Grids and Blocks - High School Art Sub Idea 

This is from Nic Hahn (aka Mini Matisse).....from Maureen Crosbie on Flickr. From what I read in the comments on Flickr and the blog, some kids as young as 10 can master it and some 8th graders had trouble with it. This might be a lesson you would want to give a test run with those students before you tried leaving it with a sub.

Radial Name Design Art Sub Lesson 

This post originally led to a lesson at a blog called Art4Cast. It seems that this blog no longer exists. 

From what I can tell, this is how this radial name design was created. 

Starting at the center of the paper, draw lines that spiral out to the edges of the paper.

The students' names may be written in bubble letters in every space, or alternate the spaces with names and patterns.

There are other radial name design lessons on the web, but I am not sure they are sub-friendly.