Materials: pencil, paper, chip board or cardboard, wire, masking tape, bowl, water, flour, newspaper or recycled copy paper, tempera or acrylic paint, (I love these, especially if you can find the neon colors!)
- have pictures available of a variety of animals or an ipad/printer for viewing them as children decide which animal to be inspired by (you could also tie this in to a culture or geography-inspired unit and study specific animals)
- draw animal face/head with pencil- think about all the parts of the face and details for each part
- using the cardboard as a base (I cut the pieces into about 5 inch rectangles (you could also do ovals, or U shapes kind of like little shields) crumble newspaper to create the head form and any snout/ears/etc.
- tape the pieces together, and use wire as needed. make sure all is securely taped to your base
- trim any extra cardboard (especially if you have corners sticking out) from the base
- add paper mache (aboouuut 1 tablespoon of flour to 1/2 cup of water) all over the newspaper/wire form by dipping 1 inch (doesn’t need to be exact) strips of copy or newspaper into flour+water mixture, sliding fingers down the strip to get excess water off, and draping+pressing onto the form
- repeat until front, sides, and back of form are covered in paper mache
- when dry, you can add paint
- add a small screw eye to a discrete place near the base so that you can hang the animal flush with the wall
*I also showed the children examples of Abigail Brown’s paper mache animal heads
Christy M. King 