Halloween Art Projects for Kids: Design a Pumpkin

Halloween art projects for kids don’t have to be so time consuming in terms of prep work, set up, and clean up. I talk to a great deal of regular education teachers daily. They tell me they would like to do an art project in class but don’t feel like they 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!

I’ve released a roll-a-dice drawing game that’s super simple for all teachers to implement and fun for students. The game includes the game board, step-by step photo directions, and a pumpkin tracer.

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!

Decision Time

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

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

Designing the Pumpkin

If you’re choosing to “paint” with markers, they 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. 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!

Watch it in Action!

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.