I was so inspired by the french blog, les petites têtes de l'art.  Using her post as a jumping off point, kindergartners drew large scale portraits.

We began talking about the differences between landscapes, still lives, and portraits in class this week.  We looked at a variety of portraits from different artists and even explored how different illustrators drew different people.  

We jumped in by discussing drawing hair as a shape, not just lines.  We looked at a handout that I had created a few years back and kids were encouraged to draw a hairline that they later painted with neutral paint that they mixed themselves.  

We reflected back on how artists and illustrators had drawn facial features and kiddos were given lots of options in how to draw eyes, noses, and mouths.  Kids were excited to share their faces with one another and enjoyed trying some new ways to draw their faces.

In kindergarten we only have a half hour a week so we wrapped it up the first week after painting our hair and drawing in our face.  We picked it up the week after by discussing choosing a good color to represent our skin tones and talked about using the side of the crayon to shade a large area like the one we were working in.  

The portraits took a fantastic turn when they were photographed with the artist for the finale!  
Check the collection outhere on artsonia.

There is an awesome art lesson book called Dynamic Art Projects for Children.  It is, by far, the best printed resource for creative art lesson plans, in my opinion.  I regularly use it for inspiration and direct instruction.  I do the 'Dragon a in Cave'  lesson every year with my fifth graders.  I change Ms. Logan's plan slightly.  I start by doing a step by step drawing of very basic shapes to draw a dragon.  The kids then look at lots of resources to complete their drawings.  Over the years I have complied many how to drawings of dragons and dinosaurs.  They are helpful to expand kid's ideas.  They are all encouraged to add many details to give their dragons lots of personality.