Long Night Moon

I found this book:

Long Night Moon 

by Cynthia Rylant and Mark Siegel

It goes through the moon in each month of the year with beautiful illustrations!

I was inspired by the February moon that was covered by a snowy haze. 

This project was simple but a great success. The second graders did a great job and were very proud of their pictures. One class I only had one 30 minute period and one class I had two 30 minute periods. Both worked out. The project timing can work for 30 minutes to an hour depending on your time block.

Step 1: Draw a circle with pencil about 2 inches in diameter. Draw the bare tree on the bottom of the page (we have previously done a lot of tree drawing so I did not need to spend time introducing this).

Step 2: Color in the circle with white chalk. CAREFULLY take your finger and blend around the edge of the moon to create the "snowy haze" effect. 

Then color in the tree using brown construction paper crayon. 

Step 3: Students can gently make clouds in the sky and snow along the bottom.

Step 4: Draw a mountain in the background by using less chalk to color it in so it is not as bright white.

Step 5: Dot stars in the sky using toothpicks dipped in silver paint.