Styrofoam Prints

Christa, Grade 3

The third grade students have started their first printmaking project.  They are staying with the Chicago theme, since they are studying Chicago in Social Studies this year.  I also know they love drawing the city, so it's a great line drawing for their first print.  They used dull pencils or the back of a paintbrush to scratch the image of a city into a piece of styrofoam.  I explained that if we were etching, we would be scratching a metal plate, and that some artists carve into linoleum or wood.  They painted their backgrounds half warm colors and half cool colors with watercolors.  I let them use the metallic and glitter paint because it's their favorite.  When the backgrounds dried, they printed their cities twice, with the prints touching at the horizon.  The first, darker print became their city skyline, and the second, lighter print resembled reflections in the water.  As usual, I'm impressed with what they have done!  I could tell from their reflections that they really understood all of the steps.  Here is what Cindy wrote for hers:

"Printmaking is a type of art that you print.  It is used to make many copies of art to a paper, so you don’t have to do it over and over again.  I used watercolors for my background, with warm colors on one half and cool colors on the other half.  I made stripes of color instead of tapping my brush.  My whole classroom was doing tapping, and I was thinking that I should do something really different.  I just slide my brush with strips.  I drew the Chicago city because it reminds me of Chicago in peace.  I had a small puddle of black ink on a piece of glass, and I slid the ink with a brayer until I heard a static sound.  I cut the sky off so the black ink would not go on the sky.  I painted my towers with the black ink on the brayer.  The most fun part was sliding the brayer in the glass with black ink.  It felt calm and kind of relaxing."

Ally, Christa and Grace try out the brayers.

Cindy, Grade 3

Gael, Grade 3

Ally, Grade 3

Grace, Grade 3

Christopher, Grade 3