Little Blue and Little Yellow

The past two weeks, my Pre-K through 1st graders have been working on some color mixing. We read Little Blue and Little Yellow by Leo Lionni and created a painting of the "friends" hugging and turning green!

I used a technique with the students that I learned at a workshop this summer in which small pieces of kitchen sponges are clipped into clothespins like this (image below borrowed from Pink & Green Mama's site):

Students then gently stamp the paint on the page. This was a fantastic way to mix paint. No excessive puddles of paint on the paper or heavy duty drips. Plus, the best part was all my students achieved some hue of green in the middle and we got to briefly touch on the concept of printmaking vs. painting with brushstrokes!

On the next visit to the art room, we learned Leo Lionni created the illustrations in the story using torn paper collage. The students cut their paintings out, we briefly discussed texture, and then they proceeded to tear out from construction paper the many colorful friends of Little Blue and Little Yellow from the story and arrange them on their collages. The final step was a few hand-drawn embellishments with our trusty oil pastels. The students were encouraged to draw lines from our Lots of Lines poster and also to experiment with oil pastel on the surface of dry paint. 

A fun, colorful lesson with amazing results! There was so much dialogue between students on the colors they were choosing while creating the characters "Little Orange," "Little Red," and "Little Purple" among others. I love the bright, colorful feeling in these pieces!