Having fun and learning about tone
What a fun thing to do, learning how to mix different tones of grey inspired by the pots, pans and other utensils from the kitchen.
Young children love different approaches to art, different challenges and the different ways we teachers present ideas to them. This art experience presented the young students with the unexpected, pots and pans from the kitchen in the classroom and the idea of painting with a limited palette of 2 at most, three colours.
My aim was to introduce the students to TONE, and how to mix grey tones, painting a composition in an unusual and exciting way.
This exercise is one of the many important learning experiences that children can engage since very young. They can start in this very simple way to develop their knowledge of tone and other elements by practicing art as they grow older. By practicing like this, young children learn the basics of art that will help them to make independent decisions as they grow older.
I started by collecting old pots and kitchen metal utensils. At the end of my search we had old aluminium pots in different sizes and shapes, old baking tins, metal graters, metal beaters and many other big and small interesting things.The students first had some time to handle and to look at the objects, they looked for different shapes and textures. We set up small groups of pots and pans on each table for the students to examine.
The first part of our exercise was to engage in mixing a small number of greys. Starting by mixing a bit of black into white and remixing and adding more black to change the tone of the different greys. The yellow was our third choice of colour to introduce some different greys as greys can be cool greys or warm greys. Young children will need to mix only a few greys to paint their compositions to keep the mixing exercise simple.After they finished with the mixing exercise students then drew the composition with their paint brushes using one grey tone only, students were encouraged to draw big compositions that would occupy the paper from top to bottom and from side to side.
Older students can mix more grey tones and add a bit of blue and red to their greys to create cool and warm greys they could also add the reflections of light on the objects.
Raquel Redmond
Art Teacher and Blogger
Brava Art Press
