Collaborative art posters are a perfect low-prep activity with big impact in your classroom or your community. It is perfect for kids and adults alike. You can use them in a variety of ways and they are perfect throughout the year.
A collaborative art poster is a bit of work, unless you purchase a ready-to-use resource. This Hispanic Heritage Collaborative Art Poster is the perfect project for you to jump in to the collaborative art poster world.
What are Collaborative Art Posters?
A collaborative poster is something that people can work on together to create a single piece of artwork. A black and white poster or artwork is cut into equal pieces and these are individually colored by different people. When they are pieced back together, they create an amazing and unique piece of artwork!
Why Collaborative Art Posters?
Part of my job responsibilities include school beautification. One year, I was also in charge of our school’s Hispanic Heritage Night. I was brainstorming activities for our families to complete together and a light bulb went off! A collaborative art poster would give our families an activity to work on together AND would give us a beautiful poster to hang in our hallways. I wanted something for about 250 families and I couldn’t find anything out there that was exactly what I wanted so I created it! These posters are amazing because even though everyone has a different coloring style, each of these colors come together and make an amazing project everytime.
How do STEMStarters’ collaborative art posters work?
First you choose a poster to use, such as this one that is already pre-marked for you to cut. All of my posters are 40 inches wide by 30 inches tall and give you options for 64 pieces, 144 pieces, and 240 pieces.
Once you have chosen the collaborative art poster that you want to use, you print the poster pages front and back, flipped on the short edge. Each of my posters are numbered on the back so it makes putting large scale projects back together very simple.
Display Your Poster
Each of my collaborative art posters have the option to print front and back and have the number of each piece on the back. This makes putting them back together a breeze! My favorite way to put these together, are to have the participants do it themselves. To make this possible, I use butcher paper (or any poster/board/paper that is larger than 30” by 40”) and I draw a grid that is 30 by 40 inches. Then I draw vertical and horizontal lines to make rectangles of equal sizes. The sizes for my puzzles include:
- For the 64 piece grid, the size of each piece is 3.75 inches tall by 5 inches wide. The grid is 8 rows and 8 columns.
- For the 144 piece grid, the size of each piece is 2.5 inches tall by 3.33 inches wide. The grid is 12 rows and 12 columns.
- For the 240 piece grid, the size of each piece is 2.33 inches tall by 2 inches wide. The grid is 12 rows and 20 columns.
I have also provided a background grid in each file that can be printed out and pieced together on a large paper or poster. Participants can then post their own finished pieces on the correct grid number.
How to use Collaborative Art Posters
There are many ways that you can use these posters in your classroom or even out in the community if you are not in a school!
Community Art Project
If you have a special family night coming up at your school, collaborative art posters are perfect for families to complete together. You would only need to print the posters front and back, cut out the poster pieces, and give each family or each participant a piece of the poster to color. You can provide crayons, markers, or colored pencils for your participants to use. When they are finished coloring, they can turn over their piece to see their number and then place their piece on the corresponding number on the display grid.
Monthly Behavior Tool
Collaborative Art Posters can be motivational behavior tool to utilize in your classroom. Decide how many compliments you would like your class to earn and print out that poster option. As students do good things in the classroom or earn compliments throughout the school, you can add puzzle pieces to the display.
Low Prep Activity
Sometimes in your classroom, you may need a low prep activity to provide for students. This is perfect for sub plans, rainy days, testing days, or other days where you need an activity to complete. Students can color their piece. You can have them place on a grid OR have them try to figure out how to piece together themselves.
These are great for
- Fast Finishers
- Sub Plans
- BrainBreaks
- Team Building
- Hallway Decorations
- Bulletin Boards
Puzzle
A collaborative art poster can also be used as a large format puzzle in your classroom, You would just laminate the pieces after students color them. Then this puzzle would be available for your students to put together throughout the year. It is a low cost option and an added BONUS is that it is created by YOUR STUDENTS! This will make it even more special to your class.
Other Ways to Use Collaborative Art
Collaborative art posters are not just for the classroom! These are great for homeschool classrooms, community centers, waiting rooms, libraries, community centers, or wherever there is time to color and space to display. You can have visitors color a piece and place on the grid. It will beautify your space, make people feel involved, and maybe encourage them to return to check out the finished product.
You can cut up any poster to use for your display, but you will need to cut them into even pieces and number the back correctly so that your participants can place the pieces themselves. If you would like the work done for you, check out my Collaborative Art Poster Collection.
Can you think of other ways to use collaborative art posters in your classroom or community? Share your ideas in the comments below!
