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Art for Kids - Blow Art: Create a Monster Friend
Creative
5-6 years old
DISCOVER
In this activity we will:
1. Manipulate materials to achieve different effects.
2. Use talk to describe and explain their creations.
PLAY
Materials you need:
- Art paper
- Straw
- Watercolour / Tempera paint
- Marker/ Crayon/ Colour pencil
- Water
- Materials to create/decorate: Googly eyes, pipe cleaners, bottle caps, pasta etc
Steps to guide Little Discoverers:
- Read & discuss "Unlike Other Monsters" by Audrey Vernick
- Start by creating droplets of paint on the art paper randomly with a different colour. Next, blow the paint in various directions using a straw.
- Invite children to observe how they can manipulate the direction of the paint. Repeat the process to create three different monsters while experimenting with various paint consistencies.
- Let the paint dry and add features for each monster. Encourage children to add more details based on their monster's character.
- Tell me about your monster friend. (Imagination)
- How can we make the monster bigger? (Problem solving)
- What happens when you add more water to the pain? (Thinking Skills)
LEARN
As children learn to observe the impact of their actions on materials, they gain an understanding of how the material work and will derive their own methods to use it creatively.
Key vocabularies to use:
Monster, friend, names of colours, description of features (round, short etc)
Ways to adapt the activity:
For beginners, fold the paper in half and spread the paint in between. Discuss together what other features can be added to the monsters. For example, spots, stripes, horns.
For advanced learners, discuss how paint with different concentrations of water acts differently and how one can manipulate the outcome of the paint's direction.
Continue the exploration by writing a description of their monsters and provide children with some loose parts/ small objects to create a 3D monster.
WHAT DID WE ACHIEVE?
Little Discoverers learned to manipulate materials to achieve different outcomes allowing them to be more creative with the materials they have. This activity exercises children's hand-eye coordination while being imaginative at the same time.
