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Category Archives: books

Art Gift Ideas for a Child

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A colorful art set with text "Art Gift Ideas for Your Young Artist" surrounded by paint, ribbons, beads, and flowers.

The holidays are quickly approaching!  While you are thinking about the kids in your life, consider picking up some creative gifts.  Please don’t buy those cheap art supply kits with a lot of different cheap crayons, markers and colored pencils.  Spending a little more money will allow the child to experience quality art supplies and they will last longer.  Here are some of my favorites. 1.  Watercolor Paints- Splurge on a better quality set than Rose Art.  The child will … Read more… →

Watercolor Sharks and Free Shark Drawing Guide/Coloring Pages

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Two colorful sharks, one large blue and one small orange, swimming in an ocean-themed watercolor painting, beautifully capturing the essence of marine life.

Recently, I reviewed the book How to Survive as a Firefly and showed you a firefly art project to go along with the book.  I also received a free copy of How to Survive as a Shark from Innovation Press.  This book is illustrated in a similar style and is very cute and engaging.  There is a lot of great scientific information about sharks in this book. From the publisher’s description:  How to Survive as a Shark provides a unique take on fish … Read more… →

Yayoi Kusama Children’s Book

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Yayoi Kusama Children’s Book

I am in love with this new children’s book about Yayoi Kusama.  The illustrations are gorgeous.  I love Yayoi’s style and her artwork.  Known for her polka dot installations, polka dot pumpkins and mirrored rooms, this artist is sure to captivate your students. From the inside cover: “Growing up in Japan, Yayoi Kusama dreamed of becoming an artist.  In the fields of her family’s nurseries she drew flowers and plants and stones, imagining the world around her as streams and … Read more… →

All About Me Foldable Explosion Books

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Hand holding a colorful, foldable squash book.

One of the first projects my 4th/5th grade students created this year were personal “About Me” folded squash books.  The kids were introduced to a simple foldable bookmaking technique and then they personalized them with drawings and collages about themselves.  Each section of the book had a prompt to get them started. I showed them a video demonstration of how to assemble the book and I provided square templates printed on card stock.  Both the video, templates and instructions are … Read more… →

Free Printable: Faith Ringgold Inspired Quilt Template

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A child's drawing of a family surrounded by a colorful mosaic frame, with a hand resting at the bottom, inspired by Faith Ringgold.

Hi!  I’m here today to share with you a meaningful art project for your younger students.  This would be good as as a “getting to know you” activity.  The following examples were all made by kindergartners near the end of the year, but I would think this lesson would be suitable for kids through grades 2. Many art teachers have taught about the artist Faith Ringgold and had their students create paper quilts.  I have a free printable for you … Read more… →

Art Using Train Tracks

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Wooden train tracks and drawing activities. Blank outline drawing of train tracks colored in vibrant patterns and artful designs.

In my last blog post, I reviewed the book Old Tracks, New Tricks.  It is a super cute and creative book. The book itself is good for up to about 1st or 2nd grade, in my opinion.  The kids at my school saw me drawing this train track picture and some of the 3rd graders wanted to try it.  I’m thinking 1st through 3rd grade might be best for this art project.  I will test it with the Kindergartners and … Read more… →

Review of Old Tracks, New Tricks– Children’s Book about Trains

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A book cover shows wooden train tracks and toy trains with faces, titled "Old Tracks, New Tricks," a delightful children's book by Jessica Petersen.

Get the whole free download here!  I have a fun book to share with you today.  Innovation Press sent me a free copy of Old Tracks, New Tricks to review. I selected to receive this book because it looked cute and I thought my 3 year old son would really like it even if it was too young for my classes.  I think this book would be most appropriate for Pre-K to grade 2. The book is adorable and so creative! … Read more… →

Make Your Own Creature with Fabric and Paper Scraps

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A collage featuring colorful, patterned animal art and a book titled "Zigzag," created using paper scraps. Text reads "Make a Creature Collage.

Little artists love digging into a big box of fabric scraps to find the perfect patterned piece that speaks to them. We have an upcoming Fine Arts Night with the theme of Animals. We are calling it “Wild about the Arts”, which someone suggested in the Facebook art teachers group.  The 1st graders made these fun creature collages.   First we read the book Zigzag by Robert Souci and looked at the illustrations of fabric dolls. The students made creature collages, either … Read more… →

4th and 5th Grade Profile Drawings: In the Style of Egyptians, Mixtec Codex and Duncan Tonatiuh

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4th and 5th Grade Profile Drawings: In the Style of Egyptians, Mixtec Codex and Duncan Tonatiuh

My students were treated to a visit by illustrator Duncan Tonatiuh.  He is both Mexican and American. He grew up in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico and graduated from Parsons School of Design in New York City. His images are inspired by ancient Mexican art, especially the Mixtec codex of the 14th and 15th centuries. Like the people and animals in the codex, the figures in his illustrations are always drawn in profile– their entire bodies are usually shown and their ears … Read more… →

Duncan Tonatiuh: Author/Illustrator Visit

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An illustrator depicts a woman pointing upward as four children sit around her, with corn stalks in the background.

On Friday, we had a visit to our school by author and illustrator Duncan Tonatiuh. See his artwork here.  He is both Mexican and American. He grew up in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico and graduated from Parsons School of Design in New York City. His artwork is inspired by Pre-Columbian art, particularly that of the Mixtec codex. His goal is to create images and stories that honor the past, but that are relevant to people, especially children, nowadays.  His books are beautiful … Read more… →

“Emily’s Blue Period” Art Project: Personal Collages

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A colorful personal collage featuring animals, words like "hoping," "joy," and "style," along with various textures and images.

Personal Collages:  4th and 5th Grade   We read the book Emily’s Blue Period, which is about a girl whose parents are divorcing and now she has two homes. Emily was learning about Pablo Picasso, his Blue Period and his collages in her art class. She goes through her own “blue period” of sadness.  Her art teacher asks the class to make personal collages about their homes.  She doesn’t know what to do because she has two homes now.  She ends up … Read more… →

3 Fun and Easy Kindergarten Art Lessons

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A collage of three fun and easy kindergarten art projects featuring colorful drawings, glue stick, markers, and scissors. Text reads "3 Easy Art Projects for Kindergarten.

For me it is always a challenge to keep up with Kindergarten art projects. I see my classes twice per week for 40 minutes, so they get to do a lot of art!  They go through lessons and projects quickly, their attention spans are short and they have difficulty sometimes with very basic skills.  Here are three Kindergarten art lessons that are fairly easy to prepare for, teach important art concepts and use the same selection of materials. The first … Read more… →

Article in Arts & Activities Magazine

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Magazine open to an article titled "Anthropomorphic Animal Collages" in Arts & Activities Magazine, featuring colorful animal artwork and text.

I’m pretty excited my article in the October issue of Arts & Activities is on the cover! I wrote about an art project my students did after learning about the artist William Wegman. I had the awesome opportunity to interview Wegman on the phone and include the interview as a large part of the article. I’m very glad that they included a bunch of my students’ artwork (3rd grade). You can read the whole article here: http://pubdev.ipaperus.com/ArtsandActivities/AAOctober2016/?page=20 If you would … Read more… →

Books for the First Day of Art Class

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A collage of art-themed books with the text "Ideal for the first day of art class.

I like to start the first art class of the year with a children’s book about art and something quick and easy to get the kids making art.  Here are some of the books I have used over the years on the first day of school or throughout the year.  I like to read general books about art & creativity on the first day.  I save the books about specific artists or topics for when we study those. Here are … Read more… →

Peace Prints with 1st Grade

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Colorful drawing of a peace sign with red hearts inside the segments, surrounded by stars and hearts on a vibrant background, ideal for Peace Prints.

I was trying to sit down to write a blog post yesterday and I was thinking about how when the world seems to be in chaos, writing a blog post about kids’ art seems insignificant in the grand scheme of things.  I had a post about recent doodling projects my students made in the works, but that didn’t seem quite appropriate after the events on Sunday morning.  When something big like the attacks in Orlando, do you go on writing … Read more… →

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