Henri Rousseau

This collection of KS1 Art lessons focus on the life and works of Henri Rousseau. Your class will find out about his life as an artist and the different places and artists which influenced his artwork as well as the different techniques and skills they can use to mimic his work themselves. After explore several of his paintings your Year 1/2 class can create their own Rousseau inspired painting.

This set of five complete lessons each come with a detailed lesson plan, lesson slides, differentiated activity ideas as well as supporting printable resources.

You may also like our Jungle Topic Bundle – select from ready-to-teach schemes across a range of subjects to create your own Jungle cross-curricular topic! 

His Life and Work

The first lesson in this series help your class learn all about the life and work of Henri Rousseau. They will learn about his life and discover the inspiration behind his different paintings and style. The children will create fun fact booklets and posters detailing the life of Rousseau.

View Lesson 1

Skills and Techniques

This lesson introduces your class to the skills and techniques used by Henri Rousseau, giving children the opportunity to create their own pieces of work including Rousseau's Key Features.

This downloadable lesson comes with a lesson plan, slideshow presentation and printable teaching resources.

View Lesson 2

Portrait-Landscape

Learn all about the genre Rousseau believed he invented called 'portrait-landscape'. Look closely at different pieces of art work and compare Rousseau's art work with other artists.

This downloadable lesson comes with a lesson plan, slideshow presentation and printable teaching resources.

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Jungle Animals

Learn all about the use of animals in Rousseau's paintings, particularly his use of pouncing animals. Discover the inspiration for these pieces of art and create animal masks using the key features Rousseau's characteristic artwork.

This downloadable lesson comes with a lesson plan, slideshow presentation and printable teaching resources.

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Using our Imagination

In the final lesson of the series your class will look closely at the inspiration behind Rousseau's paintings and the use of his imagination to create his work. They will evaluate all they have learnt about Rousseau and will also have the opportunity to use their own imaginations to create Rousseau inspired pieces of art.

This downloadable lesson comes with a lesson plan, slideshow presentation and printable teaching resources.

View Lesson 5