Homemade Scratch Art!

Did you know that you can make your own scratch art boards?  All you need is crayons or oil pastels, tempera paint, dish soap (like Dawn), a sponge brush and tag board!  In my first year of teaching, I did scratch art skeletons with my 5th grade for the Day of the Dead, but I used store-bought scratch boards.  NEVER will I do that again!  A lot of them wasted the scratch board, and it's expensive stuff!  I eventually learned how to make my own scratch boards, so I've embraced it.  I actually think it's better to make your own...then you can choose what color schemes to go with.


To make the scratch board paint, I usually just squeeze 1-2 tablespoons of dish soap into an almost full container of paint.  I'm sure there is an actual recipe out there somewhere, but I figure once the paint starts smelling like the dish soap, there's probably enough in it to make a difference.  You'll notice that the paint will be a little bubblier from the soap once you shake it up and a little shinier than normal during application.

To make the scratch board, it's very simple.  First, choose a color (or multiple colors) of crayons.  Press hard on the tag board so you get a nice, heavy, shiny coat of crayon on the paper.  You can see in the photo below where I didn't press hard at all...that won't work!  You can't have any paper showing through because the paint will adhere to it and it won't be able to be scratched off without ripping the paper.

Next, paint over the crayon with the scratch board paint!  I like using the sponge brushes.  I usually have the kids do two coats.  Be sure to use long, even strokes across the paper.  If your paint ends up being too think in spots, it will end up being difficult to scratch precise details because the paint will want to chip off.  Paint a single layer, let dry, and then paint another.  Today I had the kids take their papers to the heater and hold it upside down over the air to dry their layers faster.  Everyone was able to prepare their scratch boards in one class today.

These scratch boards are for the 6th grade Greek unit.  Students are currently learning about the evolution of Greek pottery, starting with Minoans and the geometric style.  They were asked to choose a type of Greek pot to represent in scratch art, thus the black and red colors.  Some students are doing red crayon with black paint while others are doing black crayons with the red paint to replicate the idea of red-figure vs. black-figure pottery.

The Egyptian project used up A LOT more clay than planned...so I don't think I'll be able to do as many clay projects with the 6th graders as planned.  I still need to do a clay project with my Kinders, 2nd graders, and 3rd graders.  Currently, I'm working hard on doing some reclaim of clay so that I can hopefully do more clay with 6th grade again!

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Here are some of the past scratch art projects that I've done with my kids:

These were scratch art skeletons I did with 5th grade my first year of teaching.  We used store bought scratch board.  Some of the students did a decent job creating a good composition, but others wasted the expensive board.  This is the project that opened me up to making my own scratch boards!

This was my first home-made scratch art project.  I did this with 1st graders, also during my first year of teaching.  We did under water scenes, so I asked them to choose bright colored crayons to color their tag board with.  We used black tempera.  You can see on some of the photos where students didn't have two solid coats of paint.  If you don't do two good coats, you'll be able to see the crayon through the paint.

I did this project last year with 2nd graders.  We talked about the Arctic and the types of animals that live there.  We colored our tag board with blues and greens before painting over with white tempera paint.

Art Club Mural: Nurse's Office

Riding off the shirt tails of the Christmas program mural, I decided to jump right in and start a second mural today with art club.  Every year I would like to start painting a mural in the school somewhere until we run out of room! ;)

Currently, our nurse is out of school.  She underwent treatment for breast cancer and is doing well now...only one more chemo treatment I believe!  Two years ago when I started teaching, she asked me if I would do a mural for her in her office, but I never got around to it...didn't feel I was ready. Since she is out, I figured this would be the perfect opportunity to paint one for her and surprise her when she gets back!  I can't wait!

I decided to go with an underwater theme.  A few art clubs ago, I had the kids sketch out some ideas of what they wanted to go in it.  I took their ideas and then drew this mural on the wall.  I love the look of the "View From a Submarine" project so much that I decided we were going to paint a similar one on the wall!

I probably won't have any more photos of our progress on this until after Christmas break...next Wednesday I have to cancel art club because I am a chaperon for a field trip to a nursing home with the Extended Day Program...oh the suspense will kill me!  I may have to sneak in there and do some painting myself, just for therapy!

I drew out the mural during my free period.  These three girls started us out...painting the water.

Next, these three students painted the water higher up where the shorter students couldn't reach... ;)

A few had a hard time brushing horizontally...they all wanted to do brush strokes parallel to whatever they were painting next to...even though they weren't as perfectly straight strokes as I would have liked, it still looks great!

While everyone painted, the others sat in the hallway working on homework and making Christmas cards for next Wednesday's field trip to pass out to the old folks. 

Just a shot inside the office door...the mural is being painted in the "waiting area".

The water is finished!

Next, these three students did the sand at the bottom...they painted is brownish-gold and then another student used a sponge-brush and sponged in white paint.

The last three students did the rocks.  These two painted them black...

And this student added some white to give them dimension.

Ta-da!  Day 1 progress!

Previously my school did not have any murals on the walls.  Last fall, the high school teacher had a visiting artist on Trout Lake (where she lives) and invited her to school to paint a mural with the high school students.  They did a large mural on canvas, which is in the lower cafeteria in our school.  At the time, the school was hesitant to allow her to paint directly on the walls.

Over the summer, I was able to get approval for this mural.  I'm not sure why I was able to get approval (I went to the board, had a plan written up, etc.), but I was able to paint directly on a wall!  So exciting!  A true mural!  Instead of using regular acrylic, I purchased Chroma Mural Paint from eNasco.  I don't really notice a difference between it and regular acrylic...only that the consistency is a little more watery.

For this mural, I didn't even have to go to the board!  I just went to my superintendent and she approved it!  That's progress!

3rd Grade Water Unit

The third graders are currently doing a water unit in their regular classroom and their teachers asked if I could do some water projects in art class as well. The first project we did was "A View from a Submarine."  We looked at a power point of ocean pictures.  We talked about the colors, the plant life, the animal life, and other items that are seen at the bottom of the ocean.  Students then had to pretend they were looking out a submarine window underwater.  We talked about having a good composition, as well as what an open composition is.  Since a submarine window is so small, it would be nearly impossible to see an entire shark through the window...I'd say about 1/2 of the kids understood this concept.

Students traced a circle tracer on regular drawing paper.  That had to draw their underwater drawing in pencil first.  After it was approved, they traced it in Sharpie marker and colored it with crayons.  Then, they cut out their circle and glued it onto colored tag board.  I trimmed their paper so it was a square, and for the final step, students used the marker again (or white pencil if they used black paper) to draw the submarine window rivets.

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For the second project in the 3rd grade water unit, they are going to draw themselves as a scuba diver using foreshortening. I did this project my first year of teaching called "Falling for Foreshortening".  I was originally going to do this foreshortening project with 3rd grade using outer space, but since the water unit presented itself, I decided to do this instead!  I am going to have the students color everything in crayon and then paint over the entire paper with blue watercolor paint to give it the effect of being underwater.  One of my two 3rd grade classes started this project last class...so here is the progress we have so far!

For the last project in the underwater unit, I'm going to pull out a variety of materials such as blue cellophane, paper plates, foam, etc. and let them go wild.  The will have to create a piece of art that reflects an underwater environment.