Easy Spring Flower Drawing

Student work, grade 1

Here is an easy Spring drawing lesson for young children. I start by showing them a variety of flowers (I use fake ones so they can touch the flowers and so I can use the same ones over again) and I tell them about the artist Georgia O'Keeffe, who liked to look inside the flower. I show a few examples of her work and talk about how she became famous because she painted flowers this way. I tell them, if you look inside, you can see shapes and parts, like little flowers within a bigger flower. Pretend you are using a magnifying glass. (Or, actually pass around a real magnifying glass).

Then I model how to draw the flowers, one step at a time. We draw with a black or dark crayon on a square sheet of paper. 12"x12" works well. First we draw a circle for the center of a flower, make sure it is not too small because we will be drawing inside the circle. Inside each circle we draw lines like a peppermint candy or wheel, or dots like a sunflower, or spirals, or shapes resembling antennae or lollipop, etc. Next, I show them how to draw layers of petals going around the circle. Some petals are round, some are like triangles. They love to go round and round, making the flower bigger. We fill up the whole paper, and it's okay if some flowers go off the edge. I like students to draw at least 3 different flowers.

Once they have their paper filled, they can start coloring. I tell them that green looks nice as a background color, to resemble leaves. But I allow them to choose their own colors. I provide a variety of crayons. I prefer crayons over markers so we can blend colors. I talk a little about shades and tints of colors. This lesson connects with science, seasons, shapes, color, line, art history, fine motor skills, and most importantly- joy. Time frame: 45 minutes.