3rd Journal: Wet media 1 – Watercolor and Tempera

Exploring 2-D Materials and Tools for Teaching The K-12 Setting

Material Exploration

Materials:

• Watercolors

• Tempera Paints

• Semi-dry cake palette 

• Crayola washable paints

• Watercolor pencils

• Thick papers or watercolor papers

• Paint brushes

• Sponge

• Paint tray palette

• Plastic wrap

• Salt

• Crayola washable paints, semi-dry cake palette and semi-moist watercolors are good to use for young students, K to 2^nd grade. Crayola Washable Paint applies smoothly and is excellent for use directly on paper without the need to mix in water. However, it is difficult to achieve varying degrees of transparency or opacity by adding more water. Since semi-dry cake palettes and semi-moist watercolors are already in a semi-dry state, there is little risk of the paint itself staining clothes or hands. By adjusting the water concentration, one can achieve both rich, intense colors and light, transparent tones.

• Watercolors are a versatile medium suitable for students of all ages. By adjusting the water content, one can vary color intensity and freely explore degrees of transparency and opacity. A close look at a watercolor-painted surface reveals natural layering, while transparent areas allow the texture of the paper to remain visible. Applying paint to either dry or wet surfaces can create distinctly different effects, even with the same color. If using a brush feels awkward, one can try painting with a sponge. Personally, I prefer using less water to achieve crisp outlines and a faster workflow; however, while this yields vivid colors, it limits the ability to create transparent color layers, leaving me feeling that the medium's unique characteristics were not fully utilized.

• Tempera paint, often referred to today as "poster paint", is used widely in art classes due to strength of water-soluble, dries quickly, and inexpensive. It offers an opaque, matte finish and applies smoothly and evenly as flat quality. According to the book, “Exploring Studio Materials Teaching Creative Art Making to Children,” Mary Hafeli (2015) states that tempera paint is not regarded as a professional medium because there is no evidence to substantiate that tempera paintings can be preserved over the long term. (Hafeli, 2015, p.75)

Exploring Personal Theme Work : Relationship

My theme work is a “relationship”, and I depicted a scene where birds share a moment of affection by rubbing their beaks together. While researching animal relationships, I discovered a unique greeting ritual among puffins and became fascinated by the various ways animals’ express closeness. When a male and female puffin reunite, they engage in a behavior known as "billing" touching and gently rubbing their beaks together to strengthen their bond. To capture this heartwarming greeting, I used a technique that increases water concentration to create a sense of transparency. I colored the birds' black bodies with watercolor pencil and then applied water with a brush. The blue background was colored by dabbing paint on with a sponge.

Safety Information

• Generally, watercolor and tempera with AP seal are nontoxic and safe to use for children. According to the book “Art safety guide”, Sonoma State University (2019) stats that water-based paints would include a preservative not to cause mold. (Sonoma State University, 2019, p.4) Therefore, if teacher notices a skin reaction on student, it is recommended that the student wears rubber gloves and an apron while working.

Curricular Inspiration

• Elementary (K to 6)

-For K to 2nd grade class, I would allow students to use Crayola washable paint or tempera. Since the children are young, we will guide them to explore the materials by experimenting with techniques like sponge painting or dab painting with tissues.

-For 3^rd to 6^th grade class,  I will guide students to use cake tempera and teach them how to use a brush. They will create basic sketches with pencil and consider their color choices before painting. Students can create a color wheel using six primary colors and explore the medium by mixing them. Mary Hafeli (2015) introduces about exploring tempera that mixing primary colors, red, yellow, and blue, to create secondary colors such as orange, green, and purple. (Hafeli, 2015, p.80) Teacher would guide add some amount of white and black paints to lighten and darken for various tones.

• Middle School (7 to 9)

For middle school classes, students are encouraged to use watercolors and watercolor pencils and create various sketches based on visual references. Instruction focuses on controlling water-to-paint ratios and creating graduated color tones, which students then apply to their own artwork. Also, students are guided to paint atmospheric landscape or watercolor techniques. The watercolor painting, “Flower Garden and Bungalow, Bermuda,” by Winslow Homer is a good example to introduce variety of brushes; artist used round brushes to express overlapping small, loose and multi-directional scribbled marks for soft clouds and it is called scumbling. Also, the leaves and flower petals were rendered with depth and darkness, utilizing an overlapping, layering and dry brush techniques.

Figure 3. Flower Garden and Bungalow, Bermuda [Watercolor and graphite on off-white wove paper]. By Homer, W, 1899, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Copyright 2026 by The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

• High School (10 to 12)

For High school classes, students would be encouraged to paint portraits or landscape. Mary Hafeli (2015) explains watercolor exploration methods that demonstrate how painting on dry, damp, and wet paper yields different visual effects. (Hafeli, 2015, p.87) A practice sheet of watercolor paper would guide students to explore various technique methods, such as wet-on-wet and wet-on-dry, dry brush and salt texture, layering and glazing. I would instruct students work on their watercolors in stages, starting with a light, detailed sketch. For the background, they would explore the "wet-on-wet" technique, applying paint onto a pre-wetted surface, to render white areas, transparency, mid-tones, and the base layer. Once the paper dries, they add textural details and refine the outlines of light and dark areas.

-For differentiated instruction, different asks are prepared to enable students to conduct their own expressive explorations. In the first stage, students are guided to understand the fundamental properties of the materials such as painting on dry versus wet paper and experimenting with texture. The second stage involves using photographs of the sky or the sea as references and attempting to capture their textures. Finally, the third stage introduces ways to achieve nuanced effects by combining different materials. Students explore these interactions, such as applying watercolor over an oil pastel sketch or scratching into wet tempera paint using a cotton swab or a piece of paper.

Reference

-Hafeli, Mary. Clarie. (2015). Exploring Studio Materials. Oxford University Press, USA.

-Homer, W, 1899. Flower Garden and Bungalow, Bermuda [Watercolor and graphite on off-white wove paper]. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY, United States.  

https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/11121

-Sonoma State University. (2019). Art safety guide. Environmental Health & Safety, Risk Management and Safety Services. https://ehs.sonoma.edu/sites/ehs/files/art_safety_guide.pdf