Spring Time Art & Preparing for Summer Break

The end of a school year is always tough. The connections made with my students between myself and them and them with each other is hard to ignore and I received many hugs and gifts on the last day of school.

Our final project in the art class was a fun one. I bought each student a canvas board (cheaper than a stretched canvas and more durable for littles, just fyi) and gave them two options. The idea was to have them paint a spring time portrait of an animal of some kind, however, though free time drawing and painting is fun, sometimes the projects don't end up impressing parents and I end up with complaints about the lack of structure. So! Their options were, draw either a bunny or a snake in pencil on the canvas board, trace with a sharpie marker (if you wonder why the tracing happens, it's so that the detail and the drawing doesn't get lost in the painting process), and then paint! These animal portraits turned out great. I especially love the googly eyes on some of the snakes. Bonus: canvas boards tend to dry quickly when painted with kid friendly tempera paint. They were able to take these projects home the day they were made and it made for happy kids.