Tuesday 4 March 2014

Winter Olympics Lesson - Part Two (Russian Buildings)

For Part 2 of our Winter Olympics lesson we concentrated not on the actual sports themselves yet the host nation - Russia.



Russian buildings are just beautiful to look at and were a major part of the opening ceremony and even the backdrop on our winter Olympic TV coverage.  We looked at photos of St Basil's Cathedral and then went on the produce pictures inspired by these.


After a quick Google search, I'm certainly not alone in producing a lesson plan based around St Basil's Cathedral.  Deep Space Sparkle, The Art of Education and Create with Me also have excellent lessons on the same subject (I took bits and pieces from each - thanks!).


We produced these pictures over 2 lessons with children aged 5 to 9.   These would turn out really well using liquid watercolours.  I decided to use water soluble pencils and pastels instead as I'm keen for the children to be proficient in as many mediums as possible.  Also watercolour pencils are much more readily available to purchase and use at home.

What you need:
  • Watercolour pencils and / or water soluble oil pastels
  • A3 watercolour paper
  • Water pens (or just simple paint brushes and a water pot would also suffice)
  • A3 cartridge paper
  • Blue and white paint
  • Sponges (I just cut cheap supermarket ones into small pieces)
  • Black permanent markers
  • Scissors
  • Glue
  • Glitter glue (optional)
  • Stick on jewels (optional)
  • Gold and silver markers or paint (optional) 

How to:
  • Using sponges create a background on the cartridge paper with the blue and white paint (I just left them to it with this.  Interestingly some completely blended the colours to a light blue even background and others didn't blend and left a sponged effect).
  • On the watercolour paper draw buildings using a black permanent marker
  • Colour in using watercolour pencils, pastels and water pens
  • Cut out buildings and glue to the background
  • Add further details using gold and silver pens / paint, glitter glue and stick on jewels
The Results:

I'm happy with how these turned out.  The children also really took their time with these which was great to see.  I often find they really rush through art and by doing a bit each lesson they went a lot slower.


And for those of you interested here is a bit of information about St Basil's Cathedral (taken from Parent Art Docents - thank you!)

St. Basil's Cathedral is in Moscow's Red Square, and was begun in 1555, during the reign and by order of Ivan the Terrible. (Ivan was actually very terrible - he was mentally unstable and prone to violent rages. Also his henchmen were brutal in their use of assassination and physical punishment). Anyway, the cathedral is designed to look (see if you can guess by looking at the slide show pictures!) like a bonfire, flaming into the sky (this is inspired by a passage in the book of Revelations, which describes the Kingdom of God and the vivid colours therein). There is no precedent for such a building - it is an example of wild and bold creativity by the architects, and inspired many buildings that were built after in Russia and the countries around it. Note the vivid colours on each tower, and the different patterns on the exterior of the building.

Cheers
Fiona

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