Flower Friends
Prep
This is a fun social project. Flowers are painted, cut into quarters, and shared with three other workshop participants.
The prep is easy for this project. Print flower on card stock. Feel free to use mine. Choose how you want participants to color their flowers. When using acrylic or tempera paint, this project takes 2 sessions. I have also done it in one session using dot markers. Dot markers are also a good way to catch people up if they missed the 1st painting session.
Process
I changed the flower design several times, after trying them in workshops, to make it easier to paint. My final flower has large petals and less detail. I put all 4 quarters of the flower together for people to paint vs. single precut quarters. Once the flower was dry, attendees had a real sense of the 3 parts of their flower they were sharing with others.
I saw this project, by Mary Straw, on Pinterest. It had been posted by someone else. If you are looking for other collaborative projects, I recommend checking out her Teachers Pay Teachers page.
Workshop Gallery
Session 1
Have attendees paint flowers.
I have used both tempera and acrylic paints for this project.
Small paint brush are helpful for the tiny spaces between petals and details folks might want to add.
Session 2
Since my workshops are most often a week apart, I will demonstrate and reexplain the project for participants.
Participants cut flowers into quarters.
Have them choose the quarter of their flower that they would like to keep for themselves.
Folks then swap 3 quarters of their flowers with 3 different participants.
Using a glue stick and piece of card stock, participants arrange and glue the 4 quarters back into a flower.
Optional: have the participant whose flower quarters they received sign them.
Rationale & Resources
Tips
I use plastic washable palettes with small groups, but do use paper plates with large groups for easier clean up.
Swapping flower quarters can be done in many ways. I have had folks walk around to do it. I’ve also had everyone put their 3 quarters in a big tub and then blindly chose 3 new quarters.
In both cases some people wanted to know whose flower quarters they received, but keeping track of whose is whose was difficult in a large group. It was, however, fun trying to solve the mystery.
In the future I might try having the artist sign their quarters on the front.
