Aboriginal Inspired Yarn Paintings

This year's theme for NAIDOC Week is 'Because of Her, We Can!' My Year 5 students created these yarn paintings inspired by the paintings of indigenous West Australian women. Some of the artists we researched were Biddee Baadjo, Queenie McKenzie, Eubena Nampitjin, Jill Jack, Kim West Napurrula, Nada Rawlins, Marcia Purdie, Rosie Goodjie and Stumpy Brown.

Yarn paintings or nierika, are traditionally made by the Huichol people of Mexico. I hadn't attempted this before with students and I was surprised by how well they did. We used only pieces of card and a glue stick. 

       

Queenie McKenzie                         Kim West Naparrula                       Eubena Nampitjin             

       

Rosie Goodjie                                    Biddee Baadjo                                                Jill Jac

Marcia Purdie                                       Stumpy Brown                                                   Nada Rawlins

    

   

 

 

 

 

     

   

Rainbow Spider Webs

My Grade 3s created these happy little spiders in rainbow webs inspired by this activity on Artsonia by Gateway Elementary. This is a great activity for Halloween but one that kids enjoy any time of year.

They first learned to create a pattern using line to draw their web. Students then used coloured pencils, crayons and textas to colour the different areas inside their web. 

Once they had completed colouring their web students created their own spider by making a mini pompom. Making a mini pompom using a fork is a great little textile activity for this age group.

If you haven't seen this before you can see the instructions here at 'Jellyfish Prints'.

My students made spider legs from pipe cleaners and added googly eyes to complete. Students glued their spider to their web drawing. 

 

Tie Dye with Baby Wipes

This is a really easy project that I enjoyed as much as the students. I did this with grade 1 students but I'm sure any year level will enjoy it. The idea comes from 'I Can Teach My Child', where Jenae says you can use either regular textas/markers or liquid watercolours. I found the markers weren't as effective so we used tempera paints. I also discovered that very few children this age could wind the rubber bands around the wipes so you will probably need a helper for young children.

The results were exciting though and once dry you could incorporate them into another art work. We simply glued ours onto card as an example of experimental painting. We also completed 'Spin Paintings' in the same lesson. With older students you could discuss more about the history of the artform and perhaps link it to similar techniques such as Batik.