Bright Eyes and the Buffalo Hunt 1st grade project

First graders were excited to learn that this book was written and illustrated by an 8 year old girl! My intern made an audio recording of this book so the children could listen as they made a picture about the story.
The idea for this project came from DEEP SPACE SPARKLE where I saw a neat sponge painted buffalo composition.

Last week the kids traced two buffalo shapes with white crayon on black paper and then used brown paint on sponges to make the fuzzy part of the buffalo.   This week we listened to the story as the first graders traced and decorated 3 tepees with Native American symbols they liked from the symbols handouts we put on the tables.
After everything was cut out, tepees and buffalo, students arranged everything on a blue background with a grassy hill where the story took place.