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  • Banner with colorful artwork promoting an art shop featuring kindness coloring pages, artist activities, and resources for teachers.

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.

Thankful Turkey Bulletin Board

Thankful Turkey Bulletin Board

We recently had everyone in our school trace their hands, cut them out and write things they are thankful for on the hands. We then used the hands as feathers for a turkey for a bulletin board. We are going to use the remaining hands for the leaves of a large tree. The other art teacher, Kathy, who is subbing for maternity leave made the body of the turkey. I think it turned out really cute!

All Are Welcome Bulletin Board

All Are Welcome Bulletin Board

Here is a welcoming art project you can do with your students. Read the book All Are Welcome (Amazon affiliate link at no extra cost to you.) This is a great book about including everyone at school. Have each child draw a self-portrait from head to toe. Display with the heading You Are Welcome Here! We used these handouts for reference.

Frida Kahlo and her Animalitos Art Project

Frida Kahlo and her Animalitos Art Project

This year during Latinx Heritage Month (September 15-October 15) I will be teaching my 3rd graders about Frida Kahlo and her many pets. It is a good reminder to teach about diverse artists throughout the year and throughout your curriculum. Frida Kahlo’s had many pets including macaws, parakeets, a parrot, sparrows, a cat, a fawn, monkeys, an eagle, and hairless dogs with ancient Aztec lineage. Many of her self-portraits feature herself with animals.  The animals are like children to her, … Read more…

Art Choice Board for Elementary Subs

Art Choice Board for Elementary Subs

Are you required to leave emergency sub plans? If so, you may want to use a choice board! My art colleague Sharon had the idea to make a choice board that can be used multiple times if there is a situation where you need to be gone unexpectedly (sickness or unexpected quarantine). Even if your school does not require this, I highly recommend having a stash of lesson plans ready to go in case you wake up sick in the … Read more…

Minnie Evans Art Project for Kids

Minnie Evans Art Project for Kids

Minnie Evans was a new-to-me artist that I became fascinated by her beautiful and intricate face designs. At the end of the school year I taught about her artwork to my distance learning students. Here is the Google slides I used: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1SYYp6IORiCHurWQFwUoFkVdl–8t9tWwYKuaorGSNRI/edit#slide=id.gbccc15b226_0_86 And here are the images of the slides:

Peace Sign Art with Kids

Peace Sign Art with Kids

Here is a fun art project I taught kids awhile back. I have been going through my picture files and rediscovering old projects that I want to try again. I have lots of art projects in my archives that I have never blogged about before. I was thinking this summer I can post a few of them. First, read a book about PEACE. I like Peace is an Offering, by Annette LeBox or The Peace Book, by Todd Parr. (These … Read more…

Tinfoil Figure Sculpture

Tinfoil figure of a person playing volleyball on a sandy beach court with a net and trees in the background.

Here is a fun 3-d project I did with my 3rd-5th grade classes as an asynchronous (at-home) art project. We have been hybrid for a little while and some of my classes are still fully virtual. I have been giving out asynchronous assignments and then having 1 live (either in person or virtual) art class per week as well. I found this handout online from Shoshy Art, which inspired this project. I created a step-by-step video for my students. Here … Read more…

Spring Vase of Flowers Art Project

Spring Vase of Flowers Art Project

We are in the depths of winter here with lots of snow and cold weather. I am so looking forward to Spring and thought this colorful project would brighten your day. This was a distance learning lesson I did last Spring when we were home from coronavirus. I made a video to show how to do this project. You use magazine pages, scrapbook paper or whatever colorful paper you have. You can even use the inside of patterned envelopes or … Read more…

5 Artists that Use Hearts in their Artwork

5 Artists that Use Hearts in their Artwork

I created a slideshow of 5 artists that use hearts in their artwork! My plan is to show my distance learners this slideshow which features a range of heart artworks and then have them create their own heart-inspired artwork using their own choice of media and creativity. Feel free to use the slideshow with your students to show them some heart themed artwork. Perfect for Valentine’s Day! The five artists that I used in this slideshow maybe are already known … Read more…

Easy Homemade Scratch Art

Colorful art on a black background featuring a flower, stars, and swirls in various bright colors.

Today I am going to show you a quick and easy homemade scratch art trick which is fun for kids to try. You can make your own real scratch art paper using oil pastels and watered down black paint. Or you can buy your own scratch art paper pre-made (affiliate link). This is a fun little trick that amazes and delights kids. You can make your own scratch art paper using just crayons. Start by coloring a patchwork of colors … Read more…

Monday Mousterworks with Angela C. Hawkins

Monday Mousterworks with Angela C. Hawkins

You are invited to follow along and join in with Angela C. Hawkins, a children’s author illustrator, as she recreates 52 Masterpieces in her children’s book style. Every Monday she will post them on her blog and her social media. She says, “For this project, I’ve preselected 52 Masterpieces to render in my children’s book style. Every Monday in 2021 I will post each rendition and some thoughts on Instagram, Facebook, and my blog. (Don’t forget to look for two mice in each … Read more…

Monster Origami Bookmarks

Monster Origami Bookmarks

My students LOVED this project. I had excellent participation for this lesson and we are fully remote. I sent home origami paper to the students in a materials bag, but kids could make their own origami paper simply by cutting a square out of a piece of white copy paper. We used the directions from Red Ted Art: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YVkJPCp_1UQ. I hope that this project helps add variety to your distance learning plans. I was so excited when my students were … Read more…

Perler Beads- Mario and Among Us

Perler Beads- Mario and Among Us

My 1st grade son has been really on a Perler bead kick lately. He made all of these designs this week. Here is a beginner’s guide to Perler (or fuse) beads. I thought this might be something my readers would be interested in learning about as a gift idea for a young child in their life. My son looked at some examples on the internet for Mario designs and then made them by looking at the pictures. These are from … Read more…

Distance Art Lesson: Shapes with Repeating Lines

Abstract artwork featuring a red triangle, blue square, and purple circle with layered, multicolored striped patterns and repeating lines.

We are still fully virtual over here! I feel like I have been getting into a groove and things are going pretty well. Here is a lesson I did for kindergarten and first grade. Repetition in art means to repeat something again and again. If you have been making distance learning art lessons and have shared them on a website, please comment below! I am always looking for new ideas.

  • Banner with colorful artwork promoting an art shop featuring kindness coloring pages, artist activities, and resources for teachers.