New batch of clay cacti pots and desert silhouettes

Here's a lesson I have posted about many times, and I think I have found the best presentation so far - so new post! Here goes - first I'll share a few pics from earlier...

We have made these clay pinch pots with cacti and succulent plants for several years in 4th grade:

And since starting our Artsonia portfolios, we needed a better presentation method, so we tried some different ways of photographing our 3-D works, starting with variegated tissue paper which looked a little like a sunset sky:

Since the students were also learning about what these plants are and where they come from, we started making some cut paper silhouettes as a backdrop, featuring cactus shapes:

So cool! But the silhouettes were kind of temporary, so from there we painted our own colorful skies and made landscapes that could stand as works of art on their own as well as serving as a backdrop for our clay work. We focused on blending analogous colors to keep from getting a muddy sky - it helps to not use water when painting these, because you want blended colors: 

This is a fantastic lesson because there are so many elements to explore - science, culture, color - and plenty of room for kids to experiment. Here's a view from our Artsonia gallery: