Lesson At A Glance

A brief overview of each step. Buttons jump to each section for detailed information.

10 Min – Color dancing with circle templates.

5 Min – Explain highlights and shadows

10 Min – Use sponges to make stamped clouds

5 Min – Students draw their balloons

15 Min – Cut balloons & string, add shadows, and finish clouds

10 Min – Everyone glues their balloons & signs their work!

5 Min – Everyone helps

SCROLL & TEACH

LESSONPLAN

Each section is a different color. Read over once and then you can SCROLL & TEACH using any device you like. It’s designed to work best with your phone.

Kneel down so that you are on their level. Bending over emphasizes the differences in your height, while kneeling makes them feel more important. Have tape and marker ready so you can stick some tape on the table by each student and write their name on it as they sit down.

Everyone should take their time with the work and make a finished piece of art. Limiting the paper can also help kids focus on the work. If someone finishes in super-fast time, ask them what more they can do to the existing paper. Ask again several times – unless they appear overly frustrated; then you can allow them to move on to a new work.

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Pass out the pre-made circle template above, and let students write their name on them (or give numbers if you plan to re-use the templates).

Start off by letting everyone choose four colors that look nice together, and then set those markers aside.

On 11” x 17” copy paper, have kids place a circle template on the center of the paper.  To use these templates:

1. Choose your first marker and take the cap off so you’re ready
2. Use your other hand to press down on the middle of the circle, so it won’t move around
3. Trace a colored line all around the edge of your circle
4. Take the paper circle away and set aside
5. Draw another, circle just inside this circle, a little bit smaller (use any color)
6. Draw another circle just outside and a bit bigger.
7. Make more circles inside and outside of the first one.
8. Go slowly so you can control your lines.
9. Write your name in a corner

Play slow music while they work, to facilitate slower technique and practicing control.

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Brushes should be nylon for springiness and durability. Round brushes are the most versatile.

Paints

• RED
• BLUE (Ultramarine or royal blue is best)
• BLACK
• WHITE

Use watercolor paper if possible, or very heavy paper if that’s not available. The paper we use is 11″ x 15″ and works well for this project. Students should write names on the back before beginning. Also have sheets of card stock cut to 5.5″ x 8.5″ ready (cut regular paper in half). Set several red helium-filled balloons on the table using weights to hold their strings down.

Blue paint and red paint

Students should have a water tub, paper towel, a very large brush, and a mixing plate or bowl with white tempera paint and a little blue (Ultramarine is best). Keep the paints in one area using either a divided plate, or by drawing lines across it with a sharpie marker to make 4 to 6 mixing areas. Otherwise they will use the entire plate to play in with one color.

Place some pure red in another area or in separate bowls to prevent mixing with the blue.

Write names on the back of the paper. Then have them use one of the brushes to mix the blue and white all together and paint the entire sheet of watercolor paper with their sky color. They can have more blue to mix in, if they want a stronger color.

This can be streaky and have more than one shade of blue. Help everyone fill the entire page all the way to the edges.

Set aside to dry.

Hand out the half-sized pieces of card stock copy paper (5.5″ x 8.5″). Write names in pencil on the VERY CENTER on the back. Now have them  use bright red right out of the bottle to paint this smaller piece of paper all red.

Use a new brush so blue is not mixed in by accident.

Set aside to dry.

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You should also try to use a lamp and a real shiny red balloon to show how it has a darker edge on one side and on the bottom. Then point out the highlight, which is a reflection of the lamp.

Most, if not all, of your students will not see the shadow at first – and maybe even after you point it out. Their brains only interpret the shadow as roundness. They may even tell you that the color does not get darker. Ask them to trust you on this, and try to see it by squinting your eyes. This blurs the vision and makes the lights and darks show up more.

The only difference is the shadow and the highlight. Go back and forth between the two images a couple of times.

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If you can’t find any makeup sponges, you can use regular sponges cut into cloud shapes, or even wadded up paper towels in a pinch.

Talk about how the sponges are fluffy, just like a cloud! This makes them great to paint clouds with.

Every student should have a mixing area with white, a little blue and a tiny bit of black paint. They should mix this together with a small brush, and then set the brush in the water tub.

There should be two clouds, one on each side of the paper, so that the center can have the balloon. Students can make a third cloud near the top in the center if they want.

Dip the sponge lightly into the paint and use it to stamp on the sky background. You can always get more paint, but you can’t take it back very easily. Don’t make more than 3 little clouds, using the blueish gray color. Remind them as they work that this is NOT the local color of a cloud, but that we’re painting the cloud shadows first! Make the whole cloud shape though. We will add the white later after these have dried.

Clean out the sponges really well and MAKE SURE TO DRY THEM!

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Have your class follow along with these steps. Use the term, “big shape” often. We use this term all through our lessons in older grades.

1. Have kids turn their red paper UPSIDE down, so that their name shows. It should be tall, in the shower position, not sideways like a bathtub.
2. Place your circle template on the middle of the paper. Then slide it up so that it almost reaches the top of the paper, but not quite. If it touches the top, slide it back down some. Use your non-writing hand to hold it down.
3. Trace the top half of the circle in pencil. Don’t do the bottom.
4. Set the circle aside & look at the big shape of the red balloon on the printout.
5. Notice the circle shape at the top, but how the bottom isn’t like a circle. It comes down almost to a point, like the bottom of a heart, but a little more rounded.
6. Try to draw this balloon shape. You can draw more than one line and erase them if needed.

You will also need to cut out short pieces of black yarn for the balloon string.

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Use the red paint and add a small touch of black to mix up a shadow color. Have students look at the PDF diagram and paint the side and bottom of their balloon with the darker color. Finish the balloon by cleaning out the brush really well, and using a dab of pure white paint to make a dot for the highlight.

Get the sponges back out and use the pure white paint to make the bright white fluffy parts of the clouds. Be sure to leave the right side and the bottom the shadow color.

Clean brushes.

Get out the sponges again. Then use pure white paint and stamp on top of the shadow clouds.

To make the clouds look like they have shadows, leave the right edge and bottom edge alone and do not cover these edges with the white. Show the photo below so they see exactly what you mean.

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Glue the balloon to the sky background using white glue. You can use a small piece of cardboard to spread the glue on the back of the balloon, which has some wet paint on it and cannot be set down upside down.

It’s usually good to cover some of the clouds!

Attach the strings by dragging it through the glue and placing it on the bottom of the balloon and going down in either a straight or wiggly line. Use scissors to snip any yarn that’s hanging off the bottom.

Sign your work with a pencil in the bottom corner!

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• Wash hands
• Super-wash brushes if used
• Put art supplies away
• Wipe tables & toss trash
• Remove any smocks (last)
• Check for items on floors and tables

Make sure you have all your supplies ready and a way to display photos from this web page. If you can purchase a few shiny red balloons it can really make it fun and more helpful. If you get a balloon, also find a small lamp that you can use to shine light to create a highlight.

Print all of your PDFs from the lesson plan and cut the circle templates carefully out.

Week 4: The Other Side of the Fence

This is a great lesson for learning a basic concept for drawing accurately, but without the students getting bogged down in lesson concepts. When drawing it helps artists to be able to draw the air shapes (negative shapes) that are in-between other things. It doubles the information available for accurate drawing. A fence is used to plant the seed of this concept, and then we use the bold line painting as a background for an “ink” drawing over it.

Week 5: Chicken Day

After learning about drawing big shapes and air, students get to practice these concepts, but we make it fun by having chicken day. We draw chickens, paint chickens, and even dance like chickens! The idea of drawing the air, and drawing on “both sides of the line” is reinforced with chicken shapes and also an exercise using the handle of a mug or vase. Oil pastels are used on a black line painting of a chicken.

Use this button to view our parent’s blog. Share the link: http://parentart.org, with your student’s parents so your they can read about the lesson each week.