Ice Cream Cones in Tints and Shades

Here's my version of a project that has been doing the rounds on Pinterest for quite some time. You can see another great example of this here project at 'Splats, Scraps and Glue Blobs'.

I had my grade four students fold a sheet of A3 paper into eighths, and after demonstrating how to create both tints and shades of a colour, students painted one section of their page in their chosen colour and filled the other boxes with graduating tints and shades.

Once the painting was complete, students drew a shape to represent a dripping scoop of icecream onto one of their boxes of colour. They then cut out this shape and used it as a template to draw and cut the same shape from each coloured box.

What I really liked about this project, other than the fun topic is that it incorporates painting and collage. I gave each student a long strip of white paper and asked them to layer all their scoops on the page from lightest tint to darkest shade. They were then able to glue the pieces down I gave them the option of drawing or collaging details such as the icecream cone and any decorations such as cherries and sprinkles etc.

 

Ice Cream Drawings

Ice Cream Cone by Andy Warhol. Image via Printmag.

This is an easy lesson I have done with pre-primary through to grade 4 and they have all enjoyed it very much. Students had to rely on their imaginations to create delicious ice cream cones like Andy Warhol's (1928 -1987) early drawings. 

I instructed the students to use oil pastels thickly to cover their entire page and to stick with one or two colours for the background. Some also used wooden skewers or tools to scratch patterns into their drawings.