Ceremonial Elephants- Integrating With ELA

Are you always looking to find ways to integrate your art lessons with ELA?  I'm guessing your answer is 'Yes!'
Well, here's one lesson that we did, that went along with a 2nd grade literacy unit. Ceremonial elephants from India!

We start off watching a Keynote on the background of the Ceremonial Elephants of Kerala, Indian. The kids get an overview of Lord Ganesh, the mahouts who train the elephants and what goes on during the ceremonial march to the Temple by the elephants. 

The Keynote also has images that gives the kids a good look at all the decorative designs that go onto the elephants- the embroidered blanket, the bells and tassels, the painted flowers and toenails, jeweled necklaces and bracelets. Looking at the images of the decorations gave the kids a lot of ideas when it came to designing their own elephants.

 

This lesson took about three 45 minute art classes. The kids start off by picking two pieces of colored paper for the framed background. After that they used a piece of grey colored paper to make the elephant which is centered onto the background.

Next the kids get to pick a piece of scrap booking paper to be used for the blanket. They can trim it, then glue it to the elephant's back. After this the fun begins! On to the decorating!!

From there the kids can choose scraps  that are cut into shapes to make patterns that are glued around the frame. They can also use markers to start drawing necklaces, bracelets, tassels and other various patterns and decorations on the elephants. As you can see you get a lot of interpretations of the decorative patterns! Woo Hoo!

We also used some donated plastic jewels that we glued on for some extra bling!

What do you think of our Ceremonial Elephants? Would this be a lessons you could integrate with ELA? You can leave a remark in the comments below.