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Author Archives: Marcia Beckett

About Marcia Beckett

Marcia is an elementary art teacher and loves painting, drawing, sculpture, art journaling and clay. Her blog, Art is Basic, features many exciting art projects for kids.

Emily’s Blue Period – Personal Collages for 3rd Graders

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Collage with robot, bamboo, and various elements like tickets, alphabet print, 1989 dates, and swimming certificates.

Our school librarian introduced this book to me and I think it is such a sweet story.  This book is called Emily’s Blue Period by Cathleen Daly.  The illustrations are lovely. This is a story about Emily, whose parents are divorcing and now she has two homes.  She goes through her own “blue period” of sadness. Emily was learning about Pablo Picasso, his Blue Period and his collages in her art class.   Her art teacher asks the class to … Read more… →

Shape Paintings and Color Mixing with Kindergartners

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Abstract painting with swirling patterns, bold black lines, and vibrant colors in shades of pink, blue, and green created using color mixing techniques.

Wow, I’ve been so busy.  Aren’t we all though, right?  But really, this is one of the most busy times of year.  Parent-teacher conferences this week and March is when the yearbook needs to be finished up.  I also put up an art show at the public library (which I will post about later) and we have been working like crazy on our mural in the hallway!  The mural is almost done and I am just waiting until everything has … Read more… →

Art Inspired by Microscopic Things (3rd grade)

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A vibrant watercolor painting with abstract shapes and colorful splashes in various hues like red, green, blue, and yellow, reminiscent of microscopic wonders.

My students are really interested in science and I always love when I can connect an art lesson to things they talk about in their science classes.  This unit came about because on a day when I was absent last month, one of our Science teachers subbed for my classes (we have quite a few part-time teachers at our school and teachers will often fill in for each other when there are absences.) The students went to the Science room … Read more… →

An Interview with Artist Justin Vining

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A colorful abstract painting by Justin Vining depicts a house on a snowy hill under a starry sky with constellations.

Back in September, I posted a huge list of contemporary artists.  One of the artists, Justin Vining, saw that I included his artwork in my post and left a comment on my blog.  We exchanged a few emails and I decided to use him as a resource in my classroom.  I was excited that one of the artists reached out to me through my blog and I thought it was especially cool that Justin used to be an elementary art … Read more… →

Starting a Mural at School!

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Outline of a child playing a trumpet drawn on a white wall near a light switch.

  We are starting a huge mural at school!!  I will keep you updated as we start to paint it.  It’s hard to see what’s going on in these pictures, but we traced figures on to large white banner paper, cut them out and then traced those on to the wall.  Next week the painting begins! I was thinking of something school themed and since the wall is so long a parade of kids would be fun. The idea evolved … Read more… →

25 Awesome Art Books for Kids

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A collage of 10 colorful art book covers for kids with the title "25 Awesome Art Books for Kids" in the center.

Hello! If you are visiting this page NOW, be sure to check out my Amazon Affiliate List where I have a running list of ALL my favorite art books for my elementary art classroom. I continually update this list as I find new amazing art books to share! ART BOOKS FOR KIDS (Amazon Affiliate list – no extra charge for you, I receive a small commission for recommending these books, which goes to support the upkeep of this blog.) HOW … Read more… →

Triangle Collage on Canvas for School Auction

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Triangle Collage on Canvas for School Auction

Every year, my 5th/6th grade class carves rubber stamps with symbols they have designed.  This year, we stamped extra prints on tissue paper with acrylic paint to make collaborative artworks.  To stamp, simply use a foam brush to lightly paint acrylic paint on the stamp. Then, the tissue papers were decoupaged (with hard-finish Mod-Podge) on these fun triangular canvases called Squangles.  These are going to be put in our school auction at the end of the year.  We made three … Read more… →

Group Eagle Bulletin Board with Patterned Feathers

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Group Eagle Bulletin Board with Patterned Feathers

Many of my students contributed feathers to this giant eagle bulletin board.  Our school is Eagle School and I wanted to do a group artwork where many kids could participate in designing a piece of the picture.  I was out sick one day and I had my students each create a patterned feather with the substitute teacher. If your mascot is not an eagle, you could do this bulletin board with a peacock or really any bird would work!

Beautiful Oops Painting Project

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Beautiful Oops colorful abstract painting with flowers, hearts, swirls, and various shapes in purple, blue, yellow, and pink.

Did you Celebrate Oops!?  My kindergarten and first graders started this open-ended project by reading the book Beautiful Oops! by Barney Saltzberg. We were inspired by the page in the book that said, “A smudge and a smear can make magic appear.” Each student received a piece of paper with a smear of paint on it.  They were challenged to turn that piece of paper into a “beautiful oops” and create a wonderful work of art incorporating the smear. What … Read more… →

Monoprint Hearts on Gelli Plates with 1st Graders

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A blue abstract painting of a large heart containing a smaller heart, surrounded by wave-like wave-like patterns, created using Gelli Plates.

Hello friends!  Have you used Gelli Printing Plates before?  I was introduced to this a couple of years ago because I received a couple samples to try out for my blog.  They are a super fun way to do monoprinting with kids.  You can read all about the process and see videos of techniques at their blog, Gelli Arts.  There’s also a way to make your own gelatin plates, but I’ve never tried it because it seems like a lot … Read more… →

Tinfoil Hearts with Kindergarten

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A colorful heart collage on black paper with a pink and red patterned background, featuring tinfoil hearts.

The Kindergartners made these lovely mixed media heart pictures.  They started by stamping the background paper with gadgets, such as old thread spools, bottle caps, heart sponges, cookie cutters and more. During the second class period, they traced a heart onto a piece of heavy duty tinfoil and colored designs with Sharpie markers.  They also glued on tissue paper squares and glitter.  After they finished their tinfoil hearts, I covered them in clear contact paper.  During the third class period, … Read more… →

Yarn Wrapped Hearts (2nd Grade)

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Colorful paper hearts decorated with strings and various patterns overlapping each other on a white background, ideal for 2nd grade crafts.

Often I get so wrapped up in the curriculum, I don’t take time to do “extra” projects which are just for fun for holidays.  Kids love celebrating holidays and often ask to do themed projects.  I am fine with that.. art should be fun!  I do like to incorporate skills and art techniques into each project we do.  For these yarn-wrapped hearts, I cut cardboard circles into heart shapes.  Since they had to be cut with a utility knife, I … Read more… →

A Page of Hearts (Valentine’s Pictures)

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A Page of Hearts (Valentine’s Pictures)

 Valentine’s Day is coming!  Are you looking for a fun heart project idea to try with your kids?  This challenge for my 3rd graders was to design 9 different hearts.  I used this project with a substitute teacher earlier this week when I was home with sick kids.  The students received a photocopied grid and they were challenged with drawing hearts in each rectangle and designing them in unique ways and to try a variety of materials.. these were made … Read more… →

Fun Puns about Art and Artists

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Fun Puns about Art and Artists

Are you looking to add some humor to your class? We had a “Funday Punday Monday” at our school where kids and teachers brought in puns to share.  I rounded up some fun art-related puns you could use in your class.  Sidenote:  When I read these in class and I asked “Why did the artist go to the bathroom?”  One of my second graders called out (without missing a beat) “because he was consti-painted!”  That was a new answer and … Read more… →

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