End of Term Art Games with No Mess!
It’s nearly the end of term and your brain is fried and your resources depleted. The following end of term art games just might save your sanity! The most any of them need is paper and a pencil and occasionally a timer which we all have on our phones. When you register on The Arty Teacher website you can download 3 free resources each month.
Exquisite Corpse
Exquisite Corpse is the original surrealist game where each player has to draw part of a body – be it human or animal or a mixture of both. There are some good examples here by Jake and Dino Chapman. The lesson plan below explains how to run this activity and makes suggestions for how this activity can fill a whole lesson.
Dr Moreau’s Beast Folk
If you’ve read ‘The Island of Dr Moreau’ by H.G. Wells you will be familiar with ‘Beast Folk’ which are half-human half-animal. This game asks students to secretly suggest animals for other players who then have to combine them with a human body. This is wonderful for imaginative drawing. The lesson plan describes this in more detail and includes strategies to encourage your students to include more detail.
Busy Branches
In this game you first ask your students to draw a tree with no leaves. Students then take it in turns to make suggestions of something to add to the tree. This can be realistic or not! For example, they might suggest a swing or a butterfly, or they might suggest an armchair or a grand piano. The lesson plan details how to manage you time, keep pace and fill a whole lesson.
Picture Writing
Picture writing is where you ask your students to write out a poem but substitute some of the words with pictures. Below is a good example. The lesson plan includes several children’s poems or nursery rhymes that are ideal for this task. It also comes with some paper with wide lines to complete the task on.
Round Robin Drawing
If you have been meaning to include some group work in your teaching, this is just the ticket. Students add to collaborative drawings as they are passed around the room. The lesson plan details ideas to prompt their imagination and what to look for in a plenary.
Five Dots
Each player draws five groups of five dots on a page. They can be evenly spaced, scattered or in a straight line. They swap paper with another player. The challenge is then to draw a person where one dot is where the head is, and the other dots are where the hands and feet are placed.
I hope you find these end of term art games useful. If your students have access to iPads or computers you may also be interested in online art games. Click the picture below to find out more.
