Special Needs Art Sub Lesson with Balloons

Art Lesson for Students with Autism and Special Needs

Hi......As a retired art teacher, who subs for my art teacher friends, I come into the classroom with all my own plans.  I know my way around an art room and have no fear of paint.  When I was full time in the classroom, I rarely, if ever, left tempera for my own subs. However, I think there may be instances where it would be okay.

I have subbed for a friend's half hour elementary autism art class and this is the first lesson that I did.

Balloon Play and Print

I downloaded some short YouTube videos about balloons.  All told, the videos probably lasted 6 minutes.  I passed out a blown up balloon to each student and we all played with them for a while.  All of us, kids and teachers, had fun.  We tossed.  We caught. Someone happened to hold their balloon over the blowing heater and the balloon levitated.  Then, we all had to try it.  The kids would have continued playing for a long time, I think.

At some point I brought the kids over to the demonstration table and showed them how to bounce the balloon in the plate of tempera paint.  From there I bounced the balloon on the paper.  After a few bounces I rotated the paint color and bounced the same color in the new color.  In this way, they get a wee bit of color mixing.  They also get to observe the shape of the balloon printed on the paper.

After we finished balloon printing, the assistant lead the students, one by one, to the sink to wash hands.  Another teacher manned the balloon print table as I went back to the projector.  After the students dried their hands, they came back to the carpet and I showed the same balloon videos.

We hadn't even watched all of the videos again when it was time to go.  Having the time for videos during the handwashing though was a nice way to occupy students when the teachers needed to do other tasks.

It would be nice to leave your sub a clean paint shirt or apron for this lesson.


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It didn't occur to me to take my own photos.
***** photo credits*****
licensed under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/
photo by Marco
https://www.flickr.com/photos/mcx83/6482430163/in/photolist-aSQ9Di-gCRWtj-duGimr-a2yRMC-xascmT-4cdrns-22Hbrs-oGQCJh-tWfMe4-aatXqL-yMMLFu-aat4Qe-qEfFN-nn6Mwp-eivXWm-gCRpt2-9uGexz-eP5gzp-pwLPwk-583kwS-fzDc4k-anKjEx-fhCDqv-anKmjX-anKjti-anKkCi-anN9eC-ezpZi3-cFfBKA-fAim7j-xjXDNE-fAimgL-5ehEC2-fjrR8E-bQmRTF-kpBo3-pwbbuv-fjrP7A-3byGAD-oUrt6D-Arjnp-3y1bDA-2ZjWuY-pyPDMF-h1B9k4-6N1eJd-x9iikT-fhSUmu-dmFmVm-8mmqCu