Young arts project

The Arts Society North Lincolnshire

Young Arts Project 

In September 2018 the Society contributed £500 to a local artist Jon Dent to deliver a creative art project to 35 key stage 2 children at Wootton St Andrews Church of England (VA) Primary School

Brief

The Octopus's Garden Workshop

This is a lovely project for the most junior category of developing Artists with a big focus on development of the creative use of imagination and experimentation and development of ideas through the process of drawing and painting. The project also has a focus on developing initial concepts into larger more impressive finished artistic objects that have enhanced value so there is an inbuilt progression for young learners. There is a large element of fun in this project.

Session one.

Stage one.

Stage one involves the children working together, looking at pictures of creatures that live under the sea and objects that might come from the marine habitat.

The children will be able to discuss the creatures, what they are, their names and perhaps even how they might move through the water through interpreting their movements using their own body movements. The children at this stage can already begin to think about relating movements to the kind of marks they might make if they were to draw the creatures. We will also discuss colours at this stage.

The children then get to choose one or more sea creatures that they would like to paint and draw 

Stage two.

The children are given A3 cartridge paper and coloured pencils and encouraged to draw their sea creatures. This session is overseen with plenty of coaching and encouragement from the tutor and they can draw as many creatures as they like. At the end of the session, we review their work and together we all get to choose the best ones to go through to the next day. Every child has a best image to take through to the Octopus's garden.

Stage three

Stage three requires the tutor to transfer enlarged versions of each of the chosen images either onto foam board or A2 paper, depending on financial restraints, prior to the next session. 

Session Two 

Stage four

In stage four the children will get their original drawing back along with a larger version created for them by the tutor. This is the version that they are going to paint to create their large finished artwork. They will be introduced to Daler RowneySystem three acrylic paint which is safe, bright and enables the children to mix beautiful bright and realistic looking colours that match the exciting looking colours of the sea creatures. They will use their source photographs and their original drawings to help them create a stunning looking Sea creature which we will discuss together when they are complete. Children that finish quickly can be encouraged to create other creatures or undersea plants like seaweed as extension activities.

Stage five

Finally the team will all work together to create their Octopus's Garden Frieze in the designated area in the School.

An enhanced version of this can be delivered where the final images are painted onto plywood and varnished off site and can then form an exterior semi permanent display.

Also the Sea Creature theme is not exclusive. This activity can be applied to just about any subject or theme. The marine theme is a great leveller in that there is a lot of flexibility in sea creatures in terms of children's ability to draw, refs differentiation. I.e. Starfish and Jellyfish are very achievable and more demanding subjects like Sharks or Manta Rays can be tackled by more ambitious or able children. With subjects like country shows, if everybody has to draw a horse, this can lead to some children feeling as though they have achieved less well.