Future Cities

Imagining and illustrating future technological advances

North River Arts Society
Summer Arts Camp
2015

Students will create work to reflect the future that they will live in.. After discussing technological advances made recently, they will image and try to predict what will come soon. The students  will illustrate their ideas with oil pastels and layer watercolor to create their backgrounds.               

Big Idea 
Imagining the world students will grow up in

Student Group 
Age 6-9 

Objectives 

• Students will imagine and predict future technological advances 
• Students will use mixed media to illustrate their cities 
• Students will understand why oil pastels resist watercolor paint 

Materials 

• 18x24 watercolor paper 
• pencils 
• oil pastels 
• watercolor 

Instructional Strategies 
Discussion 

• Discuss what cities students have visited, seen, or learned about.
  
• Discuss what students think cities will look like in 10, 100, 1000 years. Talk about what the streets will look like, if there will be streets, what people will use for transportation, etc. 
  
• Discuss where kids will go to play, what people will do for fun, etc. 
•  Discuss materials and why oil pastels and watercolors don't mix. Have students tried to mix oil and water before? If so, what happens? Explain how the oil pastels resist the watercolor paint. 

Art Activity 

• Students will sketch their future cities, or move straight to drawing with oil pastels.
  
• ​Students will use watercolor over their pastels to create the background of their paintings.
  
• Some students may chose to incorporate other mixed media elements, such as collage, marker colored pencil, etc.