"Growing Up as a Young Artist" is an illustrated book assignment that involves researching family scrapbooks, photo albums and films, and inquiring about family anecdotes for clues to one's artistic roots. Students creatively reflect on their early memories of imaginative events, as each page is filled with memories of creative activities they…

As soon as they graduate from arm-length viewing in shopping-cart seats, children take off to adventure in aisles, touching just about everything. Kids will pocket fallen signs and lug unusual, empty shelves and packaging materials in hopes of taking them home. Kids recognize and compliment supermarket artists--stock clerks who create container…

A lesson led by adult ideas, rubrics and formulas, conducted in a shrine dedicated to adult artists, demonstrates that children's art does not carry much weight in the art room. Art lessons need to speak of why and how artists do what they do. Art lessons also need to express the freedoms in drawing, instead of the search for the "proper way." In…

The best lesson ideas often derive from childhood recollections. When brought to class, play memories and art mementos from the teacher's childhood paint a powerful homage to children's art. A survey of a child's room in the dark, or with lights on, discloses interesting hanging sites, means of attachment and unusual items drafted for hanging, all…

In this article, the author relates the details of a recurring dream in which he and Victor Lowenfield, the father of modern art education, walk through art rooms, followed by children eager to show them their work. The scene shifts to a school cafeteria where they discuss children and their art over milk and cookies. Amateur dream analysis…

Maintaining one's artistic self while teaching should be a principal goal of art education. The ability to harmonize one's creative powers in teaching and art making should be the foremost competence of each art teacher. (Author)

Art Partnership Networks enlist college students, majors in every field of art, each of whom "adopts" a gifted elementary school child.

According to Hanes and Schiller (1994), "The student teacher experience is the traditional transition from theories of the university to practical realities of public schools. It is in this experience that critical changes occur and determine the manner of practice that preservice teachers tend to adopt for their future classrooms" (p. 218). The…

In the Adopt-A-School Program, college art faculty establish relationships with local elementary and secondary schools, act as artists-in-residence, and use the schools as bases of operation for teaching methods courses for majors and nonmajors and for working with student teachers. (MSE)

Describes how a teacher can motivate students to be creative by dressing up, performing for them, hiding things, and designing visual experiments. Advocates that art teachers demonstrate that art class is a playful and exciting place to be. Suggests methods to encourage teachers and students to perform. (KM)

Presents a lesson plan constructed around several color plates of the artwork of George Szekely. Szekely suggests a playful and open approach to his work and recommends various ways of interpreting and experiencing his art using a variety of senses. His recommendations include slide projectors, word games, and role playing. (MJP)