It's Salvador Dali and his mustache!!
I'd love to take credit for this goofy & adorable idea, but I can't. I first saw this lesson posted by Anne at Use Your Coloured Pencils back in the fall. Her 5th and 6th grade students had created portraits of Dali and his famous mustache, but I did my version with my 2nd grade students.
We used a black oil pastel (with no pre-drawing with pencil). When done, the students cut the portraits out, glued them on a construction paper color of their choice, and made a mustache with a black pipe cleaner. I hot-glued the mustaches on when the students were ready. Last week, the second graders had practiced creating a variety of facial expressions using an oil pastel and the 'biggie' paints, so they were ready to draw Dali's expressive face!
But to 'get in the mood' we began by growing our own mustaches! I gave each student a 3"x 9" piece of black tag-board, and they quickly cut out crazy mustaches and taped them on, keeping them on while they worked. They were a real hit! Some of the students used their scraps to create funky eyebrows as well. Even the teaching assistant who comes to art with his 1:1 student made a twirly mustache to wear over his real (and much shorter) real mustache in art!
These mustaches below are samples of those that have been 'grown' by my second graders. Sorry the first batch is sideways. (Oh well; tilt your head or your computer. Thank you, blogger!)
Yes, it's me below (having a bad hair day but a good mustache day!) with two real characters.
By the way, since many of my readers have been 'pinning' stuff from my blog to their Pinterest boards, I'd prefer that you choose to pin just the artwork or the hideous photo of me, and not the photos of my sweet students. I realize I don't actually have the power to prevent you from pinning them, but I thought I'd at least make the request and hope you will respect my wishes. Thanks.
One of the second grade classes shows off their newly grown mustaches! Note that many of them are trying to bug out their eyes, Dali-style!
It was a LOT to get done in a 40 minute art class, and honestly both my 2nd grade classes ran overtime but we all got done. THANK YOU THANK YOU to my wonderful awesome spectacular fabulous 2nd grade teachers for their willingness to wait for their kiddos and to help with lining the kids up quickly for a photo. And another thanks to the very patient 4th grade teacher and her students who were waiting patiently for their art class time while we cleaned up the mustache trimmings all over the floor! I know elementary classroom teachers' prep time is precious, so I appreciate that this lovely teacher was cheerful and non-complaining.
And the minute the artwork went up in the hallway, people (kids AND adults) were smiling when they walked by! FUN, FUN!