When it comes to portraits, kids of the struggle with spacing and size, and then get frustrated when their projects look, well, like cartoons. While I always encourage my kids and point out that there is value in ALL kinds of art, I understand their desire to reflect what they see in the mirror on their paper more realistically.
Enter my 2/3 portrait project. Through this project I share a step-by-step keynote with students that shows them how to draw the face with correct facial proportions. We begin with dividing the face in half, them pay attention to the spacing above and below the eyeline to create properly proportioned portraits (tongue twister much!?!?).
The kids loved this project and were so proud that their portraits looked more like themselves than ever before. They loved creating drawings that “look like real people!” an I love their passion and energy for the project.
After they finished the drawing stage of this project, we learned about color schemes, or groups of colors used in art, and the project got even more interesting. To reinforce the idea that their art doesn’t have to be realistic, each student drew a popsicle stick from a cup that had a color scheme on it. The color schemes included warm, cool, analogous combinations, primary, secondary and rainbow). The kids were even more excited than I expected to use their color schemes. They were all wondering who had what scheme and what they should use for what part of their portrait. “Should by face be green? What about purple hair! Can I do blue hair!?” My classroom was filled with giggles and excitement.
On the last day of the project, I wanted to do something really special for kids to reflect on what they had learned. I decided that Keynote portraits would be an awesome way to wrap up this fun project!
I gave students a quick rundown of keynote, and told them they’d have just 45 minutes to create their portrait. I emphasized that they needed to commit to their work, and not overuse the “undo” button or they may run out of time. The kids dived in and I was thrilled with the results. Check them out to the left.
