Glue and Pastel Totem Pole Pictures

Using white glue for “lead” and chalk (or oil) pastel for “glass”, you can create wonderful stained glass designs.

By Andrea Mulder-Slater

For this particular lesson, personal totems were the theme, however you can use any subject or theme with this project. (see Glue Fish)

What You Need:

• Black construction paper
• White glue
• Chalk pastels (or just plain blackboard chalk in different colours) – or oil pastels
• Examples of stained glass (pictures, or the real thing)
• Examples of totem poles (see reference section below)

What You Do:

1. Talk about totem poles and show students examples of totems. See reference section/handouts below.
2. Have students think about which animals might best represent them. Then, have them sketch some of these ideas on paper.
3. Once they have an idea worked out, students can then start drawing their totem on the black poster paper. If you have white pencil crayons, these work well, if not, pencils will do the trick.
4. Then students outline their drawing with white glue. Crayola makes a nice school glue that dries clear – read the label.
5. Let the glue dry (for about a day).
6. When the glue is dry, students colour in between the glue lines using chalk or oil pastel.
7. If using chalk, you can “fix” the stained glass with hairspray or an artist’s fixative to prevent the chalk from smudging off the paper. Do this in a WELL VENTILATED area.

Note: For this project, we introduced students to images of totem poles. However, any subject or theme (including abstract stained glass designs) would translate really well with this technique. See the Glue Fish lesson plan for more examples of “stained glass” designs.

Reference Material/Handouts:

• Totem Theme (includes): How to “read a totem pole”, Animal symbols, Northwest art animals, Totem coloring page
• Totem Poles (description)
• The Alphabet of Northwest Coast Art