Second Grade Amate Bark Painting

To continue our study of Latin America, second grade began a project based on the Amate Bark Paintings of Mexico. I started the project by showing them this video I found on YouTube.


Then I gave each student a piece of Kraft paper and had them crumple it up and smooth it out 10 times. I had them repeat this 10 times, because the longer they crumpled their paper, the softer and more pliable it became.

They painted the Kraft paper with watered down brown tempera paint, giving it a quick coating- I didn't want the entire paper covered in brown paint, but wanted to give it the look of the bark paper.

The students then began planning out their compositions. I had them draw an animal that could be found in the jungle. They had to practice drawing it bigger than their hand (very difficult for some!) and they had to embellish some aspect of their animal (make it fancy!). They gave their birds curly feathers, long toes on their lizards, crazy manes on their lions, etc. Once they had their animal, they had to have at least 5 pieces of foliage in their jungle. Each piece had to be touching their animal and the side of the paper.

Once they had their picture ready in their sketchbook, they were ready to draw onto their Kraft paper. I had them draw with pencil first and then trace over the drawing with a black marker.

I gave each table a tray of fluorescent tempera paint (no green yet). They were allowed to paint their animal any color they chose- the wilder the better!

When the animals were finished, I gave them a couple of different greens and some white. I showed them how they could mix the colors together to get different tints of green and explained that I didn't want any of their plants to be the same green as any other. They all had to be different.

Once the entire project was dry, they used the smallest brushes I had available and embellished their pictures. Some just added a little bit of white, others added patterns.

The last step was to go over the black marker one more time and retrace it.

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Prekindergarten Jackson Pollock Paintings

This was probably my favorite project that my PreK students did this year! We looked at paintings by Jackson Pollock. This was something new for them. They were used to being able to "see" something in the artwork. I heard words like "ugly", "weird", "messy". There were some very strong reactions to what they saw- exactly what I was looking for!

I put large pieces of white paper (18 x 24) on the floor. My room was covered in paper! I spread them out so that the students had enough room.

I showed the students how they were to dip their brush into the paint (for this I used fluorescent tempera) and then let the paint drip onto the paper. I stressed that I did NOT want the brush to touch the paper. This was hard for them. So I showed them how I wanted them to stand up tall over their paper and hold their brush. If they were standing up, they could not touch their paper.

I let them get started with 1 color of paint and then I started rotating around the room, switching the colors until everyone had used every color. My PreK classes come with an assistant, so I had help with this part. It was still a little crazy. I need to figure out a more organized way to switch the paint. Suggestions from anyone??

Warning! By the end of class, my floor was covered with paint. However, my little ones LOVE cleaning, so I passed out wet towels and set them loose cleaning up the floor once all of the papers were picked up. The mess was cleaned up in less than 5 minutes! Pin It