Lesson video

- Hello there.

My name's Mrs. Tong.

I'm a teacher and an artist, and I'm going to be working with you on a series of printmaking lessons.

Today's lesson is the first lesson of five in total.

And today we're going to look at patterns and textures around us so that in the other lessons we can make prints together.

What is a print, I wonder? What do you think? Actually, prints are all around us.

You probably don't notice them, but think about the patterns that are printed onto maybe your duvet cover or your curtains.

There's even a print behind me, behind my head.

Can you see it? Well, prints are all around us, and today we're going to be looking for some, and then making our own textures and patterns together.

Are you ready? Let's make a start.

For our lesson today, we're going to explore patterns and find them all around us.

We're going to explore texture by making some rubbings, and we're going to create some repeating patterns.

For the lesson, you'll need a little bit of basic equipment.

You'll need some paper, some wax crayons, some scissors, and some glue.

You'll also need to go around your house or maybe your garden or outdoor space and find some textured surfaces.

I've suggested some here in the pictures.

Maybe you could use the wood on a fence or the bark of a tree, or a brick wall, or even a radiator or a door indoors.

Have you done some printmaking before, do you think? Maybe you've made some press-in shapes in the paint from last lesson, or made a repeating pattern.

I bet, though, that you've all put your hands into the paint and then put them on the paper, maybe when you were a bit younger.

You've probably made lots of prints, but maybe not even remembered it.

We've got some star words for our lesson today.

The first one is printmaking.

Can you say them with me? Printmaking.

Rubbings.

Texture.

Repeating pattern.

Well done.

What do you think a print is? That's right.

It's an image that's been made lots and lots of times.

Prints are around us.

For example, in a picture book, the image is printed lots of time so that we can all look at the books.

Sometimes artists make lots of prints of their work so that it can be shared with more people.

I'm going to ask you to pause the video in a minute when you're ready, and to look around your house for some patterns.

See if you can draw some of the patterns.

See how many you can find.

Are you ready? Press Pause on the video then.

Off you go.

What did you find? Did you find some patterns that were repeated over and over again? In my picture here, I've got some really groovy wallpaper.

Maybe you didn't find something like that, but I bet you found patterns in maybe your duvet cover or on a curtain.

Have a look at the pattern I've got here.

Can you see that there are parts of it that are repeated again and again? Use your finger to find the repeated patterns.

Now, we're going to collect some patterns of our own.

You may need to place your hands over the patterns to feel them.

And if you can feel them, that's called texture.

You'll need your crayons and your paper to make your rubbings.

Hold your crayon on the side.

That's Mrs. Tong's top tip for the day.

Rub it over the paper on top of the surface to create your rubbing, Rob the crayon over the paper and use lots and lots of colours.

How many different patterns can you find? Find as many as you can.

Pause the video now to complete your task.

You ready to make some rubbings? Off you go.

How did you get on? I bet you found lots and lots of textures to make rubbings from, didn't you? Tell me about one of them that you did.

Brilliant.

Well done.

I've got some pictures here of some of the rubbings that I made.

I tried to use as many different colours as I could, and I then cut them and tore them up so that I can make them into new patterns.

Can you see what I've done? I'm going to show you how I made my sketchbook designs.

So I've got my equipment here.

At the moment, all I need is my scissors, and I'm just going to quickly show you how I made one of my rubbings, just in case you need to make some more.

So I took the crayon on its side, laid my piece of paper over a textured surface, and rolled the crayon over it.

I'll show you on a new piece.

You have to hold your paper quite still, don't you? I found that a little bit tricky at first until I got used to it.

So now I have lots and lots of rubbings of all different colours and all different textures.

What I'm going to do now is to make them into a design a little bit like the design I made for my sketchbook.

I'm going to make another one with you now.

I'm going to take a new piece of clean paper and some of the pieces I might cut and some I might tear.

Let me show you what I'm gonna do.

I think I'm gonna take these lovely, straight yellow lines that I've just made and I'm going to cut them because they're so nice.

I think I'm gonna keep with those straight lines.

Think I'm gonna cut it into little strips because they look quite good, don't they? You can cut any shapes you like, circles, arrows, stars.

I'm going to make a kind of a fan pattern, I think, 'cause that's one of my favourite types of patterns.

Then I'm gonna take another colour.

Can you see this rubbing has the mark from a piece of wood? This was from my kitchen table and it's kind of a bit like a circle.

So this time I'm going to make a circle shape.

I'm going to try and tear it.

It's not going to be very easy but I'm gonna have a go.

I have to pinch the paper while I tear it and then I can control where I'm tearing.

Can you see how I'm pinching it with my fingers and my thumbs, with both hands? So I've managed to tear a pretty good circle.

There's a little bit sticking out so I'm just going to pinch it and tear it off.

I'm going to put that in the middle.

Ooh, it's a bit like a sun, doesn't it? I'm not sure about having those behind, though.

I think I might put them onto the top, or maybe one behind and then one on top.

Ooh, I think I like that better.

I might make some more lines so that I've got a bigger design.

When you're out being an artist, it's making decisions all of the time about what you're doing, changing your mind, moving things as you go, whether you're making a painting or a pot, or a collage, like we are now, it doesn't matter.

We're changing our minds and getting it right for us.

Every artwork is different.

Yours will be different to mine, but it's right for us, and that's the important thing.

Okay, I've got some nice yellow and red now and I'm gradually making a collage out of all of my rubbings.

I've now got some lovely pieces of blue.

These were from my kitchen tiles.

So the place where the top.

These are the tiles and the place in between didn't come up on the rubbing so it makes a kind of cross.

Can you see? I think, with these, that I might tear these ones.

I think I'm going to make a sort of rectangle.

I think if I changed my mind and I didn't like the shape I'd torn or cut, I could make another rubbing, couldn't I? Now, I'm not sure where I'm going to put this piece.

I love the cross on it though.

I think I might tuck it behind these yellow pieces.

Yeah, I'm quite happy with that.

And then I'm going to do one the other side.

Sometimes you can tear a really straight line in one go.

Sometimes when we're making art, too, we get sort of happy accidents.

Things go right.

Sometimes they don't always go right.

But when they do, it's quite fun, isn't it? 'Cause you get a shape that perhaps you weren't expecting or a texture that you weren't expecting.

So I'm tucking them in, starting to build my pattern.

One is tucked under them, then one is above.

One is tucked under and one above.

I'm gonna build up my shapes as I go.

When I'm completely happy, I can take my glue stick and I can start to stick them down.

I'm gonna start from the ones at the back, first of all, and then build up on top with my layers.

Can you see that I'm holding them down with my hand while I glue with the other hand? That makes it a bit easier.

I don't have to glue them all down properly just yet.

And I probably could still move them around if I change my mind.

But I think I'm happy.

And I think I want to add onto these pieces that I've got.

So I'm just gonna glue them for a little bit at the moment and all of these little edges I can tidy up later.

Okay.

For now, I think I'm happy with my collage and I'm going to finish it off with lots of blue round here, alternating with the yellow.

So it will go blue, yellow, blue, yellow, all the way around.

And then, I'm going to put my picture into my sketchbook.

Your next task is having a go at doing the same.

Cut or tear your rubbings into small pieces, and then put them together again.

Lay them down on paper to make new patterns.

See if you can make patterns that are repeated so they happen again and again.

That might be as simple as making a strip of blue and red and blue and red, and so on.

Have a go.

Pause the video again, to try and rearrange the pieces of rubbings into some patterns.

Off you go.

Well done.

Did you come up with some great patterns? If you've stuck them down, hold it up to the camera so that I can see.

Wow, well done everyone.

I arranged some of the pieces of mine into a repeating pattern.

Can you spot the pattern? Have a look at these pictures.

Which colour comes next? Is it blue, green or yellow? Pause the video if you need to and work it out.

Let's see.

From the top, the colours go green, yellow, blue, yellow, green, yellow, blue, yellow, green, yellow.

That's right.

The next one will be blue.

Did you get it right? Well done.

What an exciting lesson, well done.

Let's have a quick recap.

What new words have you learned today? You may have heard the word texture before, but you've probably been reminded about what it means.

It's the bumps on a surface, something that you can feel, a pattern that you can feel, in fact.

A repeating pattern is a pattern that is produced again and again.

It repeats itself.

What do you think of your piece of work now in your sketchbook or on your new piece of paper? I hope you're pleased with it.

I'm quite pleased with mine.

I think you should be, too.

You can share your work with Oak National.

Please ask your parent or carer to do this for you.

The details are on this screen.

Thank you very much for taking part in the lesson today.

I really hope you'll join me for the rest of the lessons in the printmaking unit, where we can make lots of different types of prints together.

Bye-bye, see you soon.