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How to Draw a Robot

1

65

Min

Teach your kids how to draw a robot and use fun metallic paints and pastels to add polish and shine. No doubt using shapes to draw you robots allows for a great connection with math but that’s not my motivation.  For me, it’s all about the imagination.

metallic-robot-cover

I have two robot books that I love:

Robots: Spaceships and Other Tin Toys

The Robot Book

I place these books on the ledge of the whiteboard as I demonstrate the lesson. As I talk about the basic part of the robot, I’ll pick up the “tin toy” book and show a few (bookmarked) ideas for heads, bodies, etc.

If you are doing a robot lesson that demonstrates shading like my Value Robots, the photographs are particularly good as they show great contrast.

great robot book for kids

Here’s What You’ll Need:

  • 12″ x 18″ colored drawing paper ( just happened to have a lot of eggplant colored paper at the end of the year!)
  • black oil pastel for drawing (crayons are fine)
  • Metallic oil pastels or metallic tempera paint
  • Regular oil pastels (optional)

Use this drawing guide to kickstart your next robot art activity

 

Drawing the Robot

  • Start with the head. Leaf through the book to show the head shape possibilities.
  • Show the kids how to start near the top of the page. They need to leave a bit of room for antenna, etc. For very small kids you may even want to control their first shape by using a template. It could be a playing card or any rectangular shape. This helps establish the size of the drawing so that the rest of the body remains large. This is just a suggestion.
  • Draw the body next: an oval, square, rectangle, trapezoid, etc. Many kids looked through the book to see the different shape of a robot’s body. Most often it is larger than the head but it doesn’t have to be.
  • Add a “connector” shape between the head and body.
  • Without adding a connector shape, draw a pelvis. This part is optional but many robots have this as a separate shape. Draw a connector shape (accordion shapes are popular).
  • Draw legs and arms. The trick with these appendages is that the shapes shouldn’t curve. So, to make them bend, you’ll need to draw a connector piece like a circle (ball), accordion shape or even a wire.
  • It’s fun to add half-circles before adding the arms and legs as placement points.
  • Add “hands” and “feet”.

 

For a bit of drawing help, photocopy the Robot Drawing Guide below:

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Use this drawing guide to kickstart your next robot art activity

 

Coloring the Robot

I used Faber-Castell Gel Sticks for this project. They color like oil pastel but blend like chalk pastel. You may have to demonstrate how to blend if you are not used to using oil pastels that blend well.  I had to introduce this technique to my students. The metallic version of these Gel Sticks are a great choice for this project. I also placed some metallic tempera paint on the tables.  Lots of choices!

First Grade Gallery

Use this drawing guide to kickstart your next robot art activity. See what my first grade kids created!

What do you think?

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  • catmama7801@gmail.com

    Thank you!

  • Andi

    Hi
    I notice you don’t give pencil first. Do the black crayons work ok for timid drawers?
    Thanks

  • Paula

    Wondering…What happened to the 3D robot you used to have?
    I had my students draw with sharpies – great detail on a 2 sided idea sheet

  • Teresa

    Love these lessons, but my classes sail through them in much shorter time than listed. This one says “65 min.” My class took about 15 to 20 minutes to complete their robots. They did a nice job on them too. Thankfully I had extra paper, I let them each draw another one. Then They could draw whatever they wanted on a third piece of paper. And finally I broke out construction paper shapes, pipe cleaners and glue and let them make collage robots with googly eyes. They enjoyed themselves so much. We have 55 minute classes.

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