Whole School Collaborative ‘Murals’

At the start of each year, I typically organize a collaborative “mural” project for the entire school. During the first lesson, in addition to discussing Art room rules and routines, each student contributes a small piece to a larger mural. By the end of the first week, we have a finished piece ready for display. The mural follows a theme and includes a caption that highlights a school value. The students enjoy finding their own section and admiring their classmates’ contributions as well. Here are some examples from previous years:

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‘WE EMBRACE OUR DIFFERENCES BECAUSE THAT’S WHAT MAKES US UNIQUE.’ Each student drew their face (option to trace a face shape onto the square so they are all a similar size) onto a white pre-cut square. They used a permanent marker/ fineliner to draw their face, then mix watercolour paints to match their skin tone, and a coloured background.

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‘HEARTS FULL OF LOVE‘: Each student selected a colored pre-cut square. (The size you used will depend on how many students you have to fit the display space.)They had the option to either draw or trace a heart, then color and decorate it with markers and paint pens, or cut out a heart from painted paper or their own drawn design on plain paper, and glue it onto the colored square before decorating with paint pens.

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‘EQUALITY IS WHEN EVERYONE HAS SHOES. EQUITY IS WHEN EVERYONE HAS SHOES THAT FIT‘ Each student chose a template shoe shape (small- Prep to Yr 2, medium-Yr 3 to 4, large- Yr 4 to 6) to represent their size and decorated it however they chose! Template download below- you can adjust the sizes if neccesary!

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‘WE ARE MANY DIFFERENT COLOURS – TOGETHER WE ARE LIKE A BEAUTIFUL RAINBOW’ This is a popular idea for a collaborative mural based on Cassie Stephen’s mini monochromatic self portraits and selfie mural. Each class was assigned a colour (or students could choose the colour- have tables set up with the same colour pencils and markers – light, medium, dark) This could be a mini lesson about portrait drawing, or assess where they are at with drawing their face without instruction. Teachers can also add their mini portrait- a quick activity at a staff meeting at the beginning of the year.

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‘WHEN WE CONNECT WE BUILD A STRONG COMMUNITY’ I couldn’t find a photo of the fully completed ‘mural’ but students had a photocopy template of the block with the top black, so they decorated two sides. They were cut out, then all glued together to form a “wall” of blocks.

Above is a document with templates to choose orientation of the ‘tumbling’ blocks, (they all need to be the same) to then reduce or enlarge to size to photocopy for students.

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BOTJOY! Another successful whole school collaboration was every student decorating a domino ‘BOTJOY’ inspired by Gary Hirsch. They created their own bot- choosing a positive value, such as love, kindness, curiosity, bravery, confidence, gratitude, etc. to spread a feeling of wellbeing. I glued magnets on the back so students could put it on their fridge but my school principal loved them so much he had them framed as a permanent school display. The kids do like seeing them around the school!

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NAIDOC WEEK – 2021 THEME: ‘HEAL COUNTRY’ The theme called for stronger measures to recognise, protect and maintain Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture and heritage. Each students used paint sticks to decorate a real gum leaf. Some leaves had words added with a paint pen: culture, leadership, grow, nurture, equality, respect. The leaves were glued around a map of Australia. The black top half (sky), red bottom half (land) and the yellow map (sun) also represent the Aboriginal flag.

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‘BUNJIL THE EAGLE: CREATOR SPIRIT OF THE BOONWURRUNG PEOPLE ON WHOSE LAND WE STAND’ As part of teaching Aboriginal perspectives, students are made aware of the First Nations people of the land where we live and go to school. Each student used either black, red, or yellow to decorate a feather shape with lines and pattern in marker and colour with pencil.