Third and fourth grade art students drew their own coloring book pages, then colored a photo copy of a classmate’s artwork.

Supplies:

• Copy paper
• Pencils
• Sharpies
• Crayons
• Copier (Make one copy of each drawing)

Downloadable PowerPoint: Create a Coloring Page

This project is a winner for artists of all ages – I have done it with high school seniors and they loved it! Last year it became my classic end-of-the-quarter project. After the Showcase was over, this was a fun project that allowed students to think creatively and work together.

On the first day, we observed an abstract and realistic example of a coloring page. We talked about how the artwork only had the outlines. They got to choose what the subject of their artwork would be. This is the most fun part for me! I love seeing the wide range of topics that they come up with. It is also a great opportunity for kids who want to get better at drawing realistically to practice drawing from observation. If kids need to see an image in order to draw something, I paste it onto a blank PowerPoint slide.

They draw using pencil first and then trace over it with Sharpie. We take two days for this step. As they finish a page, they turn it in to me so that I can put it in the “Copy” folder. If they finish a page early, they can draw another page to have copied.

The next step was a little confusing for some of the kids, so I tried to explain it a different way each day we were working on the project. After the second day, I photo-copied all of the coloring pages that were finished. On the third day, they got to pick someone else’s page and color it in using crayons, markers or colored pencils. (I reassured them that they would get back their own original drawings.) Because they wrote their names on the back with pencil, it was easy for me to see which were originals and which were copies.

On the third day, they got to choose someone else’s drawing to color in. Each table got more pages to choose from than people who sat at the table. That way the last person to choose still had three options to pick from. I mixed together all of the drawings from the entire grade level. Before I passed out the photo-copied drawings, I gave a pep talk on speaking respectfully about each other’s artwork.

Before I passed out the photo-copied drawings, I gave a pep talk on speaking respectfully about each other’s artwork.

I modeled polite ways of talking about which artwork you were going to choose (“I don’t care for snakes, so I think I’ll color the drawing of the flower…”) and I gave examples of inappropriate ways of talking about the art (“Eew! I hate snakes! I don’t want that one!”) I was so proud of my students! After doing this project with 28 classes, I only had to talk with one or two kids about speaking respectfully.

The coloring portion of this project is so relaxing! I put on mellow music, and the kids get really into coloring their classmate’s artwork. They also love the idea that someone else is coloring their drawing. If they finish the first page early, I give them back their original artwork and they can start coloring it in as well. At the end of the class period, everyone leaves with at least two pieces of artwork – their original drawing and the photo-copied drawing that they colored.