5 Winter Art Lesson Ideas for Your Classroom Using Flexible, Choice Art Mediums

Okay so let’s dive on into 5 Winter Art Project or Lesson Ideas that you can simply and easily do in your classroom that use choice or flexible art mediums, perfect for Choice-Based Art Education and Learning. I have a bunch of easy-to-do and prep ideas that can use choice art mediums and can allow the students to really immerse themselves in some Winter vibes. So grab your Art Making Mediums (of your choice of course) and let’s get into these Winter Ready-Made, Simple and Engaging, Art Lesson Ideas for your Amazing art classroom.

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WINTER LANDSCAPE ART PROJECT & EXPLORATION

This idea can be done with any age! I always think that any time we have an opportunity for kids to immerse themselves in an observational experience and we have the means to, then we should allow it. In this art lesson idea, I think we need to let students experience what a winter landscape looks like! I think that you can for sure do this in a few ways. First, you can take your students out on an observational walk during winter where you live. I live in Canada so I often take it for granted that we have 4 very distinct seasons here. Truth be told, where I am is just north of Washington state so you can imagine I mainly get rain for 10 months of the year.

That being said I think there is a lot for kids to learn about winter and how it presents in their own environment and country or area. So for this lesson idea, take your students out on a walk during Winter, no matter what winter looks like where you live. If you cannot go on a walk around your neighborhood, go around your school yard. If that isn’t an option, you can always put on a video on YouTube of what winter looks like in other places or a video on the Arctic regions of thee world to give them a more icy vibe. If you don’t like that, I know Bob Ross has painted a lot of winter landscapes which you can play on Netflix and I am sure the kids will appreciate it. Basically, let them immerse in the essence of a beautiful winter day, whatever that might mean for you.

IMMERSIVE BRAINSTORM: After your walk or video, take your classroom projector and find a YouTube video of like snow falling and then just like put it at the back of the room and project it into the classroom instead of a screen like a Van Gogh Museum immersive experience. Let them walk around in the snow without talking and let them spend 3 to 5 minutes visualizing a Winter landscape. Explain that once they have an idea, they should quietly return to their seat and make a quick sketch (either in a sketchbook or on scrap paper) of their winter landscape idea.

After? Create a winter landscape artwork inspired by the immersive experience and immersive brainstorm. You can let them choose choice art mediums OR you can pick the art mediums, or let them pick from a few art mediums that you are willing to allow them to choose from. Let it be flexible and choice. You can do this with any art mediums, it will take a few art classes, and you know that kids will be developing a strong sense of observational skills and will be highly engaged in the art making process. After all that immersion they will be tingling with creativity and winter art ideas. Just plant the seed and watch it grow! This is a perfect idea for anyone wanting to implement more choice based art in their classrooms and really, any teacher can do this with little prep as a lot of the art making is self-directed. Of course, for more winter art ideas your can visit my TeachersPayTeachers store, Ms Artastic, or Join my Art teacher Membership, the Artastic Collective, in January.

DO YOU WANT TO BUILD A SNOWMAN?

Want to increase engagement and have your students focused while the Winter weather takes over? No problem. Combat those Winter jitters by letting them make some snowman art! You can do resist painting snowmen with white wax crayons or oils pastels and then paint the backgrounds with COOL colors using with tempera paint cakes or watercolor paints. Of course, cool colors are colors that make us feel calm and cool and are blue, green, and purple.

If you want more choice based play, you can provide students with a choice of a COOL Color background paper (construction paper) and let them choose between liquid tempera paint, white soft pastel or chalk pastel, or oil pastels to create their own snowman design on the paper. You can be assured you will have a variety of snowman artworks when supplying a choice of these 3 art mediums! Your role would be to demo what each medium might look like as a sample on construction paper and show how to use each, but not show HOW to make a snowman artwork. You support with using mediums like a studio tech and kids can do the experimenting and creating.

WINTER ANIMALS IN SNOW ART PROJECTS:

Another idea would be to let your students pick a choice animal that will be he subject of their art piece and let them create or draw their animal playing in snow. If you have primaries, this is a great time to pull out some cotton swabs and let them do some fine motor practice by letting them dip the swab into white paint and then stamp on white dots onto the artwork after drawing to create snow texture in the background.

Alternatively, pull out those cotton balls and let them pull them apart and glue the cotton onto the bottom of the paper around the animal to create a snowy textured ground. I love this idea and it could be done in combination with the cotton swab dots, it just really depends on how much energy you have!

If you want a pre-planned animal in snow art project, I of course have a large selection of fully planned winter art lessons in my TpT store, Ms Artastic.

ARCTIC ANIMAL ART PROJECT:

Challenge your students to create an artwork of an Arctic Animal using at least 5 mediums to encourage them to experiment and be creative. This can be done with any age! However, if you’re doing this with primary, reduce it to 3 art mediums. Direct 1 of the mediums to be magazine clippings OR scrap paper pieces. Put up pictures or a YouTube video clip of Arctic Animals and let them create choice-based art by creating their own Arctic Animal inspired by the picture or video, but using a variety of art making mediums and materials. They MUST include 5 (or 3 for primary) art mediums so we can ask the students to really think outside the box and move outside their comfort zone. This can be done with most ages, from Elementary all the way up to High School. All about expanding Creative Thinking Skills.

WINTER SCULPTURES:

Challenge students to make miniature Winter sculptures using cardboard and paper and any other choice art mediums. Challenge them to explore and go deeper into the project to create a Winter character or winter landscape. This is a fun, engaging art idea that can really be done with anything from a recycling bin to also encourage reusing and sustainability. After the project is done they can keep the art or return it to the recycling bin. This is about learning from the process, not necessarily the finished project.

aerial photography of snow covered trees — Photo by Ruvim Miksanskiy on Pexels.com

READY-MADE WINTER ART PROJECTS on the Ms Artastic TeachersPayTeachers store:

If you’re looking for art lessons ready-to-use that include all the lesson plans, handouts, assessment, and more, check out my WINTER Art Lessons, Winter ARTivity booklet, directed draws, coloring pages, and more in my TeachersPayTeachers store or with your Artastic Collective Membership. Find these resources in the Winter category of my TpT store or find links in the show notes blog post. Link in the description of this video or go to msartastic.com.

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5 Winter Art Project or Lesson Ideas that you can simply and easily do in your classroom that use choice or flexible art mediums, perfect for Choice-Based Art Education and Learning. I have a bunch of easy-to-do and prep ideas that can use choice art mediums and can allow the students to really immerse themselves in some Winter vibes. So grab your Art Making Mediums (of your choice of course) and let’s get into these Winter Ready-Made, Simple and Engaging, Art Lesson Ideas for your Amazing art classroom.

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Finally, if you need some ideas or need to take a break in your classroom or from recording lessons for online instruction, I have lots of Art Video tutorials that are classroom friendly on my YouTube Channel!

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Yours Truly,
Kathleen McGiveron (Ms Artastic)