The Land Down Under
- hannahcgersh
- Jan 27, 2015
- 2 min read
This month, we've been studying Australian Art and it has been a blast! We've talked about the country/continent, its native animals (like koalas and kangaroos), and the Aborigines.
This is what my bulletin board looked like this month:
In Kindergarten, we talked about the Aborigines and the boomerang. We created our own versions of boomerangs, using black oil pastels to draw and tempera paint to paint in the boomerang and decorate the outside. Once the paint dried, we used warm colored oil pastels to add dots to the background. I would like to say that the next time I do this lesson, I will probably help them draw the boomerang better or (GASP!) draw it for them. They did turn out really warm and colorful!
In first grade, we made didgeridoos out of toilet paper rolls/paper towel rolls and markers. We discussed Aboriginal symbols and they used these to decorate their instruments. This was a pretty simple project and would normally be too "crafty" for me, but I think the kids enjoyed it.
Second grade had so much fun painting their koalas! We learned that koalas are marsupials and learned how to make gray by mixing together black and white. We drew our koalas with black oil pastels and then painted them in using tempera paint.
Third graders through sixth graders were able to make their own Aboriginal bark paintings! I used the lesson from the Art of Education, which you can find here. We did this project in steps. We started by learning about the Aborigines and their love for dots and x-ray vision. First we tore off the edges of our papers so they would look like bark. Then, I gave each student an animal and instructed them to draw the contour of the animal with a black marker. The next step was to create a pattern or patterns for the inside of the animal. The Aborigines did this in an x-ray style, but I didn't require my students to do this. However, some thought that was cool so they did it anyway. After that, we used crayons to color in the patterns of the animals. Lastly, we used the eraser end of our pencils to dip into paint and create dots on the contour line of the animal and in the background.
You can find the boomerang lesson, the didgeridoo lesson, and the koala lesson on Teachers Pay Teachers here! Look for FREE PRINTABLES on drawing a koala and Aboriginal symbols, there too!
