3rd Grade Self Portraits

For this lesson, the time it took was much longer than anticipated! This should not surprise me, however, as this is often the case when working with detailed paintings around 30 kids! The first lesson was mostly instruction, lots of me talking and demonstrating. We looked at self-portraits by Van Gogh on the website Van Gogh'

s Gallery. It had a super cool video of many self-portraits he did that digitally melt into one another. Check it out if you can because its great to see the variety. We also looked at Picasso, then compared and contrasted the two artists. The emphasis was placed on how they drew what they "saw", from observation. The kids often associate self portraits with the whole body rather than the bust (head, neck, shoulders) that they will see in the mirror.
Next came the features of the face discussion which led us into my teacher demonstration. The kids have to see you do it first with any lesson. This not only inspires them, but they know what it is your looking for.
The first period ended with students drawing from their own personal mirrors (thank you Studio in a School!) with pencils.
The second period we focused on the environment that will be placed in the negative space around their bust. We offered either an abstract or representational background option after again looking at Van Gogh and Picasso online. Now the paint flows, which took plenty of time! I stuck with a light tone or dark tone and they could mix black and white as needed.
The next 2 periods were dedicated to work time. This led to a longer project, but better results! Hope you all enjoy their hard work...Mr. Mac