1st Grade Audubon Robins

It's spring time! Trees are blooming, and robins are looking for worms. I thought this would be a great time to introduce my 1st grade students to artist J. J. Audubon. I told them about how he was not only an artist, but also a scientist! As a scientist, he studied birds, and knew exactly what different kinds of birds look like. He could identify birds by how they look. He had to be very good at noticing details. I showed my students his robin picture:

And we looked at how he included all of the details of the robin. Then, we looked at a photograph (on my Promethean board, so it was HUGE):

I asked the students to raise their hands and tell me what details they noticed. The students noticed the white around his eye, the yellow color of his beak, the feathers on his legs, and the reddish brown of his stomach. Then, the students drew their own robin! I guided them through a basic bird drawing (circle head, curve for the stomach, fairly straight line for the back, and a skinny tail), and then the students had to look at the picture to add details. Since Audubon had placed his robin on a branch, the students could place their robin in any natural environment they wanted to. Here are some in-process pictures, and a few finished pictures: