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Sunflower
· Visual Arts · Art Appreciation · Vincent Van Gogh
Lesson Plan Printable Activities
Vincent Van Gogh 1888
Vase with Fifteen Sunflowers
A Celebration of Sunflowers!
Let's introduce our children to the art of Vincent Van Gogh in a way that will be memorable, educational and fun!
Note: This activity is also appropriate for other educational themes listed above.
Even though sunflowers were not grown in the area where I lived and grew up in childhood, I came to like them and tried
to paint the first ones at 4 years of age. My mother saved it,
so I still have it. Why did I enjoy sunflowers? Because
of the images of Van Gogh's sunflowers painting I looked at in
art books my parents showed to me!
Activity: Visit an Online
Gallery to View Van Gogh's Sunflowers and "meet" Mr. Van Gogh
- Visit the Online Gallery:
March 30th is Mr. Vincent Van Gogh's birthday, so why not celebrate his sunflowers paintings and take our
children to this online
gallery to see them and also learn about sunflowers with other activities. Click on a few of the thumbnail pictures to view a larger image. Encourage discussion and as the children view the images provide them with some basic information about Mr. Van Gogh.
- Meet Mr. Van Gogh:
- Discuss some basic information about Mr. Van Gogh and read Joy
Chiang's lesson plan for additional ideas to incorporate Mr. Van Gogh's
life and work in the activities. What is
important is to know that he left us with beautiful paintings to
enjoy and learn from.
- Famous artist and painter born in a beautiful
country called Holland, The Netherlands.
- Visual Arts / Art Appreciation: One of his favorite flowers
was the sunflower and he left us all the gift of a
collection of magnificent sunflower paintings. This type of
painting is called a still life. For information and further
activities on still life painting, visit this activity: A Still Life.
Activity: How Seeds Grow: View this cute video and discuss how a plants grow, in this case a sunflower seed to flower.
Activity: Learning About Sunflowers
Now let us derive joy from learning the story of sunflowers, how they are planted, how they grow, and their many useful byproducts. We willuse the color yellow in all it's splendor with these activities:
- Read The Story of the Sunflower Coloring Book from the screen
and simplify it as you go along or print and display on a board.
- Print those pages you think are age appropiate.
- Have the children color, paint and decorate their sunflower coloring pages.
- For toddlers children, print an easy large sunflower coloring page.
Arts and crafts activities >
- Large Sunflower Posters:
Have the children observe
Mr. Van Gogh's sunflower paintings. Provide large pieces of paper (easel size, or tape
discarded paper together) yellow paints in different shades, greens
and other colors, brushes, sponges and allow them to do free style
painting to make their own sunflowers.
- Draw, color and write: S is for Sunflower
Print the drawing
and writing paper. Have children draw and color
sunflowers. Children can then practice writing letter F is for
Flower, S for Sunflower or letter Y for Yellow.
- Coloring & writing >
Print a sunflower theme
coloring pages found in the materials column.
- Children Ages 2-4: Color or paint. Paste sunflower seeds in the
center of flower.
- For older children learning to print:
Print these writing
lines behind your choice of coloring page. Have children practice
writing letter S for sunflower or Y is for yellow. After
writing practice encourage children to color and decorate the
coloring page.
- Crafts > Sunflower
Craft > An easy to assemble sunflower craft suitable for toddlers to early elementary in color and coloring format.
Happy Birthday Mr. Van Gogh and thank you!
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Drawing & writing paper
review lesson plan for suggestions
Letter S sunflower tracer
sunflower coloring pages
(decorate w/ sunflower seeds)
The Story of
the Sunflower
Coloring Book (PDF)
[Pages 1-4] [Pages 5-8]
Sunflower
Craft
F
is for Flower activities
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