Wooden Easter Eggs - Kindergarten

The students had passed their lessons about shapes with flying colors, so around Easter time I thought it would be a good idea to introduce patterns. They learned about polka dots, stripes, plaid, swirls, and several more.  My scrapbooking paper came in handy for examples!  The children enjoyed painting designs on their eggs for spring.

Melissa P. recommended an adorable children's book to be told in conjunction with this lesson.  It is called "Henri, Egg Artiste," and can be found on Amazon here: Henri, Egg Artiste.  The students were so excited to recognize Matisse's "Icarus" painted on to one of the eggs in the story, as well as the Mona Lisa, which we had talked about when we were studying portraits.

INSTRUCTOR:
Shawna K.

GOAL:
To teach the students various patterns such as stripes, polka dots, and plaids; as well as have them painting on a 3-dimensional object instead of flat paper.

SUPPLIES:
Wooden Easter eggs (available at chain craft stores during the Spring), primer, tempera paint, small paint brushes for detail work, paper plates, tacky hold (we used a putty to temporarily adhere the eggs to the paper plates), spray lacquer, and smocks.

INSTRUCTIONS:
Prime the eggs before class and allow drying time. Our challenge with this project was to keep track of whose egg was whose and keep the eggs from falling over while the students were working on them, so we used putty that would normally be used to hang things on the walls and temporarily adhered the eggs to the paper plate.  We wrote the children's names on their paper plates. 

The students painted their designs on the eggs.  Once the eggs were dry, we sprayed them with a lacquer to make them shiny.

TIP:
It is helpful to keep a close on eye the students who have a tendency to use a lot of paint and instruct them to wash their brush in between paint colors.  Also, when a student appears to be done, TAKE their egg from them and give them something else to do.  When left with a paintbrush and paint, the students will keep painting and keep painting, so a couple of eggs ended up being solid brown because they mixed all of their colors.  It was a challenge for some students to not mix colors.