2nd Graders Start Fall Leaves with Gradation

All my 2nd are starting a project this week about the color change that happens with leaves. We talk about the different colors and how they change slowly. A slow, gradual change from one color to another is called gradation. We looked at the artwork of Peter Max who is a master at gradation. Here is Peter Max artwork:

This is a picture of what our final project may look like:

And this picture shows a couple of students painting their gradations using the wet-on-wet watercolor technique. The students really liked using a soaking wet paper to paper on. It presented them with new challenges and a new idea of what paper can do. Who knew that you could soak a paper and not ruin it!?