Death of a Snowman (Snowperson)

For years I have been trying to teach the difference between warm colors and cool colors. I’ve had the students watch videos, look at paintings to show mood, wear t-shirts in a line.  I even have my classroom (table groups) divided into warm colors and cool colors.  Nothing helped these kids remember the difference between warm colors and cool colors…until….

I killed a snowman.

I saw this lesson on Pinterest, I believe.  Do you know how many lessons there are on snowmen out there? Lots.  This one caught my eye though, simply because it really focuses on warm and cool colors.

We watched some videos on warm and cool colors (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htN1VJW3ePo), then we looked at artwork.  We discussed the importance of knowing your warm and cool colors.  These colors convey moods, they bring out emotion.  They are visual representations of feelings and colors actually do have a profound affect on your mind.  Color matters.  For fun, we even watched a few clips of Inside Out.  Kids really get the color references for sadness and anger.

For the first day we focused on painting our background with cool colors.  We also did some work on blending and using a large paintbrush to make the process easier.  The next day was warm colors.  Then we set to work on making our happy snowman very alive and well in cold land.  Then the next day, kids loved making blobs and sad faces for the inevitable day in which their snowman has to melt. And I mean, THEY LOVED IT!  They kept talking about how hot it would be, how their creation would feel locked inside a hot volcano or launched into the sun.  They were making connections.  Yay!

Here are some of their pieces, which were displayed side by side.