Grade 4 Op Art Portraits

Inspired by the optical and expressive art of the 1960's, 4th grade artists created Op Art self-portraits. We began with a lesson on drawing the face and it's features proportionately on manilla paper. Once drawings were complete students cut out their sillouette and chose a bright color for their skin, retraced their drawing and cut out the sillouette again. They then mounted their bright sillouette on their choice of contrasting background paper. Next they began feature by feature to cut, trace on colored paper, recut and mount; layering their portrait like a collage. This lesson provided fine-motor skill practice and students enjoyed building their portrait and adding personal details such as clothing items, hats and hair bows. This lesson served as a great variation to a traditional portrait lesson and I am pleased with our results!

Grade 3 Monster Mama Portraits

This literacy engagement began with reading the story Monster Mama by Liz Rosenberg. We had fun studying the colorful illustrations and then reviewed the placement and proportion of facial features. We began with a light neutral oil pastel and sketched our portraits through the guided drawing process. In the next lesson I demonstrated the technique of blending oil pastels and showed students how to ensure that their facial features did not blend in to the face. During the last lesson students completed blending their portraits with color and took turns at the painting tables where they blew paint through straws for the hair and splattered the background for the finishing touches. My students worked hard, had a blast and are proud of their "monster portraits"!