• Subscribe to Blog via Email

    Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

    Join 4,626 other subscribers
  • Banner with colorful artwork promoting an art shop featuring kindness coloring pages, artist activities, and resources for teachers.

Category Archives: book review

Featuring Magazine.. new issue is almost here!

By | | , ,
Leave a comment

Hi!  Happy Summer! When I am not teaching art to little kiddos, I spend some of my free time writing articles and submitting them to various magazines.  I am a contributing editor for Featuring magazine, which is a relatively new international art magazine.  I am so proud of our magazine and I wanted to share our latest issue with you. Wowza, Issue #4 is almost here!  We’ve been working really hard on this issue and even though we’ve had many … Read more… →

Alternative Art Journals Book Giveaway

By | |
7 Comments
Book cover of "Alternative Art Journals" by Margaret Peot featuring various creative art pieces and drawings.

The editors at F + W media were kind enough to send me a review copy of Alternative Art Journals: Explore Innovative Approaches to Collecting Your Creativity, by Margaret Peot.  I anxiously awaited the arrival of the book and it came today.  I love art journals (as you may know) and this book could be a great addition to your resource library.  If you click on the link above you can “search inside the book” at amazon.  There are several … Read more… →

Books I’m Loving Now

By | | ,
2 Comments

I love to read.  Of course I do, I’m a teacher.Here are some of the books I’m loving now! I can’t say enough good things about Lynda Barry’s collages and drawings.  They are just so fun and chock- full of inspiration.  She came to Madison recently to do some artist-in-residency programming and I am kicking myself now that I did not get tickets to her lecture.  Apparently, she brought Matt Groening with her to speak!!!  He is the creator of … Read more… →

Beautiful Oops

By | | , , ,
4 Comments
A child's drawing of a green, round creature with a big smile, yellow background, and "WAW" written beside it captures the creativity often seen in a children's book like *Beautiful Oops*.

If you haven’t seen Beautiful Oops yet, you must find a copy and look at it.. It’s my favorite book ever! The first graders looked at this book in class and then they were presented with a creative challenge.  Each child chose a piece of colored paper with a hole in it.  Holes of various sizes were pre-cut into papers of various colors.  They had to figure out how to turn this “oops” piece of paper into a work of … Read more… →

Two New Books!

By | |
Leave a comment
A hand holds open two books to a page with an illustration of a boy and the titled chapter, "7 The Visit.

Our school librarian, who has a contagious love of books, showed me these two books by Brian Selznick.  I fell in love with them!  I ordered them last week and they came in the mail today, so I have not read them yet. The books are over 500 pages and are about half illustrations and half text.  The illustrations are gorgeous and I am going to incorporate them somehow into an art lesson when I teach shading, crosshatching, and contrast.  … Read more… →

Inspirational Book I’m “reading”

By | | ,
3 Comments

I am going through this book called The Element, by Ken Robinson.  I’m actually listening to it in my car on cd!  I find that listening to books on cd is a good way to pass the time in the car.  I’ve only listened to about a half an hour, but I already recommend it.  It is all about creativity, nurturing different types of intelligences, finding and developing talent and pursuing a career that utilizes all of your creative talent.  … Read more… →

Book Review!

By | |
2 Comments
Orange retro bus displayed against a black-and-white background.

Here is a really cool book I found. It’s called “Willy Whyner, Cloud Designer.”  I’m not really sure how I would use this in the classroom, but the pictures are awesome.  It’s about a boy who’s a dreamer and thinks about clouds.  Then he goes into the business of designing clouds. Look!  His parents look like the people from American Gothic! Clouds in the sky! A moon cloud!  A whale cloud! Even advertising clouds! Don’t forget to leave a comment … Read more… →

Book Review 2

By | | ,
Leave a comment
Open sketchbook with colorful, abstract drawings of whimsical creatures and patterns, held by a hand at the bottom—a visual delight.

Linda Barry combines funny comics, drawings, and text in a book for adults about how to get your drawing juices flowing.  There’s how tos are more for an adult who just wants to get started drawing.  Her own comics and art are what is really inspiring for me!  I also enjoy her commentary and questioning about the drawing process and creativity.  In one comic the dialogue says, “If you use coloring books past the age of ten, you will wreck … Read more… →

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