Last week I had the good fortune to attend the winter trade show of the Craft and Hobby Association. I was there with Memory Makers Magazine and Deann of DiScTalkRadio.
Anyway... the last day of the show was a slow day for me... all of my obligations were done. And it was a slow day on the trade show floor... so I wandered a bit out my scrapbooking comfort zone and started looking at the other craft sections (Joyce, I peeked at some quilting stuff too). At some point I ended up in the Crayola booth and I started chatting with one the men who was working in the booth. It turned out to be a great conversation. He is an art professor at a college so I asked him all kinds of questions on how to integrate more art into our homeschool day. He gave me some great ideas of things he used with his classes and how he adapted them for his grandchildren.
The one that struck me to most was his take on an artist study. He said that in his class last term, he ordered one pink lawn flamingo for each student. They were to study their favorite artist and decorate/adorn/whatever that flamingo to reflect something about that artist's style. He told me about the Jackson Pollock inspired flamingo that his grandchildren did. (Random note: while googling Jackson Pollock I came across this... not sure what this site is but it was kind of fun.)
What a fun way to add some excitement to an artist study for kids! Who knows, I might even order a couple of lawn flamingos (they might look nice in Alex's garden he wants to do for the garden walk... LOL!). His class this semester is doing this project using old shoes, so he suggesting saving some old shoes for future projects... he also suggested that old toys and dolls could be fun as well.
I'm really getting excited about the possibilities of this approach to art appreciation studies! He really stressed nurturing creativity now and the technical stuff can come later. I think I can do that! LOL!
If anyone out there does this too... leave me a note! I would love to hear how your project turned out!
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