I have my students draw a single line across their paper, from one side to the other. Nothing crazy, nothing fancy, just a line from the left to the right, or from the right to the left.
I then tell them "You've made your first landscape."
I ask them why it's a landscape, and they talk about the ground and the sky.
One time, a young student had drawn her line diagonally. When we started talking about the horizon, she saw all the other kids had drawn their lines more or less parallel to the top and bottom edges, and she turned her paper face down on the table to hide it. I walked over and picked it up. Showing it to the class, I asked, "Is this a landscape?" They all agreed it was and said it was a hill. (I'm 45 years old and I still feel like turning my paper face down when I do something more creative than everyone else).
I then tell them to color in the top like a sky and the bottom like the grass. Sometimes, the really young ones need a trip outside to see that the sky really does touch the grass.
