Art activities for shapes lesson plan?

I need an art activity that involves shapes and geometry. I am reading " The greedy triangle" by Marilyn burns to the children. my objective for the children is to reconize geometric shapes in the enviroment, and to understand everything is made up of shapes. What activity would go along with this? It has to be an art activity and one I can do cheaply. I mean like with paper, markets, crayons and contruction paper. Anything that is easy to get and probably is already in the art room. The age is early elementary.

Art activities for shapes lesson plan?
After reading the "Greedy Triangle" (great book, by the way) have the children choose a shape. You can either cut some out before hand on white paper or have the children do it themselves... depends on their ability.


After they choose their shape they can either:


a) Make the shapes into "people" by decorating them, adding characteristcs, etc.


or


b) Make the shape that they chose look like something they would see everyday. Ex. A circle could be made to look like a clock, etc. With this one it would be a good idea to brainstorm ideas for each shape before the project begins. Make a list on the board!


Have fun!


or


c) Have a bunch of pre-cut shapes out for the students to make something out of.
Reply:Using Ed Emberley's "Picture Pie" as inspiration, my K-2 students used pre-cut construction paper circles, half circles, fourths and eighths to make some incredible birds and fish. I showed them how to make simple ones and then gave them more challenging pages from Emberley's book. They simply glued the shapes to colored construction paper.





I have also done the same type project - pre-cut construction paper shapes and glue - using Lois Ehlert's "Color Zoo." We see how Ehlert combines geometric shapes on top of each other to make an ox or a monkey. Then the students create an animal for our geometric zoo using the pre-cut shapes and gluing them onto construction paper. We will also use construction paper to create a "zoo" for our animals once they are created.





I know this sounds very very simplistic, but it seems to work with very young children and is certainly budget conscious.





I also divide the students into teams of four to five and give them a four foot long piece of yarn. We have shape races, which group can make the shape using the piece of yarn the fastest. I even play this game with older students who are learning more complex shapes. It is quite a challenge for four people to make an octagon out of string quickly. This is a good focus activity before the art lesson.

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