Flora and Fauna Printmaking

For their printmaking project this quarter, fifth grade girls created stylized (which means simplified) animal drawings which they transferred to a rubber-like printing plate. Using a tool called a gouge, students focused on balancing the positive and negative space in their carving. Finished plates were printed with colorful inks and papers to create the center image of the project. For the border, the girls created a 2" printing block on which they carved a "fauna" design that would go with the habitat of their animal (in most cases, although we started to get creative and we wound up with a border of worms for the bird, barns for the pig, seashells, etc.). Here are a few pics of the girls printing, followed by the finished work: