If and 10 grapes dancing

“The teacher who is indeed wise does not bid you to enter the house of wisdom but rather leads you to the threshold of your mind.”  - Khalil Gibran

Such powerful words.  When I teach art specifically, my goal is to have as many different interpretations of an idea as there are children.  Working this way is harder and requires individual instruction for each child (not a bad thing).  I strive to be open to as many different possibilities as the children can think of. 

One technique I like combines literacy and art inspired by books like IF by Sarah Perry.  Each child comes up with his or her own idea (If) and then develops drawing and painting skills in the representation of the idea. "If blueberries were jewelry", "If strawberries drove motorcycles", "If the sun was an orange".

2 Lollipops wanting to swing
sharpie and watercolor on
watercolor paper

Another technique is counting books from 1 to 10 like Counting with Wayne Thiebaud – each child chooses the number of items and what they are doing for example: 10 red strawberries dancing, next would be 9 lemons running, then 8 grapes sings, etc.  This can be done with food, animals, anything. I love the creativity of each child’s ideas.  I have discovered that when giving children open-ended questions their critical thinking and problem-solving abilities are activated in his or her artistic/creative perspective. 

3 Candies dancing around
sharpie and watercolor
on watercolor paper

Children then have an opportunity to share what they know, what they think and how they figured out their idea. 

4 Singing Tomatoes
sharpie and watercolor on
watercolor paper

Artistic expression is personal and every child and person learns at a different pace.  Children benefit from having knowledge about different artists and their styles; but children highly benefit from getting to visually express their thoughts and interpretations of the world around them.