Halloween Art Projects for Kids: Design a Pumpkin & Template

Planning Halloween art projects for kids doesn’t have to be so time-consuming in terms of prep work, set up, and clean up.

I talk to a great deal of general education teachers daily. They tell me they would like to do a pumpkin art project at Halloween. But they don’t have the time amongst all the other demands.

If they’re going to do an art project, it had better be simple and require minimal set up, especially around Halloween when the kids can be rather amped up. I get it!

As a result, I designed a roll a pumpkin drawing game that’s super simple for all elementary teachers to implement. And, fun for students, too.

My pumpkin project includes a game board, step-by step directions, a pumpkin tracer, and writing prompts to tie the project to literacy.

Basically the way the game works is, the students roll a die to collect 5 designs that they’ll use to decorate their pumpkin. A few of the designs have a Halloween theme to them which adds to the fun!

Planning the Pumpkin Project

Once they have the patterns, you, as the teacher, can do one of two things:

Copy the pumpkin tracer onto a piece of white drawing paper in preparation for “painting” with markers.
Use the tracer as their final paper in which they skip the “painting” and just use dry media like markers and crayons to color.

It’s really up to you and how much time you have on hand.

I’ve also seen teachers print the tracer directly only drawing paper right from their printer. That’s bound to save a ton of time if you want to paint the pumpkin with your students.

Tips for Designing the Halloween Pumpkin

If you’re choosing to “paint” with markers, your students can lightly draw all their designs in the different segments of the pumpkin. It’s wise for them to consider which pattern might go where.

Now, when I teach this to my students, I have them determine which patterns are shape patterns and which ones are line patterns.

It’s far more interesting to space these kinds of patterns out. So a shape pattern next to a line pattern instead of having all the shape patterns together. But I’m an art teacher, so I try to get my students to consider the elements of art in the planning phase.

Once they’ve draw everything, they’ll quickly go over them with bold markers.

At this point, provide them with a tiny brush and a very small cup of water. You barely have to fill the cup. I recommend you don’t give them too much on purpose. They really don’t need it.

Don’t encourage them to add lots of water to their paper by giving them too much to start with. It will flood the paper and all the colors will run. The brush needs to be barely wet to make “paint” from markers.

They also need a small paper towel so they can blot the brush to wipe off the colored marker from the brush.

When I do marker painting projects, I tell my students to wet all the same colored areas in succession. This is so they don’t have keep wiping off their brush of that same color. Just add a teensy bit of water and move along.

Now, if you’re choosing the skip the “painting” portion, just have them draw and color directly onto the tracer. The colors will be more bold and the final result will look like a Pop Art pumpkin!

1st Grade Pumpkin Art Projects

Here are some student artworks from first grade. I was very proud of their work!

halloween pumpkin activity for 1st and 2nd grade

Watch it in Action!

Here’s me painting my Halloween pumpkin:

Halloween Art Projects for Kids That Work

No prep, fuss-free!
More than a coloring worksheet
Interactive and engaging
Hands-on learning
Low cost, minimal materials
Easy to implement

There’s no reason to drive yourself crazy trying to plan Halloween art projects for kids when you can have it all in one convenient download. Just print and go!

And let the kids do all the work making fun art work that they will be proud to see hung up on your classroom bulletin board. You can check out this “Design a Pumpkin Game” art project in my shop.

Digital Pumpkin Project for Kids

But if you don’t have time to do a hands-on art project, I’ve also created a digital halloween pumpkin lesson on Google Slides!

Kids will work to disguise their pumpkin. They can dress up their pumpkin as a queen, pirate, chef, nurse, etc.

This is a great way to integrate technology into art class. And, teach students spatial skills. Layering objects in order (background, middle ground, foreground) is a skill that transitions well to the digital realm.