montessori art projects Archives

July 16, 2020January 31, 2024

5 Montessori Rocks and Minerals Art Lessons

This blog post is a part of a three-month series: Montessori Art in the Natural World: Kids Nature Journal Color Lessons. This series is about growing kids’ knowledge about the natural world by taking them outside their home or classroom and challenging them to create focused art, based on the nature around them. Every aspect of nature—seasons, layers of the earth’s soil, energy, rocks and minerals, fossils, landforms, water, flora, fauna, the atmosphere—can all be represented and expressed through art lessons. These Montessori rocks and minerals art lessons encourage your students to use natural rocks in their art projects and learn more about nature, rocks, and our world’s lands!

5 Montessori Rocks and Minerals Art Lessons

The natural rock cycle can be an interesting topic for Montessori students to learn; when you bring ideas from the Coming of the Universe and the Earth Great Lessons and combine them with rock art lessons—your students will really become engaged! You might even see them paying more attention to and investigating rock formations in the natural world.

It doesn’t matter what grade level you are teaching, rock art lessons can be fun for all Montessori students. I often work with rocks in my art studio and art programing classes, and have done many of these activities with children of all ages—sometimes even adults! You can use these art lessons to help introduce subjects like igneous rocks, sedimentary rocks, metamorphic rocks, or fossils; you can even use these rock art activities to help build fine-motor skills for early childhood students through rock arranging.

Here are five different ways to integrate art making with rock lessons in all areas of visual arts.

Montessori Rocks and Minerals Art Lessons:

Rock painting
Natural art arrangements
Designing biomes
Sketching rocks
Making pigments from rocks

Painting on Rocks

Rock painting with acrylic paint is one of my all-time favorite art projects and kids love it too! This lesson can teach so many skills, such as brushstrokes, color mixing, creating textures, and making lines. Rocks are a wonderful surface to use as a canvas, plus, they’re 100% sustainable and can be found in any environment.

Natural Art Rock Arrangements

Arranging rocks into concentric designs is a fun way to teach kids about balance and develop their concentration skills. It also gets kids outdoors and sparks discussions about different types of rocks and how to select specimens for arrangements. With these types of Montessori rocks and minerals art lessons, I try to focus on collecting, sorting, and organizing the natural objects. While kids are organizing and arranging, they’ll also learn about key art elements like symmetry and balance.

Designing Biomes with Rocks

Letting children design their own biomes with rocks they’ve collected is a great way to teach them about diverse natural biomes. You can even teach students about the Coming of Human Beings, and how humans have migrated to and from different biomes throughout history. There are many biomes children can design using rocks: rivers, mountains, caves, savannahs, and forests, etc.

5 Montessori Rocks and Minerals Art Lessons, spramani elaun art teacher

Sketching Rocks Shadows

Drawing is an important skill all students—especially at elementary ages—should have. I often use rocks to teach 3-D perspectives, identifying color value, and how to create shadows in drawings and paintings. Rocks can usually be found in every type of outdoor landscape and can be captured in outdoor nature journal sketching. Start this activity by collecting rocks locally; then you can have students make sketch marks in the shapes of the rocks they’re observing. The next step would be to have your students observe how light placement (like the sun in the sky) casts shadows, and have them include the shadows in their sketches.

5 Montessori Rocks and Minerals Art Lessons, art teacher spramani

Making Pigments from Rocks and Minerals

Explaining to students how natural pigments can be made from minerals and rocks is a wonderful way to teach them to observe color in nature and connect how art and colors are made. Natural dyes and pigments can come from a wide variety of nature objects, including rocks! One of simplest ways to teach kids about rock composition is to have them make paint from grounded rock minerals; for details and instructions on how to do this, check out this blog:

How to Make Paint, Inks & Dyes from Nature

Where to Start: Setting Up a Rock Painting Table

Again, painting rocks is one of my favorite activities to do with Montessori kids! The activity itself allows kids to be independent and creative, and the finished project is just so fun and colorful! It’s very simple to do, the majority of “work” just involves setting up a space for students to work.

You will need:

Kid-safe acrylic paint
Paint palette
Paint brushes
Napkins
Water jar
Rocks – river rocks are best because of their flat surface, but stones of any shape will work

How to do it:

Wash rocks in water and wipe clean (this ensures the paint sticks); completely dry rocks before painting
Prepare and fill a palette with a variety of paint colors
Set out paint brushes (a variety of brush sizes allows kids to create whatever brush stroke they desire)
Paint one layer of color at a time; set aside to dry before painting the next color
Once students finish their desired image, set rocks out to dry; rocks dry best when left in direct sunlight

One Step Further: Montessori Nature Activity Outdoor Journal Checklist

Here’s a bonus nature art activity for you! While your students are out collecting rocks outside, have them take out their nature journals and record their observations. (For information and instructions on how to create a nature art journal, click here.)

Nature journaling is a relatively independent activity, but you should still guide your students to make sure they’re following scientific principles and standards. This Nature Journal Checklist will help you make sure your students are including data that helps them implement both scientific and artistic principles during their expedition.

To download the checklist for FREE, click here.

Print it out or save it on your phone so you have it with you the next time you lead your students outside to journal or collect nature objects for crafting.

A Short Cut Just for You: Buy Painting Step-by-Step Curriculum

spramani elaun paint curriculum for kids

One of the reasons I really like painting on rocks is because it opens up a whole world of painting for kids. A rock is such an interesting and unique canvas; once they start painting there, they’ll want to learn even more techniques. Before kids explore all the different ways to paint, it’s important that they learn proper paint brush and brushstroke techniques to help them develop their painting skills.

My Kids Painting Practice & Process Curriculum has 57 master lessons that take kids from setting up a paint station and holding a brush all the way to creating beautiful nature landscapes and painting different types of animals! Each lesson is featured as part of a sequence and includes all the information—materials, demonstration technique, and direct and indirect aims—you need to properly present the activity to your students.

To purchase the curriculum, click here.

No part of this blog may be used or be reproduced in any manner whatsoever including reproducing, publishing, performing, and making any adaptions of the work – including translation into another foreign language without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. Nature of Art® Publishing P.O. Box 443 Solana Beach, California 92075.

May 16, 2019January 14, 2021

Watercolor Play | Montessori Art Lesson

If you’re looking for a hands-off project that’s fun for kids, I have the perfect art lesson for you! Watercolor Play introduces young children to the basics of color and lets them explore their creativity. Because this project is process-based—meaning it’s about experimenting and experiencing the process of making art—it’s a perfect Montessori art lesson, since students can work independently.

Watercolor Play is a simple, natural way for kids to learn the basis of color. Students in Plane 1 or younger can’t really be sat down and taught color theory, so this activity is a way for them to be introduced to color in a way that meets their level of understanding. It teaches them how color behaves and mixes, which are things all artists need to learn, without getting into technical details and overwhelming them.

This lesson provides the building blocks of color theory so students are ready for more advanced work as they get more experience. This foundation will help them be more willing to experiment when they’re older, because they already have an introduction to art and the knowledge of how colors work together.

Watercolor Play is Ideal for Early Childhood

While this activity is ideal for early childhood, you can adapt aspects of it to work for older children too. You’ll see that I try to keep this art lesson very simple to start off with, but you can add in primary and secondary color concepts once students have a better understanding.

No matter how old your students are, mixing colors can be therapeutic. It’s soothing, relaxing, and can relieve stress. Giving children the opportunity to play like this also helps them develop the wiring in their minds.

I recommend setting up this art lesson on a regular basis—maybe once a month, or even once a week—so their understanding consistently grows and deepens.

Watercolor Play from Spramani Elaun on Vimeo.

Supplies

Kid-safe, non-toxic liquid paint (acrylic, tempera, or watercolor) that’s been watered down to be transparent
Bottles with adjustable caps OR clear plastic tubs
Bowls
Paintbrushes, sponges, stampers, drippers
Watercolor paper or thick/butcher paper (optional)
Aprons or old clothes

Steps:

Put all your materials out on a table
Let kids explore and play

That’s it! Watercolor Play is such a simple activity. You don’t want to direct it or try to teach anything if your students are at a young age. Let them play with the colors and mix things naturally, they’ll create their own colors and see things for themselves. If they’re old enough to ask about colors, then you can go ahead and start naming the general hues, and hint at what adding other colors might do to change the original color (i.e. make it lighter).

Watercolor Paints

You can start with whatever colors you want. You can start with primary colors, or set out just one color at a time, then add new or different colors the next time. I recommend sticking with limited color options to start out with, especially for children 24 months or younger. Once they’re older and have had more exposure to colors and the activity, they’ll be able to start experimenting more, and getting more excited about their experimentation.

With this art lesson, you’re not focusing on the outcome; do not expect kids to create an actual finished work. The watercolor paper is optional because older students may want to make their own artwork, if the choose to do so, make sure there’s a place to keep the paper out to dry. Seeing how the paint and color changes once their work is done is part of the experience as well.

You may also want to consider starting with lighter colors before introducing darker ones, since dark colors can “stain” the other ones by eventually turning everything a murky gray—which is less exciting.

While this project is relatively hands off, you may need to take the lead initially by squirting and mixing the paint in your own bowl or tub. Kids are so used to us telling them to be careful, and not to make messes, so this is a new experience for them.

NOTE: This project should be set up outdoors or somewhere that water can be splashed (i.e., not rugs or carpet). This project can get messy with younger children, since most toddlers and lower elementary students don’t yet have very developed fine motor skills to control what they’re doing.

For more activities and lessons on color theory, check out my book Kids Color Theory.

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The Phases of Art Development is a quick digital course that explains how art making can help students develop their creativity, fine-motor skills, and focus. More importantly, I share what types of projects students at every age are capable of completing safely, and without making a mess.

Best of all—it’s free! To sign up for the course, click here.

March 7, 2019January 14, 2021

Lower Elementary Montessori Art Teach Method

I’ve spent years and years researching and observing how children learn art, and what I’ve found is that children are able to grasp different artistic skills at different planes. In this new blog series, I’ll be sharing my insight on the art teaching methods that work for each age group of Montessori students.

Children of all ages can be taught visual arts and be guided through the artistic process. Each developmental phase requires different teaching styles and approaches.

Below you’ll find a general arts literacy guide for Montessori Lower Elementary ages following the International Standards for the Arts Education & Sensory Visual Arts method that aligns with a child’s growth – Nature of Art®.

Montessori Lower Elementary Art Teaching Methods Resources

If you would like to understand more about which types of art projects children can work on, register for my free video course, Phases of Arts Development, which discusses teaching methods for Lower Elementary Montessori students (ages 7-9).

You can learn about Art Literacy Standards and the benefits of visual arts by reading Defining Visual Arts (paperback book).

Get more information on how to bring art lessons into the Montessori classroom by reading Introducing Visual Arts into the Montessori Classroom (paperback book).

If you would like to understand more about the phases of art development, register for this free mini digital course.

Lower Elementary, Ages 7-9, Montessori Visual Arts Teaching Curriculum

Children at the lower L, age can do a number of different types of art projects. They can conjure up their own ideas and imaginative creations. Montessori lower elementary students can now plan with intention and think their ideas through to completion, going through the four steps of the artistic process.

At this age, students love to explore and discover what results different art mediums can produce. They encounter visual arts and Montessori art projects with lots of curiosity and a willingness to try different techniques.

Stretching Students’ Art Skills

Children can follow simple guided-art instructions and remain focused on their work for up to 1.5 hours. However, it’s still important to keep projects simple, with just a few un-complicated steps. Montessori art projects should start to introduce line, shape, form, texture, color, and symmetrical balance ideas.

You can also start introducing your lower elementary Montessori students to art language and the Elements & Principles of Design. For more information, reference Defining Visual Arts to better understand art language for young children.

Students’ fine-motor skills are becoming more controlled due to all the activities in their day-to-day Montessori curriculum and academic studies. Drawing and painting can be done with higher levels of control. The most important thing to focus on is giving children tasks that will continue to develop their fine-motor skills.

Children in lower elementary also need lots of exploratory sessions that allow them to experiment with varied mediums and techniques. Children are now drawing and painting with a 2D perspective and can be introduced to texture.

Art-Teaching Methods for Lower Elementary

Based on my proprietary sensory art method, I recommend teaching Montessori art through a combination of three methods: process-based art, creative-mode, and simple copy-mode.

Process-based art is about exploring and using their own imagination; it’s not necessarily focused on the child’s final piece of artwork.
Creative mode gives children the opportunity to explore mediums and conjure up creative images based on their own imaginations, thoughts, and ideas.
Copy mode refers to a systematic, step-by-step art instruction. Copy-mode should not be copy what you see in the image type lessons.

Lower Elementary Montessori Art Activities & Mediums

Here are some great Montessori Lower Elementary art projects for your students who are 7-9 years old, in the elementary grades. These types of art activities will help develop their fine motor control and small muscles in fingers and hands while teaching the Elements & Principles of Design. (You can find non-toxic, kid-friendly art supplies needed for these art activities at Nature of Art for Kids.)

Drawing: crayons, color pencils, graphite pencil, oil pastels, etc.
Painting: watercolor paints, tempera paints, acrylic paints, watercolor crayons, watercolor pencils etc.
Color Theory: primary color mixing, dropper color mixing, etc.
Clay Modeling: earth clay, non-harden plasticine clay, air-dry modeling clay, beeswax forming, etc.
Crafts: paper folding, nature and paper collage, mosaic arrangements, sewing basics, wool felting, string weaving, nature crafting, 3D constructing, etc.

Learn more about Montessori art teaching methods for lower elementary and get some Montessori art projects ideas by registering for my FREE mini digital course, Phases of Art Development Video.

Sign-up to receive video course & Montessori art teaching e-newsletter.

Best of all—it’s free! To sign up for the course, click here.

January 10, 2019February 1, 2020

The Value of Art Journaling for Kids, Montessori Activities

I’ve shared with you the importance of stimulating positive art talk in your Montessori classroom. It’s one of the easiest ways to get students interested in art. Once they’ve been allowed to explore their creativity through visual art, chances are, they’re going to be hooked and want to learn so much more. I’ve see it happen so many times! One of the best ways to keep them captivated, allow them to explore even more, and track their progress is through art journaling.

What I love about art journaling is that there’s no minimum talent or skill required—students of any age can benefit. All you really need is a journal, some simple art materials, and the willingness to get creative and have some fun.

What is Art Journaling?

An art journal is a book kept by artists as a visual—sometimes verbal—log of their thoughts, ideas, and creations. Art journaling the same concept as a written journal, but it combines writing with art and visual aspects. It’s a way for children to record their ideas and observations or respond to information they’ve learned with simple drawings and basic written descriptions.

It also gives them a space to explore. With art journaling, anything goes! Every style, medium, and technique can be used.

Art making is also powerful and therapeutic. Journaling gives students a healthy outlet to express their feelings and work through their emotions. For example, communicating through doodles can be much easier for children than talking.

How Art Journals Works

There’s no right or wrong way to do art journaling because they are personal to each artist! Students can use it to try out new techniques, document what happened to them that day or week, or artistically express the different emotions or issues they’re experiencing.

Students can keep their art journals with them or you can store them in a specific place on your art shelf or in a cabinet where they can grab them when they’re feeling creative. They can use the art supplies you put out on your art shelf to fill in the pages of their journal.

For the most part, journaling is an independent project and doesn’t require any lessons to complete. However, if you want to, you can provide simple prompts to inspire them; some examples may be: elaborate doodling, depicting poems, illustrating specific emotions, and creating patterned pages.

Make & Decorate Your Own Art Journal

Making an art journal is simple, all you really need is the journal itself—preferably filled with blank, un-lined pages.

Composition notebooks—although lined—usually cost about $1 or $2 each, and bulk pasts can be even cheaper. But I know purchasing a journal for each child in your class can still add up…so I’m offering you two solutions to cut down on costs.

1. Ask parents to donate journals. You’ll be surprised at how many parents will be willing to donate a few notebooks for your classroom.

2. Create a mini art journal out of plain paper:

Take 4 sheets of 8 1/2 x 11 plain white copy paper
Cut sheets in half (8 1/2 x 5 1/2), then fold in half into a mini booklet
Bind loose pages with a rubber band or stitch together (along the fold)
Stitching Instructions: get a thumb tack and press to make 3 holes along the fold; bind pages using a simple string stitch (watch video below).

Once you have your journal figured out, give students the opportunity to decorate their notebooks. If they’ll be using their own individual books make sure they put their names on them. Then put out a few basic art supplies (markers, stickers, glue, scissors, colored paper, beads, ribbons, etc.) and let them have fun. These will more than likely be the same supplies they’ll use to decorate the inside of their journals as well.

If your students choose to share their art journals with you, make sure you offer them supportive and nurturing language.

You never know…creating and encouraging your students to keep art journals might inspire you to start one yourself!

Learn more about teaching kids art lessons

Want more information on the types of techniques your students can handle or ideas for art projects outside of journals? Sign up for my absolutely FREE mini course, Phases of Art Development Guides & Art Project Ideas. It’s a quick guide to what your students are capable of and what to teach them at each age. They’re bite-sized videos that have proven helpful to many other Montessori teachers and they’ll give you a solid foundation to begin teaching art in your classroom!

Sign-up to receive video course & Montessori art teaching e-newsletter.

Best of all—it’s free! To sign up for the course, click here.

Of course, if you want to stay up-to-date on more teaching tips and art project ideas, make sure you sign up for my newsletter!

October 11, 2018February 1, 2020

4 Fall Leaf Ideas for Your Montessori Classroom

Idea #1: Leaf Crayon Rubbing

Check out the video above for full details, or follow the instructions below.

Simple Steps:

Place leaf facing down, vein side up.
Place white paper on top of leaf.
Hold paper and leaf firmly so they don’t move.
Take crayon and start rubbing over the leaf area.
The impression of your leaf should show up!

Idea #2: Leaf Pressing

Pressing leaves is a wonderful way to teach children how botanists preserve specimens. This activity can lead to many different types of art projects can down the road, such as leaf painting (see Idea #3, below). You can also let children come up with their own ideas of what to do with their pressed leaves once they’re done.

Simple Steps:

Gently wipe off any dirt from the leaf.
Place the leaf between newspaper sheets or in pages of a book.
Place a note card with the date collected and any information gathered about the leaf, in a safe place so that you can retrieve it once the leaf is pressed.
Pile a small stack of heavy books on top of the pages and press for 1 to 24 hours.

Idea #3: Leaf Painting

Allow your students to use leaves as a canvas and get creative with paint.

Simple Steps:

Press leaves first—they are easier to paint when flattened.
Select bright paint colors—acrylic, tempera, gauche, or craft paint will work best.
Paint leaf with paintbrush as desired.
Set aside to dry, then decorate note cards or other art projects with them.

Idea #4: Clay Leaf Fossils

A great way to show children how fossils are created is by compressing leaves into wet clay!

Simple Steps:

Roll out a flat slab of clay with a rolling pin. Use air dry model clay (which dries overnight), or white polymer clay (bakes to harden).
Place leaf, with veins facing down, onto the clay and firmly but gently press the compression by hand or with a rolling pin.
Carefully remove the leaf by pulling it by the stem.
Bake or leave to air dry.

Optional: paint fossil

The key to coming up with more engaging and exciting projects is understanding how kids learn and what would interest them. I’m launching an online course—The Art Teaching Blueprint—that teaches you everything you need to know about teaching art in a Montessori classroom and break it down into bite-sized videos so you can go through them at a pace that works for you. To get on the wait list and be notified when registration opens, click here!

montessori fall crafts fall leaf download

One Step Further: Download My Fall Leaf Inspiration Print

I personally think the fall season can give us hundreds of art activity and project ideas, but just to make it even easier on you (which, really, is such a joy because I get to share my love of both fall and art with you!), I’m giving you a FREE Fall Leaf Inspiration Print.

You can print it out and use it on your art shelf or hang it in your inspiration gallery to during the season, or let students fill it in with beautiful colors. It seems like a simple tool, right? But trust me, it’ll lead to so many amazing, creative artworks! Download the Fall Leaf Inspiration Print by clicking here.

A Short Cut Just for You

Of course, fall is just one season of the school year. If you want the tools to be able to come up with art activities all year long, you need the foundation of understanding how children are able to learn art. In my online course, Art Teaching Blueprint, I give you everything you need to easily start teaching art to your your Montessori students.

And fall registration for Art Teaching Blueprint is about to open!

I’ve been helping Montessori teachers all over the world bring art into their classroom for more than 20 years. And I’ve honed and perfected my own art teaching method, and have developed it to complement and support Montessori philosophy, so that you can start teaching art in your classroom too. From setting up a proper art environment and art shelf, to giving your students age-appropriate mediums to explore with, I cover everything a Montessori teacher needs to know.

I’m so excited to be opening up the course one more time for this year! You can sign up for the course starting November 1. But if you want a reminder, and to save your seat now, click here to join the waitlist!

Sign-up to receive video course & Montessori art teaching e-newsletter.

Best of all—it’s free! To sign up for the course, click here.

Montessori Rocks and Minerals Art Lessons:

Painting on Rocks

Natural Art Rock Arrangements

Designing Biomes with Rocks

Sketching Rocks Shadows

Making Pigments from Rocks and Minerals

Where to Start: Setting Up a Rock Painting Table

One Step Further: Montessori Nature Activity Outdoor Journal Checklist

A Short Cut Just for You: Buy Painting Step-by-Step Curriculum

Watercolor Play is Ideal for Early Childhood

Supplies

Watercolor Paints

Montessori Lower Elementary Art Teaching Methods Resources﻿

Lower Elementary, Ages 7-9, Montessori Visual Arts Teaching Curriculum

Stretching Students’ Art Skills﻿

Art-Teaching Methods for Lower Elementary﻿

Lower Elementary Montessori Art Activities & Mediums

What is Art Journaling?

How Art Journals Works

Make & Decorate Your Own Art Journal

Learn more about teaching kids art lessons

One Step Further: Download My Fall Leaf Inspiration Print

A Short Cut Just for You

And fall registration for Art Teaching Blueprint is about to open!

Montessori Lower Elementary Art Teaching Methods Resources

Stretching Students’ Art Skills

Art-Teaching Methods for Lower Elementary