Medieval Castles

I found this lesson at Deep Space Sparkle and created castles with 1st grade. We started by drawing simple castles all together on black paper. Then we used foam brushes and gray paint to stamp on our bricks. They did a great job arranging their bricks to look realistic. 

Then we cut out the castles and glued them to a drawn background. We used old paint samples to add doors, windows, and flags. They are so bright and beautiful!

Medieval Shields

My 2nd graders have been waiting (impatiently) to do this projects since they walked in the first day of art class and saw my massive stack of wooden circles. I was lucky enough to meet a teacher whose husband owns a custom guitar shop and they have leftover circles. So I have a wonderful surplus of free wooden circles! :)

The first week of this project, we drew with markers and planned out our designs because we only get one shot to paint. I love how they stuck to their designs when we started painting the following week.

Once the paint dried, we added details with aluminum foil.

I LOVE how these turned out! Great work!

It Took All Week...

But I finally found a way to explain how to draw dragons that kindergarteners understand! Look at this awesome dragon! 

Greek Mosaics

After viewing artworks in buildings in Greece and the mosaic artworks inside, we created our own using paper scraps. Students were encouraged to make the focus an animal as seen in many Greek mosaics. We also added columns and a roof like the Parthenon to make a kind of "animal temple". This was a big test of patience for the kids; there's no shortcuts! ^_^

Greek Theatre Masks

For our Greek art unit, 5th grade created theatre masks using paper mache. We worked on plastic mask forms to create these. I made a paper mache mixture of half water, half regular glue and newspaper. When they were dry, they could paint them however they wanted and added paper for hair, horns, teeth, etc. I am very impressed at how these turned out, they did a great job!