Symmetrical Butterflies

We are studying butterflies in my little co-op class. We did a fun project with colored glue. I mixed some black acrylic paint into half bottles of glue. (Ours was Elmer's.) We used large sheets of heavier paper pre-folded in half. Each student drew 1/2 of a large butterfly on one side of the paper, making large details versus small, fussy details. Paper was folded over onto the glue butterfly and gently rubbed, not pressed too hard, to transfer the glue to the other side. Opening the paper revealed a symmetrical butterfly. Rorschach anyone? We set them aside to dry until the next week, then colored them in. Some students used colored pencils for a softer look, others used regular markers that gave a more bold, stained glass look. Fun!

We also did a project from artprojectsforkids.org. The idea was to tell the kids to draw specific things without them seeing each others papers during the process. They were to draw a hill, then a tree and add one or as many hearts as they wanted. Then we colored them and saw how different and the same they were.