Oil Pastels- Snow Globes

Project Summary:

This lesson was done by Mandy Lee and Megan Gilbraith. The lesson began by introducing an artist from South Dakota, Terry Redlin, and some of his paintings. Terry Redlin used background, middle ground, and foreground in his paintings. After we were done learning about this new artist, we were given a practice sheet to practice drawing with oil pastels. I had never used oil pastels but the teachers were very helpful with giving us hints when working with them. When we were done practicing, we were given a stencil to use to trace out our snow globes. We then started to color using our oil pastels. We could draw whatever we liked, but we had to background, middle ground, and foreground in our picture. The teachers told us that it was easiest to start with the background, form the middle ground, and then do the foreground. There also had to be one item in the snow globe that represented us. My item was me sledding down the snow hill. After we were done coloring, we could cut out our snow globe. A few of us had the opportunity to share our snow globes with the class, while the rest of the class continued to work.

Activity:

This would be great to include in a lesson about the different seasons and how each one is different. The students could do a snow globe for their favorite season. Even though we're using a snow globe, it doesn't have to involve winter if it's not their favorite season. Then the students could share with the class what they included in their snow globe and why, and also why they chose that season.