Dick Blick Art Materials
Stitch It Up!
Ever think about combining the art forms of painting and embroidery? Then this art lesson is right up your alley! Given a piece of white cloth, young artists first create a grayscale painting and then highlight certain features by...
Endangered Species Coalition
Endangered Species Day Art
Albrecht Durer created a highly textured stamp or print of a rhinoceros. To better understand which animals are near extinction, upper graders create similar prints of endangered animals they've researched. The six-day lesson includes...
Curated OER
To the North: A Black Family Leaves Arkansas to Find Work in Michigan
Upper elementary and middle school scholars study the economic factors that caused so many Arkansans to migrate to different parts of the country looking for work. Use this history lesson plan to help your charges gain a better...
Curated OER
Designing a Crew Exploration Vehicle
Take your class on an out-of-this-world adventure with this fun engineering design lesson. Working in small groups, young scientists design, build, and test crew exploration vehicles using some creativity, teamwork, and an assortment of...
Curated OER
Language Arts: Ode to the Ordinary
Eighth graders select ordinary objects, determine their uses, and write poems about them. Once they select an object, they create a web about its uses to serve as an outline. Once they have written their own odes, 8th graders meet in...
Curated OER
Strong Descriptive Writing: James and the Giant Peach
Support your writers! Clear procedures and appropriate support make this a superb resource for elementary writing instruction. Ready your class to compose original descriptive paragraphs inspired by the episode in Roald Dahl's James and...
Curated OER
Yellow Bird and Me
Upper elementary artists create works which demonstrate an understanding of the many elements of theater and the visual arts. This four-day plan combines many wonderful aspects of visual, musical, and theatrical arts into one very...
Curated OER
Pen and Ink Drawing
Learners hone their drawing techniques to create a nature-inspired piece of art. They practice hatching, cross hatching, stippling, and shading. They discuss how each method is better suited for creating specific elements in nature such...
Smithsonian Institution
Art to Zoo: Life in the Promised Land: African-American Migrants in Northern Cities, 1916-1940
This is a fantastic resource designed for learners to envision what it was like for the three million African-Americans who migrated to urban industrial centers of the northern United States between 1910 and 1940. After reading a...
Curated OER
Scratch Art
Students create a piece of art using crayons, black paint and toothpicks. They cover a paper with bright crayon color, paint over the crayons with black paint and then scratch a design over the black paint in a an outline of their choice.
Curated OER
Kodomo No Hi: Children's Day Celebration
Children's Day is a beloved Japanese holiday with many colorful and engaging traditions. On this national holiday celebrated yearly on May 5, children are honored for their strengths and given good wishes for happiness. Your younger...
Curated OER
Very, Very, Simple Decorative Papers
Elementary schoolers gather flowers, leaves, fiber, ribbons and newspapers to expand studenT awareness of their environment. They use these to make printmaking papers, cards, book covers, picture frames and photo mats. Beautiful results...
Curated OER
Let's Make Bullying Stop
In this bullying prevention worksheet, students read detailed informative hints on what to do if faced with this problem. Ideas about how to handle various situations are included in this handout designed for older elementary students.
Curated OER
How to Make a Mummy Mask
With some plaster casting materials and a quick lesson on the ancient burial traditions of Egypt, your class can create amazing mummy masks. Listed here are all the tools, precautions, and steps needed for each child to make an Egyptian...
Curated OER
Stained Glass Flowers
Elementary and middle schoolers create decorative flowers using wire armatures and a special paint that remains flexible when it dries. The results from this project are stunning, but the materials needed may be tough to track down. An...
Curated OER
Modernizing a Traditional Irish Folktale
Students write their own folktales based on "Cathal O'Cruachan and the Cowherd." In discussions they examine the animal symbolism in the story, as well as the characters, events, problems, and solution. With partners, they select...
Curated OER
Dewey Decimal Game
Engage all the upper elementary classes in your school in a game to learn Dewey Decimal Classification. On 5 or 6 consecutive visits to the library, teams from each class learn how the system works, locate books in each category, and...
Curated OER
Puzzle Trees
Elementary artists use a collage and multi-media technique to create textured trees. They study the fall trees, discussing texture and what bare trees look like. They then use a variety of materials to create a textural piece.
Curated OER
Spot the Leaf: Identifying Plants in Works of Art
Students explore the leaf as a design motif in art. They conduct Internet research on leaf and tree symbolism, view and discuss artwork, and create an original work of art featuring a leaf or leaf motif.
Curated OER
A Holiday Calendar in MS Publisher for Elementary School
Students create a holiday calendar using ms word. In this technology activity, students create their own calendar while learning basic Publisher skills. Students use clipart, explore how to change fonts, and how to use templates.
Curated OER
Bottle Cap Locket
Pupils create "bottle cap lockets" using bottle caps, ribbon, small photos, and beads in this elementary Art lesson ideal for Valentine's Day or special occasions. The lesson suggests using the "Polaroid i-Zone Mini Instant Camera" for...
Curated OER
Go Fish
Here is a good art lesson on creating colorful versions of fish. After studying images of a variety of fish, young artists choose one that they want to create an image of. Using some high-quality materials, they create their masterpieces...
Curated OER
Fall Collage
Students create fall collages using digital images, clip art or downloaded images, and the software program Adobe Photoshop in this Art instructional activity for the elementary classroom. The instructional activity involves the use of...
Curated OER
Finding Main Ideas
Elementary schoolers read paragraphs one at a time in order to pick out the main ideas. They choose which sentences are most important in a paragraph. This type of exercise prepares learners to identify the main idea in longer narratives.