Our latest art for kids involves sketching on a unique canvas- gesso covered wood panels! After reading the book, A Tree is Nice, we decided to sketch our own trees on wood using colored pencils! (This post contains affiliate links. Thank you for your support.)

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Have you read the children’s book, A Tree is Nice by Janice May Udry? It’s one of our favorites! The story is all about ways trees are useful, and the kids always love coming up with even more reasons why trees are important after reading the story. I also love the illustrations. All kinds of different trees are depicted in the book!

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The illustrations of all the different trees inspired me to come up with this art activity for kids (similar to our stick art) to use in my after school enrichment class for Kindergarteners! 

Sketching Trees on Wooden Panels

Materials

• Wood panel (We used 5×7 inch birch panels.)
• White gesso
• Colored pencils
• A Tree is Nice by Janice May Udry

Directions

Preparing the Wood Panels

Prior to this art activity, the kids and I prepared our wood panels. We painted white gesso on one side of our wood panels and then set them aside to dry. 

Discussing the Story

Before beginning the art project we discussed why trees were important. I loved hearing all the ideas the kids shared! We then read the story together as a class. After we had finished reading, we added more ideas to our list based on information from the story.

We also went back through the book and discussed the different types of trees in the illustrations. The kids really connected with the pictures and were excitedly sharing descriptions of all kinds of trees in their yard or neighborhoods!

I asked them to close their eyes and picture the type of tree they would like to draw for their art project. I had them focus on the colors in the tree and on the shapes of the leaves and branches. 

Sketching Trees

We gathered our wood panels and colored pencils and began to sketch.

It was so much fun walking around the classroom and observing all the various trees being drawn! There were many examples of fruit trees being created…

… as well as other types of trees. Here’s a Christmas tree, a palm tree, and a tree with different colored leaves! 

The kids really enjoyed this art project and loved the fact that they were drawing trees on wood that came from trees! 

The finished artwork can be placed on a shelf or mantle, or you could attach string to the top to hang! 

Be sure not to miss these other art projects for kids on Buggy and Buddy:

• Art for Kids Using Crayons and Sandpaper
• Drawing with Colored Sand
• Unique Rainbow Art for Kids