Intro Drawing Unit: Line, Marks and Value, Oh My!

 Introduce your students to LINES, MARKS and VALUE in a fun a way that encourages exploration and play while being chock-full of information and skill builders!

There are FIVE sheets of skill builders that will get your students understanding LINE, MARK-MAKING and VALUE--each with mini activities for hands-on learning and to increase student engagement and understanding!

LINE:

• Exploring different types of line in art
• What is contour line?
• Drawing with your eyes closed!

MARK-MAKING:

• Exploring mark-making (ideas for using found objects or scratch art)
• Mark-making value scale

VALUE:

• What is a value scale?
• Value scale practice and shading a sphere
• Value challenge: Exploring the ways value can be made

This packet also contains a culminating actvity where students can explore different drawing materials and make Material Mark Cards. This activity is fun and allows students to practice what they've learned about LINE, MARK-MAKING and VALUE in a fun, low-stress way. I use stations for this, but you can set it up however you'd like.

All handouts are digitized for clarity and I've even included my tips and tricks to get you started.

Check out my Teachers Pay Teachers store for more info!

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Intro-Drawing-Unit-Lines-Marks-and-Value-Oh-My-12018473

My TpT Store: How To Use Graphic Pencils

 Hey friends and enemies!

This year, I'm creating some resources that students can use to learn the basics of art supplies. So many times I do the same demos over and over and it would be nice to be able to quickly refer students to a demo in case they missed it or need additional info. 

In this resource, I created a video and handout that teach students about Graphite pencils. With the handout and video they will learn:

• What are graphite pencils?
• What is a value scale?
• How to create a value scale
• Grid drawing: Using a grid to redraw a photo 
• Shading Practice: Using a photo for reference

The link to the video is on youtube.

The free handout is on my Teachers Pay Teachers Store.

If you use these resources, leave a comment below! I love to hear that people are enjoying my resources. 

Enjoy!

Still Life Self Portraits With 7th Grade

Self portraits can be daunting, but students can express themselves without painting a traditional portrait. This project is based on one that the art teacher at Amherst Middle School, Rachel Rouillard, does with her 7th grade students. Students learn about self-portraits (traditional and non-traditional) and then bring in three objects from home to arrange into a composition and paint. Rachel has the students use acrylic and paint a mini composition (I think 4" square on canvas board, if I remember correctly). With the group of 7th graders I had at the time, I thought I'd try having them use ink, watercolor and colored pencil--I think that combination offers students more control and they can still explore value and color-mixing using paint.

These photos don't seem to do justice to these pieces.
They are really beautiful in person!

We spent a good amount of time sketching and working on composition for these pieces so that they were dynamic. I did not specify the size for the final pieces and there was a nice variety of little compositions and larger ones. The only trouble I ran into with this project was having the students bring in items from home--that just didn't work well for some. I'm not sure how I would work that in the future (perhaps give them the chance to bring objects in, but if they don't they use objects from the classroom?).

Anyway, I was SUPER-impressed by the work the students did. I think some of them were too! Once these were on display, they generated lots of discussion and comments from the middle school students and teachers in the hallway outside of class. ENJOY!

I like the inclusion of body spray in this one. ;-)

Some students preferred to focus on one object at a time.
I like how this student worked the background as well
adding color around each object and a shadow below.

This student also wanted to have the objects separate because he felt they were easier
to read with some space between them. He did a nice job with the details
and these objects have a great deal of personal significance to him.

And here are more of the students' work from the display...

And even more! Finished pieces were mounted onto mat board.
I feel this elevates the work from ho-hum to a finished piece worthy of display
(and preparing work for presentation is one of the National Core Art Standards).

1 Point Perspective Shapes of AWESOMENESS

Ok, so this is a pretty basic 1 point perspective draw-a-long that I did with my 6th grade students. This was left by the art teacher for me to do with the students as their first project of the semester. Since it could be a little dry, I starting calling it "Shapes of AWESOMENESS" and used a super-hero-type voice that really inspired awe in my students :-) or maybe they were worried I had lost my marbles!

One of the students made me this--Thank you!

Anyhoo, this was a great way for them to learn the basics of perspective drawing such as horizon line, vanishing point, height, width, depth, facing size, construction lines, etc. They were able to draw geometric shapes, organic shapes, and letters. I encouraged the students to place their shapes and letters above and below the horizon line.

Once they practiced drawing a variety of shapes and letters on their "Shapes of Awesomeness" test sheet, I gave them another, smaller piece of paper and they could draw their names using what they had learned. They drew with pencil, outlined with Sharpie, then shaded with colored pencils.

My super-smart students then suggested we glue the finished names to their folders (duh, Mrs. P, why didn't you think of that!?!) and that's what we did. The teacher I was subbing for uses basic two-pocket folders for students to hold class paperwork and smaller projects in-the-works and these fit nicely on the cover.

Enjoy!

Tints Landscape With Charcoal

I love working one-on-one with students! It's just the break I need in my week. I get to focus on art and one person and really enjoy both!

Today, my 3rd grade private art student finished this beauty. I am so proud of her! I had originally seen this post called "Winter White Landscape Paintings" at the blog A Faithful Attempt and loved them! The landscapes are done in tints of blues (in tempera!) and then the details added with charcoal pencils. LOVE IT! Honestly, I didn't think of temperas as a serious art paint, but I am so glad we tried this. I have completed my own piece and have another in the works--they are pretty addicting to create!

So, enjoy my student's work and hop on over to A Faithful Attempt to see how her students did it--and try one for yourself! You'll be glad you did!

With this project, my student learned:

• Color that are mixed with white are called "tints" and there can be many tints of a color!
• How to select a composition to paint (visual interest, balance, value range, etc.)
• How to use opaque water-based paint (tempera) to paint a landscape in layers and in multiple steps that require planning
• How to add details and value to a piece using charcoal pencils and the different ways of applying them as well as grades of softness
• One point perspective (fence) and direction of light and its effects on the shadows in a composition

Mini Hand Drawing With Pattern & Ribbon

Well, here's another project I saw on Pinterest only to follow the link to nowhere. If you know where this came from, let me know so I can give credit where credit is due! When I originally saw this project I thought it would be great for my 13-year-old private art student. It was, but I also modified it and had my 9-year-old student do it as well. Here are my notes and method:

This is a lovely project that encompasses a variety of art concepts: inking patterns, drawing hands, shading with colored pencils, depth, positive and negative space, and value (in the ribbon and in the patterns). But, in order to make it manageable, I suggest only drawing one hand on an oversize index card. This keeps the size relatively small and you should be able to actually get the piece done at some point. My 13-year-old student used a large piece of paper (maybe 11" x 14"?) and had two hands in the composition and divided up the space with lots of ribbons and she worked on it for over three weeks (each an hour long session) and it was only about 1/3 of the way done. It got to be pretty tedious for her, I think.

With this smaller format, you get all of the fun and it is just enough to keep it interesting. Here's how we did it:

Mini Hand Drawing With Pattern & Ribbon

Supplies Needed:

• Oversize (6" x 9") white index card, blank (or card stock)
• Pencil with eraser
• Sharpies (fine and ultra fine tips)
• Colored pencils, assorted colors

Directions:

1. Place the hand you don't draw with onto the index card. You can make the hand go off the page a bit, but extend your fingers so that the space around your hand is broken up a bit by your fingers. Trace your hand with pencil.

2. Move your hand off of the paper and use it as a model to fill in some of the details of the hand you traced on your paper. Add wrinkles, rings, bracelets and fingernails. Don't add too many wrinkles though!

3. Draw a ribbon curling around your hand or through fingers and take care to have the ribbon divide up the negative space in your piece. Make it interesting!

4. Erase the lines of your fingers where the ribbon overlaps them. You'll want to take a minute and really make sure that your lines make sense--you don't want to ink something that shouldn't be there!

5. Trace the hand and the details on your hand with the ultra fine point Sharpie. Also trace the ribbon with the Sharpie.

6. Use your pencil to draw different patterns in the different sections of the background. Patterns can be made of lines, dots, squares, triangles, zig zags, and more!

7. Once you have your patterns down, ink them in with the Sharpies.

8. Erase all pencil lines.

9. Use the colored pencils to add color to the ribbons. Once you've built up nice layers of color, use darker colors in areas to create shadows.

My 9-year-old art student created her piece in two one-hour sessions. I'd think that this would take 3-4 regular class sessions if you were doing this project in a classroom setting. 

Follow-up: 3D Wire Sculpture

One of my 13-year-old private art students created a wonderful sculpture from pantyhose and a coat hanger and it came out so incredibly cool! I wish I could do this project with ALL of my students! I originally showed this project here while it was in-the-works. These sculptures do take a while to make--she worked on it during a few of our sessions together (a coat of gesso here, a coat or paint there...). But finally, it was done!

She chose to paint her sculpture with a bright red acrylic paint (3 coats) and we finished up with a coat of Mod Podge to add a bit of sheen and seal it up. While the Mod Podge was drying, we used the opportunity to sketch the sculpture from a variety of angles and with a few different types of drawing media.

I brought out the very large newsprint I have and we practiced drawing BIG and loose trying to get the feel of the sculpture and the lines and movement with our sketchy lines. Some children have a hard time with being "sketchy" with their drawing--a few timed drawings (each about 2 minutes) and some vine charcoal usually loosen them up.

We then tried sketching the sculpture from other angles working with charcoals and conté crayons in various shades of grey, black and brownish-reds. Some of the media lent itself to sketchy, loose drawing (vine charcoal and traditional, chalky, pastels), while other media allowed my student to create hard edges. I really stressed that these drawings were just sketches--they needn't be museum-quality--the more you draw, the more you learn.

This was also a wonderful project to discuss value and contrast and perspective (the base of the sculpture needs to "lie flat" in the drawing. This was a great lesson and the results were wonderful! ENJOY!

Winter Silhouette Landscapes

WOW! This is one of those projects where I think, "Yeah, this will be a good one to do with the kids," but then I do it and, WOW. I was so happy with the way these came out and the creativity my students showed when making these pieces.

Look at that sky! Beautiful!

My homeschool art class just finished up a two-week session on Chinese New Year and we had a class to go before starting African art. I wanted to do a winter-related project that taught them a skill (such as color-mixing) but also tied in some elements of art such as value, etc.

I found this project for a moon-lit landscape in the book, "Using Color in Your Art," by Sandi Henry. It's published by Williamson Books and I LOVE their art books for children.

I also tied in another favorite book of mine, "The Day the Babies Crawled Away," by Peggy Rathmann. It's a great book that has striking skies offset with detailed silhouettes. The story is about a boy who notices the babies in his neighborhood crawling away from a neighborhood celebration (unbeknownst to their parents). He follows the babies to keep an eye on them and the images are hilarious! Oh yeah, and it illustrates the whole "beautiful background/silhouette landscape-thing I'm trying to teach with this project!

This project teaches a whole bunch of concepts to children, here's the info:

We started by talking about landscapes and what that meant. Then we discussed how there can be different values (lights and darks) of colors. When a painter mixed white with a color, it gets lighter. The values that are made by mixing white with a color are called tints. When a painter mixes black with a color, it gets darker. The values that are made by mixing black with a color are called shades.

In the first part of this project, we are going to make the sky (or background) for our Winter Silhouette Landscapes.

Supplies Needed to make the SKY:

• 11" x 14" White Heavyweight Paper (I used bristol, but you could use posterboard)
• Pencil
• Blue tempera paint
• White tempera paint
• Disposable plate for a palette
• Paint brush or piece of sponge
• Water, paper towels & newspapers

Directions to make the SKY:

1. Using your finger, locate the center of the white piece of paper. Move your finger up about 2" and then over to the right about 2." This is where your moon will be. Use the pencil to make a little dot to mark the place.

2. Put some white and blue paint on the palette. Paint a 2" circle with white paint onto the dot you marked as the "moon" on your paper.

3. With your brush, get a dab of blue and mix it into the entire blob of white paint on your palette (not in your paper!). Use this brush or the sponge to paint this light blue paint in a ring around the moon on your paper.

4. Keep repeating the process (adding blue paint to make the paint on your palette darker and then painting a ring of color onto your paper) until the entire page is filled with rings of color. It's OK if some of the rings go off your paper. Just keep going and continue filling the page.

5. Let this dry. I brought a fan in to speed up the process since I wanted to send this project home today.

Supplies needed to make the SILHOUETTE-LANDSCAPE:

• 1 Piece of 9" x 12" black construction paper
• Bits of yellow construction paper, optional
• Pencil
• Scissors
• Glue stick

Directions to make the SILHOUETTE-LANDSCAPE:

1. I started by talking with the children about what they'd see if we went walking in their yard at night. We discussed not only what we'd see (houses, snowmen), but what we'd smell (trees, smoke from a chimney). Then I asked them what we'd hear (crunching snow, dogs barking, children playing). I also showed them the book by Peggy Rathmann and we discussed a few things we saw in there.

2. Draw a ground line on the black construction paper. Add a house, trees, etc. using the pencil making sure that the elements touch the ground and are large enough and simple enough to be recognized and easy enough to cut out with scissors.

3. Cut out the silhouette with scissors.

4. Glue the silhouette to the background/sky painting using a glue stick. The silhouette becomes the foreground of the picture. The moon makes a nice focal point.

5. Using bits of yellow construction paper and the glue stick, add a window or two to your house.

ENJOY the warm, inviting night-time winter landscapes!

This piece shows one of the babies from the book
getting into trouble by hanging upside from a tree limb!