Imaginative Art & A Walking Talking Story

Part One

The children will need to know:

Vocabulary to describe characteristics.

The names of colors.

Some knowledge of what is a caterpillar.

Understanding of same and different.

Prepare:

The story book, One Little Caterpillar By Maria Grujicic
A small plate, cardboard square or anything flat that can hold dabs of paint to make a paint pallet.
Place dabs of white, yellow, blue and red on the pallet.
Scissors
A pencil
A piece of blank paper

Age: Adapt the activity for any age. This activity is perfect for young children. For older children, ask them to draw each other’s hands.

This is a fabulous way to help children think creatively and become more involved in the story telling and creating process.

Read the book, One Little Caterpillar with the children or/and act out the story.
Say you will turn to one of your favorite pages in the book, and find a page with 5 hands on it.
Look at the hands, and then look at your hand to connect the picture with the real hand.
Tell the children that our hands can also be like the caterpillars in the story!
Show the children what to do by tracing your hand on a piece of paper.
Take the prepared palette of different colors, and show how to mix each sets of color to make a new color.
Paint your ‘caterpillar’ hand using the new color you made.
Tell the children they can experiment to make the color they like.
Show the children the scissors and tell them that once the hand is dry, they can cut it out.

Looking forward:

These hands will be used as the caterpillars in our mural.
The children will experiment with making different shades of skin color. Guide the children towards making these different shades and colors, which relate to the different hands in the book.
The children will develop observation skills and learn about what makes them unique and special.
By this time you may have some ideas of your own about how this mural can develop. Feel free to share, then look at part 2 of the process.
If a child does not know how to trace and cut, he/she can work with a friend.
After we make the mural, we will be turning it into a walking talking story.

This activity is based on the story One Little Caterpillar, By Maria Grujicic
For the next step of this project, look at part two or take a preview at the other parts!

Part One / Part Two / Part Three / Part Four /Part Five / Part Six / Part Seven / Part Eight / Part Nine/ Part Ten

Buy the book: