Inspired by Mary Oliver’s nature poetry and the picture book Goldfinches, this free National Poetry Month secret garden songbird art project guides kids through creating a vibrant layered garden scene with a bird of their choice using oil pastels, watercolor, and collage. Students practice mixed media techniques including wet-on-wet watercolor, oil pastel resist, and collage assembly, with a free downloadable lesson plan and video tutorial available to guide the process.
“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” These well-known and poignant words come from Mary Oliver’s poem, The Summer Day. Oliver, a Pulitzer Prize winning poetry from the United States, was known for her hopeful and awe-inspiring observations of nature, woven into sensitive poetry. In the picture book, Goldfinches, illustrator Melissa Sweet illuminates the Oliver’s poem, Goldfinches, with mixed media of bright and beautiful colors. This art project is perfect to celebrate National Poetry Month, held in April each year.
In this lesson, kids will create a layered garden with a bird of choice. They will draw a bird using simple shapes and add details with color, using mixed media of oil pastel, watercolor, and collage to create a rich, vibrant scene.
So grab your oil pastels, watercolors, and maybe your birding life list, and let’s create!
What you'll need:
- 9×12 white sulphite paper
- oil pastels
- watercolors
- paintbrush
- water
- paper towel
- glue
- scissors
Secret Garden Songbird Art Project Instructions
Choose garden plants to draw on the bottom half of your page.
Use oil pastels in different green shades to draw plants across the bottom.
Add thistles, including a warm-colored bloom with hatch marks on one side.
Use the wet-on-wet watercolor technique to paint the entire paper a color like yellow.
Paint just water over the whole page. Then go back and add yellow watercolors.
Splatter another warm color on the top half of the page.
Time to draw your bird!
Choose a bird and look at the big shapes it is made of.
Sketch the head, body, wing, tail, feet, etc.
Draw it on the top piece of watercolor paper.
Color it with oil pastels, then cut it out. Trim the top of the watercolored paper so it is straight.
Decide where to place your bird and glue it down.
Add a brown branch with shading and highlights to show how the light hits it.
Add any details you’d like to finish your collage, including big leaves.
To try this project out with a video, click below to go our YouTube channel.
Step-by-step directions in a downloadable pdf are below!
“Tell me, what will you do with this one wild and precious life?” ~ Mary Oliver
Click the banner below to download the FREE lesson plan.
We would love it if you’d share your art project results!
Don’t forget to tag us at @soulsparklettes on social media if you do this songbird art project with your kids or students – we love to see what you create!
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