Not Now Bernard by David Mckee

"Hello, Dad," said Bernard.

David Mckee is one of my favourite authors and illustrators. I love his retro illustrations and the vibrant colours he uses.

Activity: Painting and drawing in the style of David Mckee

Year group: 2 onwards

Resources: Colour wheel, pencil, eraser, paint, paint brush paper, scissors, black pen, colouring pencils, glue

What to do:

1. Choose 3 colours that sit near to one another on the colour wheel e.g yellow, orange & red.

2. Use a ruler and pencil to divide the paper into walls and floor of the room.

3. Paint the walls and floor in the three chosen colours, using two colours for the main wall, the lighter at the bottom. Blend the colours
with horizontal strokes.

4. Now for the characters. On a separate piece of paper draw your character in the style of David Mckee. You can achieve this by starting with a chunky body, a head almost the same size as the body and short chunky legs. Choose a pattern for the sweater.

5. Once you are happy with your character, draw around him/her using black pen, then rub out the pencil marks. Colour your character using coloured pencils. Finally cut out and place on top of your background.

6. Use this technique to make more characters, furniture and objects.

7. Finally, when you are happy with your layout, glue each piece down.

You could continue this process to make a whole book. Add text if you want to! Why not include a mum or a dad, a monster and YOU!

TIP: To save time, photocopy your characters multiple times and colour it in afterwards if you want to add them to more pages.