Farm Scene with George the Farmer- Year 1/2 Mixed Media Art lesson

This project tied in with our “Picasso Cow Program” where the school was involved in learning about the dairy industry and the health benefits of eating dairy products. The “Discover Dairy” website was a wealth of information with loads of short informative videos.

Firstly, I posed some questions to students to see what their prior knowledge of dairy farms was: What is a DAIRY farm? What does a dairy farmer do? What do dairy farmers do besides milk cows?

We watched some videos from Discover Dairy to give students an insight into life on a dairy farm and were useful to learn about what happens on a typical dairy farm to prompt discussion.

‘George the Farmer’ is a character created by two people from farming backgrounds whose vision is ‘a world where children connect to the earth, food and farm’. Based in regional South Australia, they produce fun picture storybooks about all types of farming and agriculture, with lots of teacher resources as well. https://www.georgethefarmer.com.au We used the picture book: ‘George the Farmer- Ruby and the Dairy Dilemma.’

One of the learning opportunities when beginning our farm scene was about SPACE- foreground, middle ground and background and the size proportions. Students drew a background of farm paddocks, discussing how when things are further away they look smaller. They drew some farm buildings like a dairy, barn or windmill just below the horizon line and added a tractor and maybe a cow in the middle ground.

Students used oil pastels to colour in and food dye wash for grass and sky.

Students then made painted paper for George the Farmer’s shirt and pants, and scraps of painted paper in brown, beige, yellow for the hat, face hands, boots etc. I had several of each shape for the pieces of George in card cut from cereal boxes so the children could trace them on the back of the painted paper, choosing the shape shirt they want. I had painted paper already done for the skin, hat and hair and cut them into smaller pieces to just fit the card shapes so there was no wastage.

I cut out card shapes of the shirt, pants, face, and hat for children to trace around on the back of the painted paper. They used scraps to cut out a belt, boots, hair and hands.

Students paint a print out of a cow and cut out to glue on or the cow could have been drawn onto the middle ground or foreground (larger) instead.

AUD $2 for email download of full lesson plan

Lesson plan with learning intentions, success criteria, links to useful videos, suggested artist artworks for discussion, template for shapes to make George the Farmer.

Milk Bottle Cows- John Kelly inspired ~ Year 5/6 art lesson

Melbourne artist John Kelly is well known for his many cow sculptures and paintings, but they are rather intriguing because they are a boxy shape and have an elongated neck and small head. It is not until you find out the back story for these strange bovines that they make sense.

His inspiration came from a story about how life size paper mache model cows were made during WWII and placed around airfields to disguise them as farms to Japanese aircraft! The interesting part is that several artists who were serving in the army were instructed to make the cows, including William Dobell who served as an official war artist. In 1943 he won the Archibald Prize with a stylised, exaggerated portrait of fellow artist Joshua Smith, with an elongated neck and small head, which at the time was quite controversial.

So when John Kelly read about this wartime ruse, he decided to make artworks of what he named, “Dobell’s Cows” mimicking portraits Dobell had made with these long necks and small heads on his cows. He imagined how Dobell would have marked out lines to paint them as Holstein or Ayreshire cows with patched markings, maybe had them on wheels to move them around the field, stacked them up line blocks- quite a parody of events!

https://johnkellyartist.com/dobells-cows/

LESSON ACTIVITIES:

Students were shown the artwork, ‘The Incident’ by John Kelly, without any knowledge of the story behind it. I used the Visual Thinking Strategies by posing the questions:

What is going on in this picture?

What do you see that makes you say that?

What else can you find?

After students shared their thoughts, we looked at other artworks by Kelly that help build up the story. I used a Powerpoint (included with lesson plan below) with other works and a look at William Dobell’s portraits to understand how this influenced Kelly’s cows.

Use 2 Litre plastic milk bottles for the cow body.

We used corks for legs because I had a huge tub full of them, but you could just as easily secure rolled cardboard to the front and back.

Start with the legs, covering with strips of wet plaster cloth to join to the bottle, then cover the entire bottle with plaster smoothing as you go.

I sliced off edges of champagne corks to make the thin neck and glued and glued egg shaped poly balls to them. The top of the cork fitted nicely into the opening of the milk bottle with a strip of wet plaster bandage wound around to hold it in place.

When covering the head with plaster strips, ears can be shaped out of the wet plaster.

Horns can be added with the plaster or paper clay like Crayola Model Magic. Once the plaster is dry the cow is painted either black and white for a Holstein cow or reddish-tan for an Ayrshire cow.

AUD $5 email download for lesson plan & PPT/ PDF

Detailed lesson plan for John Kelly Cow models. Includes learning intention, success criteria, assessment /self evaluation rubric and Victorian curriculum standards. Also a PDF to discuss John Kelly’s cow artworks.

PDF to discuss John Kelly’s cow artworks.

Cows with Four Stomachs! Year 3/4 Art lesson

LEARNING INTENTION & SUCCESS CRITERIA:

We are learning about the 4 stomachs of a cow and how they make milk and digest food.

I can draw the the side view of a cow and colour it in a chosen breed, eg, Holstein, Ayreshire, Jersey, Guernsey, etc.

I can draw and label the four stomachs of a cow to stick behind the flap cut in the cow’s stomach.

LESSON ACTIVITIES:

Videos to learn about cow’s digestion and their 4 stomachs- list the names on board.

How cows make milk 4 stomachs explained.

FOR KIDS – The Cow’s Stomach video,

Mobile Dairy Classroom: Learn About Cattle Eating Habits and Cow Digestion, Grades 4-6 (best from 1:50min)

Students draw a cow on A3 paper to mostly fill the paper. Colour it in a chosen breed. We used the Discover Dairy website to help choose: Cow Breeds Interactive We used water soluble pastels to colour then painted with water to give it a painted look. Food dye wash for sky and grass.

On A4 paper draw the cows four stomachs and label, making sure it will fit inside the cow’s stomach that they drew. Cut a flap in cow (I did this for them with a scalpel knife (Stanley knife)- basically a “U” shape, so you can see the stomachs stuck behind when you lift the flap.

cow-with-4-stomachs-year-3-4-art-lesson Download

Holstein Cow & Barn- Prep art lesson

LEARNING INTENTIONS:

To use shapes to draw a farm scene- a cow in green pasture with a red barn.

To use skills of tracing, drawing, colouring, cutting, gluing, painting and techniques of making texture.

To make red painted paper adding horizontal or vertical lines as texture for a barn.

SUCCESS CRITERIA:

I can trace/ draw rectangles for body & head and arrange for shape of a cow.

I can trace my pencils lines on my cow shapes in Prockey marker and colour some black patches on the cow. I can add 4 legs, an udder, ears, eyes & nose.

I can paint some paper with red paint, and while paint is wet scrape a texture comb through to make straight lines. (horizontal or vertical) for the barn.

I can use dye wash to paint sky and grass around my cow.

I can cut a square with a semi circle or triangle roof for a barn, and glue it on my scene, halfway up on the paper, so it looks like it is further away.