ELEMENTS OF ART

By Tiffany Qiu
What is Line ?
• The path of a point moving in any direction.
• Thick or thin, bent or straight, broken or solid, angular or curved.
• Creates an infinite number of configurations.
• Defines the edges or boundaries of shapes and forms.
Lesson plan for primary
Objective: Silly hair people
Materials: Black or white construction paper, crayons, coloured pencils
Motivation: Read the book “Lines that Wiggle” by Candace Whiteman
Have students draw as many different lines as they can
introduce some basic line vocabulary, zig-zag, wavy, dashed, dotted, etc…
Step1: Draw the main shapes of a face and a body
Step2: Add silly hair, encourage students to use all the different lines they learned in class
Step3: Using more lines, have students decorate the face details.
Lesson plan for intermediate

Objective: Free draw “Favorite Community Scene”

Materials: Paper, pencil and observe
Motivation: Line is a very important and basic element and it’s everywhere.
Step1: Take students out for a nature walk around the community, let students observe the
buildings, the cars, the road signs, the trees, the benches, etc….
Step2: Let students draw their favorite scene around their community using different lines
What is shape?
• A two-dimensional image created with lines. Compose two images:
The positive shape ( inside ) and negative shape ( outside )
• Regular or geometric examples are rectangles, ovals, trapezoids.
• Irregular or organic examples are a paint spill, the outline of a lake on a map ,or an
unusual puddle.
Lesson plan for Primary

Objective: Hot hair balloons

Materials: Watercolour and paper
Step1: Show students various hot air balloons, then have them create their own balloon shapes.
Step2: Use tempera paints and paint the shapes and patterns, starting with the lightest colour
and eventually ending with black.
Step3: Outline in black tempera paint
Step4: Students cut out their air balloons then glue them onto watercolour paper and add the
basket at the bottom.
Lesson plan for intermediate

Objective: Use basic shapes to draw a recognizable animal face

Materials: Paper, pencils, black crayons and watercolours
Motivation: Discuss and observe images of Laurel burch’s artwork, specifically her cat
talk about how shapes can be put together to make animals
Step1: Practice
Ask students to look at the cats and identify shapes they can see. Demonstrate how to use
shapes to draw a cat face. Break things down into very simple directions: triangle ears; semi-circle
face, oval eyes, etc….
Step2: Draw
Pass out the final paper and have students use black crayons or oil pastels to draw a face.
Have students add details like whiskers, a body, and anything else they would like.
Step3: Paint
Demonstrate how to use a brush. Show students how they can outline a shape before
filling it with colour. Have students paint their cats in whatever colour they would like.
What is texture?
• An actual or simulated appearance.
• Evokes the sense of touch.
• Suggests rough, smooth, bumpy, grainy, prickly, fluffy, hard.
Lesson plan for primary

Objective: Make texture monsters

Materials: Coloured construction paper, a small piece of white and black paper to glue
everything down onto.
Step1: Ask students to cut out shapes to make the body of a monster from their construction
paper, and glue it on the black paper.
Step2: Once they are done with the basic body then they could come to the desk to get some
textured materials, like yarn, cotton balls, pipe cleaners, etc….
Step3: Create their own monster and have fun.
Lesson plan for intermediate

Objective: Tin foil art

Materials: recycled cardboard, glue gun with extra glue refills, tin foil, glue stick, permanent
markers scissors
Step1: Cut a piece of cardboard to make your frame. Have your students draw a simple design
on the cardboard, can be a boat in the ocean or a house.
Step2: Carefully go over the drawn lines with the glue gun and allow to dry
Step3: Cover the cardboard with tin foil and gently rub to expose the textured outlines of the
drawing then colour the tin foil using the permanent markers
What is space?
• The illusion of depth and /or form on a two-dimensional surface.
• Techniques used to suggest depth are perspective, overlapping, and variation of size.
Lesson plan for primary

Objective: “Flower Bouquets” students will use overlapping to create space

Materials: Watercolour paper, watercolour paint, crayons and flowers for display
Step 1: Introduce the life and work of Pablo Picasso and show his art for inspiration, discuss overlapping in
the art piece
Step 2: Trace hands, ask students to trace their hands horizontally on their paper.
Step 3: Now ask students to draw flowers
Lesson plan for intermediate

Objective: Create landscape with fantasy theme that highlights the use of contrast
Materials: Kraft paper, tempera paint, markers
Step1: Draw
Students will draw their fantasy landscape on kraft paper
Step2: Paint
Demonstrate how to fill in landscape features starting with the background first and
working towards the foreground.
Step3: Outline
Once the paint is dry, students can re-outline their shapes. The can also use the marker
to add additional details to their landscape.
What is value?
• The lightness or darkness of any colour.
• Bright, dark, light, and muted are some terms used to describe the
value of a colour.
Lesson plan for primary

Objective: Value ice cream cones

Materials:
Step1: Discuss the terms—Tints= colour + white Shades= colour + black Value=one colour going
light to dark
Step2: Demonstrate how to create colour tints and let students try on their own. Make sure they
have 4 different colour tints
Step3: Paint 4 different colours on paper from light to dark in order and let it dry.
Step4: Demonstrate how to create colour shades and let students try on their own and let them
pick one shaded colour they created as the cone colour.
Step5: Cut ice creams scoops out from the tins paper and cut out the cone shape out from the
shaded paper
Step6: Glue their ice cream cone together to create a value scale
Lesson plan for intermediate

Objective: Ocean animal “ under the sea”

Materials: blue, black and white tempera paint. Canvas
Step1:Demonstrate how to create colour shades, mixing white and black with blue colour
Step2: Show students some photos taken from under the sea and let the students discuss how
the colour changed from light to dark, then try to paint their own undersea theme painting.
Step3: Using makers to outline the ocean animal after.
What is form?
• Three-dimensional forms occupy space or give
the illusion of occupying space.
• Created with sculpture, photography, papier-
mache, glass, etc.
Lesson plan for primary

Objective: Students will use found objects to create relief sculptures

Materials: 1. Large craft sticks
2. White glue
3. Art room junk , like beads, buttons, toothpicks, wood pieces, etc…
Motivation:
1. Show the work of artist Louise Nevelson and let students try to guess how she made
her sculptures.
2. Review the difference between two-dimensional and three-dimensional art
3. Discuss the concept of “ trash to treasure” or taking something old and making it
new.
Step 1: Make the base
Step 2: Create the sculpture
Step 3: Paint
Step 4: Put students sculptures art work on the wall. And they can take it home when
next project been made.
Lesson plan for intermediate

Objective: Create a symmetrical 3D mask out of a paper

Materials: 1. Construction paper
2. scissors,
3. glue sticks
4. white glue
Motivations:
1.Discuss symmetry
2. Show students mask making with paper video.

Step1: Prepare
Step2: Create mask shape
Step3: Add details and hair
What is colour ?
• Experienced by the way light reflects a surface.
• Colours create relationships: Contrast, complementary,
primary, secondary, and tertiary.
• Primary colours are red, blue, yellow.
• Tertiary colours are created by mixing a primary colour
with an adjacent secondary colour (e.g. mixing red and
orange)
Lesson plan for primary

Objective: Mix colours and paint colour wheel

Materials:1. White construction paper
2.Colour wheel printed
3.tempera paint
Motivation: Explores colour by Identifying the primary colours and begin basic mixing
techniques to create secondary colours.
Step1: Draw a large circle on the construction paper, then draw twelve circles or squares
evenly spaced around it.
Step2: Get paint ready and demonstrate to the students how to mix the six intermediate colours
Step3: Paint three primary colours, red, yellow, and blue, three secondary colours ,green,
orange, and violet, and the six intermediate colours, red-violet, blue-violet, blue-green, yellow-
green, yellow-orange, and red-orange. ( For variation and interest, draw the outlines of
animals or flowers instead of circles
Lesson for intermediate

Objective: Students use warm, cool, and neutral colours in artwork

Materials: White construction paper, pencil, oil pastels
Motivation:
1. Talk about warm, cool and neutral colours, review the colour families.
2. Introduce the artist Picasso
3. Introduce oil pastels as an art tool and demonstrate proper use of this media
Step1: Trace and lines
In the center of you paper trace a circle, leaf or any other shape you prefer, then, draw 5 lines
with a ruler that intersect the shape you traced somewhere. The lines must touch the edges.
Step2: Labeling
Going around in a circle in the outside section around your shape, label each section with warm
and cool, then, repeat the procedure inside your shape going around in a circle, if the outside section
has cool colours , the inside should have warm colours, warm and cool can’t touch with a line, only by
corners.
Step3: Demonstrate how to take 3 warm colours and blend them together to make a warm design in
each warm space Repeat with cool colours. Neutrals are not allowed to be used, when you blend, take
a pastel and rub it over the previous colour to make it blur.