Animals that fly
Art Making Activities
Activity 1: Bird Head-dress (ES1 / Stage 1 students- decoration section only)
First read the Aboriginal Storybook book ‘How the Birds Got their Colours’.
a) To make a crow headdress the teacher (or another adult) will need to supply you with a pre-cut black cardboard flat shape of a long bird beak with a blunt end. This end piece will have a V shape cut out of the middle (at side) and the V shape should be closed by folding sides together.
b) Decorate the black cut out beak/ headress by using cut out circles in colour paper for the eyes and staple multi colour crepe paper to the back of the bird headdress to represent the colourful feathers.
c) Staple the folded end (V cut) to make a cap shape that sits at the back of your head. 2 holes need to be punched at the bottom of the cap so that you can run a hat elastic band through it so that it is fastened securely while you are wearing it.
Activity 2: Butterfly half face mask (Stage 1- decoration section only, Stage 2 students)
Teacher to prepare butterfly face mask stencils-Using white cardboard cut out a strip of card that would fit across child’s face from ear to ear and also from their nose to the tip of their head.
Students or teacher may fold the long strip in half and draw one side of a butterfly’s wing and then cut around the pencil lines with scissors. When opened up it should be a full set of wings! In the centre you will need to cut out a little curve (where the body of your butterfly would be) so that the wing shape rests nicely on the bridge of the nose. Hold the card shape up to your face and have someone help by circling in pencil where your eye holes will need to be cut. It is tricky to cut the eye holes with scissors so you may need help with this Decorate the wings with glitter glue or bright paint/crayon colours. When completely dry punch holes in sides of mask and use hat elastic to secure it to the head (measure how much elastic you need by stretching around the back of your head before cutting).
Activity 3: Clay modelling (Stage 1, 2 or 3- varying level of skills applied)
Look closely at the bird’s nest in the artwork titled, Honey Eater and Nest. You can create your own bird’s nest by modelling one in clay. There are 2 different ways you could build a nest. One method is to get a ball of clay and make it into a cup shape by applying the pinch pot method. Another approach is to create long coils of clay (by rolling thin sausage shapes with your hands) and then building a nest shape by layering the coils one on top of the other. These coils can later be smoothed over with your finger so that you don’t see the lines on the surface when it is finished. A good idea would be to create the texture of the nest by scratching into the clay with a pencil (looks a bit rough). You might like to make eggs to sit in the nest and attach a few clay shapes that look like leaves and twigs under the nest.
Activity 4: Make your own Animal
Pick three animals, one that runs, one that hops and one that slithers. They can be big animals or a small animals. Try to pick a combination of wild animals and domestic animals. Find a photo of each animal and pick the most distinguishing feature from each animal that you have chosen and cut it out from the photo. You could choose its eyes, its legs, its tail, its teeth, its trunk, its ears, its neck etc. Make sure you choose a combination of features, that is don’t choose all legs or all eyes. Now arrange each of the features on plain white paper, leaving large spaces between them. Don’t worry if they don’t all match up, they are not supposed to! Glue them on the page where you think they look best. Now using a crayon or pencil make a body for your animal, making sure it includes the 3 animal features that you cut out. Now you have created your very own animal that no-one else has. Where do you image your ‘animal’ lives? Try drawing its environment around it and cover the whole page, and last of all, don’t forget to give your animal a name!
Activity 5: Chalk pastel drawings inspired by Aboriginal art
Look closely at the Aboriginal artwork titled, Totemic Kangaroos included in this section. Notice the white lines and shapes are painted on brown bark and the artist has applied the X Ray style of art showing internal organs of the kangaroo. Make a list of all the Australian animals you know that either (1) run, ( 2) hop, (3) slither or slide
For the artwork you will need to choose at least 2 animals from one of your 3 lists (eg 2 that hop)
Use a large piece of brown cardboard or brown construction paper (scrunch paper and then flatten it out to create a textured surface like bark).
Select one white, black and dark brown chalk pastel (an alternative to use is crayons) Draw your large animal shapes in white and use either the brown, black or brown coloured chalks to show particular internal features (like the heart, liver, intestines, digestive tract, skeleton, etc). Repeat your 2 animal designs in different spaces on the paper (they can be upside down, or sideways to each other (see Totemic Kangaroos composition). In the space around your animals you can use the side of your dark brown chalks to lightly rub textures and your own symbols onto the background.
