4th Grade - Aliens!

I was inspired by a post from one of my favorite blogs: That Artist Woman.

Hers is a frog, but at the end she shows a picture of her son's take on the project - a monster/alien/creature. I took this kid's idea and ran with it.

I started out by having my students trace each of their hands on the sides of a 12x18" piece of white sulfur paper (watercolor paper would be good, too). Then they drew the alien's head in the middle, keeping in mind that they would later weave either one or two eyes (their choice) and glue them on. I had stencils that were the size that the eyes would be on hand so students could be sure they would fit. They could also alter the hands to make them more... out of this world, if you will. After they outlined it heavily with crayon, they had to choose a texture (i.e. watercolor technique) : salt, plastic wrap, marker, crayon or oil pastel. We've experimented with all of these before, so students were aware of the effect the technique would make.

Once the paint was dry, they cut out the alien's head and hands and glued them onto a black piece of construction paper. Then, it was time for the weaving. I simplified the weaving a bit compared to the inspiration project... I just have students weave around the tag board itself, making sure they cut 5 slits (an even number will not work... 5 seemed to be the best amount for the size we were working with).


I also had them use yarn that was already multi-colored. I had several choices for them to choose from - most wanted the bright rainbow. Psychedelic, indeed. Once weaved, the eye(s) are glued on and voila! This project was definitely a hallway crowd pleaser.

I still have a few classes to finish this project with, and I think I'm going to have them oil pastel a space background.