read more

I saw this activity at 'Casa Maria's Creative Learning Zone' and knew I would have to try it at some point. Her student's results were so beautiful and reminded me of British artist Damien Hirst's Spin Paintings.  The only place  I know that still sells salad spinners is IKEA. Grab yourself a couple. I then made a cardboard template of a circle that fit the inside of the salad spinner. I had the students trace the template and cut out a couple of circles for themselves out of white paper. The consistency of the paint is important. It needs to be fairly thin and runny. We used li ..read more

This is a really easy project that I enjoyed as much as the students. I did this with grade 1 students but I'm sure any year level will enjoy it. The idea comes from 'I Can Teach My Child', where Jenae says you can use either regular textas/markers or liquid watercolours. I found the markers weren't as effective so we used tempera paints. I also discovered that very few children this age could wind the rubber bands around the wipes so you will probably need a helper for young children. The results were exciting though and once dry you could incorporate them into another art work. We simply g ..read more

These are some of the best results I've had with students using Still Life to explore value and tone. The trick seemed to be to supply many black and white photos of apples to students as a reference whilst drawing so they could really see the contrast between light and dark areas. Always great to see kids this age developing their own style too!   ..read more