My fourth grade students completed these fantastic castles today. I followed the instructions and template technique from my Architecture Made Easy PDF Lesson Plan but changed the medium. Instead of colored pencils, I suggested the students use colored markers for the small sections of the castle (windows, flags, banners, doors, etc) and liquid watercolors for the background and castle itself.
I really like the subtle nature of the watercolors and it takes much less time to finish. Always a plus this time of year!
Fourth Grade Castles…
I used your lesson with my fifth graders. I think its one of the most successful projects of our year. I hung them up in the art hall today and they are getting rave reviews! Thank you so much for your great tutorials!
Great idea!!
something about these reminds me of paul klee, particularly the rightmost of the top row, and then the last two!
trying to figure out why…
maybe it's the scaliness of the castle walls and the color palette
http://imagecache5.art.com/p/LRG/16/1677/1M11D00Z/paul-klee-ad-parnassum-1932.jpg
Hi Patty –
Just found your website and love it! Purchased the castle plans, downloaded it twice both ways and am still getting error messages………..what should I do?
thanks!
No problem, Wendy. I’ll forward this comment to Neil in tech support.
What type of color markers did you use? When I tried this in the past the color inks ran into the watercolor and made a mess!
Hi James,
Whenever I mix watercolor paint and markers, I use a water-proof marker. Bic and Sharpie are the brands I used most often. Prismacolor markers are also waterproof.
Love the castles. Did you use watercolor paper?
Nope. Because there is not much paint mingling, regular paper seems to work fine.
My 4th graders just finished these! We did color pencil on the castle and watercolor for the background. We are now building small models of castles out of recycled materials.
After making castles I have students make small stick puppets of hero heroine villian and mythical creature.( characters, setting). Also if you change the tops of the turretts to onion domes, add lots of arch shaped windows and balconies it becomes an Arabian castle with a whole different cast of characters (sultans, genies,camels,palm trees etc)
I love your site, and I reference it often! I’m a first year art teacher and I started my job midway through the year at 2 tiny rural schools, so you can imagine that coming up with lessons is one of my daily challenges, having not had much plan time before the job started! Your site has helped me come up with quick lessons when I need a go-to, and the projects turn out beautifully!
I just started a castle lesson yesterday with my first graders, and so far they are loving it! The first time around, we drew 4 different types of line without the kids knowing why. (1 straight, 1 zigzag, 1 curvy, and 1 diagonal) then, I told them to make their own imaginary castle using the lines. It sounded great, but they all went in and erased the lines so they could start over instead of problem-solving it!
So, we talked about following directions, and I told them that we were starting over the next day on new castles. When they came in, I handed out 12′ x 18″ paper, told them to write their names as tall as possible, and then afterwards, they made their names into imaginary castles! They are turning out great so far!