131-Oil Pastel Still Life Collage Lesson Plan

Vegetable Still Life Lesson Plan-272
This is a great way to begin teaching observational drawing to elementary children.

Grades: 4 & up

Time Period: 2 art periods

Aim/Goals:
To teach observational drawing
To explore the use of oil pastels and blending
To use collage to create a “real-looking” composition

Motivation:
Examples of still lives from art history, the vegetables

Materials & Tools:
Real vegetables from supermarket (pumpkins, gourds, onions, heads of cabbage (with leaves folded over), artichokes, eggplant, carrots (with leaves on), etc.
Oil pastels
Construction paper—2-3 sheets per student
Scissors
Elmer’s glue (not School Glue)

Vocabulary:
Still life, overlapping, collage, edge, foreground, background

Standards:
1 & 2 (3 & 4, if you choose to add historical piece and talking piece)

Procedure:
You may want to start the lesson by showing examples of painted and drawn still lives. Dutch still lives might be especially appropriate. Use the vocabulary above, if possible. Ask students to tell you about what they see in the images.

Explain that you are going to have them use oil pastels in a painterly way and show them how you can blend layers of the oil pastels to create rich colors. I give them colored construction paper and admonish the students to cover all the paper with pigment. Using “magic white” can make the colors “pop.” Oil pastels will get dirty-looking after kicking around in containers for awhile, but they can be rehabilitated easily by peeling and exposing the clean insides. Encourage recycling and using the small pieces until they disappear.

Explain that they are going to observe the vegetables, one at a time and draw them on the paper, close to one another. They should try to make them look real, but they don’t have to worry about the composition, since they will cut out only the ones they like. This is a great way to give students confidence and if they do make a mistake, they can just move on.

Once the students have drawn at least four or five objects, have them make a background. I encourage having them make a table line and a background wall. They sometimes will want to make a large plate on the table. I also encourage the use of pattern as tablecloths and wallpaper. Again, the colored paper must be covered with the oil pastels.

The objects are then cut out and arranged on the background. Have the students try various combinations. They may find they want to draw a couple more objects or eliminate a couple.

Using Elmer’s glue (not School Glue, which is too weak) and a glue brush, use the phonebook/magazine method to liberally glue around the edges of each shape. Because the surface will be waxy, you need to use a lot of glue.

Reflection:
As always, you want to share and talk about the work when the project is finished.

Follow-Up/Variations:
You may want to substitute fruit or else other objects for your students to draw.