I did this project with my kids a few years ago but am just posting it now, just in time for the Christmas season.
All age groups enjoyed this nutcracker project. The bigger kids made full body nutcrackers using acrylic paint. We looked at human proportions, then discussed how these differ to nutcracker proportions. We noted that the our wooden friend has a rather stiff stature, with straight limbs, and a shiny finish, seeing as he's made of wood. We used a long format paper (A3 paper cut lengthwise, so roughly 14x42cm). These were folded lightly (without creasing) 4 times to section off our nutcracker proportions: head to neck, neck to belt, belt to knees and knees to feet, roughly. We drew in our body and added our own details such as crown, mustache, beard, belt buckle, boot details, epaulettes and cuffs. Our drawing was tracked in thick black permanent marker. We painted with acrylic paint (including gold!) and added a highlight side to our nutcracker by adding a touch of white to our paint to create a lighter value. This took 2-90 minute sessions.
The little kids class (below at bottom) made nutcracker heads using a guided drawing lesson. Together we mapped out the facial features with me drawing on the whiteboard and them following along. The kids drew directly on their paper with a black oil pastel. They designed their own crown details and mustache shape. These were painted in tempera paint. The background was then painted in black or green and painted carefully around our nutcracker. This was a 1-90 minute session.
 |
| 6-9 year olds. Acrylic and marker |
 |
| 6-9 year olds. Acrylic and marker |
 |
| 7-11 year olds. Acrylic and marker |
 |
| 4-5 year olds. Tempera paint and oil pastel |
 |
| 3-5 year olds. Tempera paint and oil pastel |
