Classroom Murals: Collaborative Art Project

After seeing this post, from Organized Chaos, I could not get the idea of a group mural out of my head. Even though I have had my end-of-the-year projects planned for weeks, and we wrapped up painting projects last month...I decided to tackle a couple of group murals with my 1st graders.

 I decided that these would be fantastic bulletin boards for the summer/beginning of the year and open house next year. The original idea for this project comes from Experiments in Art Education. I would like to share my experience with this project with you, along with a few tips so that if you decide to do it with young classes, it will be easy, breezy and beautiful.

First of all, I would just like to say that I am not a control freak.  If you have control issues, beware of doing this with kindergarten and first grade....I set some ground rules, but some kids either did not 'get' the rules, or they ignored them. Its okay, the murals still look great!!

 I covered each of my 6 tables with a big sheet of bulletin board paper, and I painted a couple of them with words: ART, MUSIC, HEALTH, LIBRARY (I could've made Counselor, Office, P.E. too, but I only have 6 tables and I wanted a few plain murals without words.) Mrs. Novak suggest this in her post.

When the students walked in, I told them, do not sit down, put on a paint shirt and STAND behind your normal seat. I explained that we would be doing some group painting, but they needed to follow a couple of rules.

 Rule #1, do not paint over anyone's work
 Rule #2, paint shapes that do not touch all over the paper

I did a quick demonstration of the type of shapes that work well (with everyone gathered around one table) and said to make lots of sizes and spread them around the big paper. 

 Then I had students line up to get a jar of black paint. Since I store my paint in baby food jars, I reminded them to be careful not to drop them.

My first grade classes are freakishly small this year....I have one class of 14! Students worked pretty quietly, and even though I demonstrated what kind of shapes to paint, some still insisted on practicing stars....making big solid black blobs on the murals. GAH!

 Once there were lots of shapes, I told them to connect each shape with lines. I wish I would have told them to draw lines to the edges of the paper. But its okay, they murals still turned out great!

Some of the murals with large words like ART or MUSIC had lines drawn straight through the letters. But that's okay.

 My students have an hour of art, and this project only took up about 20-25 minutes...even after I gave some basic instructions and a brief demonstration, AND we put on paint shirts.

We created 6 murals.

 I would suggest that you have something for those that are 'done' painting to do....since my tables were covered with paper, I didn't want them sitting at their spots if they had already washed their hands and taken off their paint shirts.

Also, I instructed my students to put their jars of paint down near the hand washing bucket and then scrub if they needed to. Well, this enticed two girls in my class of 14 to paint their entire hand black and then rub them together and show off their messiness to the entire class. I was busy moving all of the murals off the tables so they could dry since we still had 40 minutes to fill!!

 Obviously, it is the end of the year, and kids to silly things, but as you might imagine, this was incredibly frustrating. I'm not one to shy away from messy projects just because they are messy, and I love fingerpainting, but for two of my best artists to be so reckless, in such a small class, who should totally know better...GRRRR. It's okay though, I made them wash their hands very last, and stand off to the side while I explained the next project to the rest of the class.

I told them they wouldn't get to participate in the 'artist trading cards' that we would be creating.

 I did let them make cards.

I'm weak. Its the end of the year, it was just a little paint.

Anyway, back to the murals!!

I let those dry until the next 1st grade class two days later. Let me clarify, I have two small 1st grade classes, but I still see 20 classes a week, 11 of those are kindergarten....so I chose to do this with my two smallest classes since I hadn't taught this type of lesson previously. It would work with any grade.
 
 Before the next class, I prepared 20+ colors of paint, using white to create tints.

I also painted over the lettering with white so it would really stand out.

I had the students do the exact same procedure as I had done with the previous class, go in, put on a paint shirt, stand behind your chair. I had them gather around one mural once everyone was dressed in their shirts, and I demonstrated how they would use their color to pain in one of the shapes, scoot over and paint in another shape.

 I explained that once they had used the color on one mural, they would move on to other tables and put their color on every mural.

 I also told them not to paint on top of the white words and gave them the same rules as I had given the previous class about not painting on top of someone's work.

 During this class period, the school maintenance team came into my room to talk to me about my new cabinets for next year.  Of course they did. I took them around and explained what I wanted and where I wanted it. I was distracted for a few minutes, but the students continued to work quietly on the murals. Whew! I was fully prepared for madness to break out at any second with paint flying, but thankfully, everyone was cool and no one dropped their paint jar or got out of control.

Pretty soon, students started to get 'done' painting. I had joined them, painting with white. I was filling in a few spots on the murals without lettering as well as touching up the white lettering, covering drips etc. Frustratingly, I wanted to keep painting...but after a few minutes....one boy was done and then, suddenly, everyone was done.

Most of the murals were finished, but a few needed more colors. I realized that I needed to move the huge-really-wet-painted papers to other spots around the room and give the 'finished' students an activity otherwise it would get out of control really fast.

It was a little wild, because the kids couldn't sit at the tables, and some of the tables and chairs needed to be wiped off after we painted, and I was the only one who could maneuver the big papers. As soon as that little moment of craziness had passed (no one painted their hands this time), I directed the students to their seats and demonstrated how to create artist trading cards.

You've probably heard of this activity before, students create a series of drawings to trade. I let mine choose their own subject, and they could use markers, colored pencils or crayons to color them.

It is a fun end of the year activity. WOW! As soon as the class had their little blank cards, pencils and fine point sharpie markers, they got right to work, creating little masterpieces. It was as if the group activity had warmed them up.

A little bit 'Keith Haring'

The room was dead silent, the opposite of what it had been minutes before when I was dragging massive paintings around the room, trying to get them off of the tables and kids were running around with wet paper towels, and messy fingers.

Without even telling them to, they were completely enthralled in the activity.

They knew they had limited time because we were going to trade cards at the very end.

 If they finished early, they could make an extra card to look at a book while they waited to trade...The students whispered....they whispered to each other....and to me if they had a question. (I was in touch-up mode on the murals, covering drips and finished the two that weren't quite done).

I had to stop and look around.....the class was completely engaged in the process.

It was magic.

Towards the end, the last 7-8 minutes, students were allowed to trade cards. Some were finished, some weren't. But the ones that weren't could take their cards and finish them later.

This was a very successful end of the year project, and I can't wait to put the large paintings up on my bulletin boards.

 If you are low on patience this late in the year, beware.....I've tried to be as honest as possible about what worked for me so that you don't make the same mistakes I made.

I would definitely do this again.

It was a really great collaborative project.

How taking a Dance Class Made me a Better Art Teacher

Today I made three students cry.

Well, I didn’t make them cry. They just cried. Little kids do that. They cry. A lot. Working with students who are barely five through age twelve, I have made my fair share of students cry for various reasons over the years.

Common reasons for crying include: anger at me or a classmate, frustration at the assignment, or just plain ‘ol, ‘I miss my mommy’ syndrome.

Actually, all three happened today.

If a student is angry with me or another student, it is usually a combination of needing to learn to share, a bad attitude or bossiness to blame. Sharing the crayons is a skill everyone should learn in kindergarten, or at least have an understanding of by second grade…if a little boy doesn’t understand, or want to share, then a fight breaks out and I have to step in and make someone take a cool down or a time out.

This is what happened today.

If a student ‘misses his mommy’ and it is May…well, I don’t know what to tell you. I’ll give you a hug…I’ll pat you on the back…but kiddo, its time to grow up a bit.

This is what happened today.

If a student expresses frustration at a project or a set of instructions, I usually do my best to encourage him to keep trying, get assistance from a friend, or I provide a bit of help to give them some success and some confidence so they can tackle the other steps.

But sometimes, my encouragement, redirection, and assistance can do little to curb a meltdown. Sometimes kids just have bad days.

This is what happened today.

Generally, when I explain a project to kindergarteners, I do one of three things:

1.     Demo everything and then give them the supplies…some tend to get lost if there are too many steps but it gives me a chance to let the artists get to work and help the challenged overcome the challenges.

2.     Demo half, let them work for a few minutes…struggle to get their attention….demo the other half (whilst doing my best-song-and-dance to keep their attention so that they aren’t cutting their neighbor’s hair as I demonstrate how to attach, affix, or adhere something to their lame little masterpieces)

3.     Demo step-by-step….each step of the project, broken down so that everyone is doing everything at the same time…completely leaving the slow-pokes in the dust and slowing down the speed-racers to complete boredom.

In my experience, it is completely exhausting to demonstrate everything step-by-step because it is difficult to keep their attention, especially the creative ones that just GET it….they get bored.

However, EVERYONE’S project is successful…they ALL look JUST like MINE.  

With this method, some get frustrated, and it is difficult to work one-on-one with someone who falls behind, because it is my job to keep going, the entire class is waiting for everyone else to cut the corners off a square for the spider’s head.  This is where I see the most room for tears of frustration.

This is how many of the lessons at the beginning of the year are organized; it helps ensure that everyone is successful.

Alternatively, some projects allow for the half and half method…for instance, if we are drawing and then painting, it just makes sense to explain the drawing information first, let them work and then once everyone has completed step one, stop and explain the directions for finishing the painting.

This is how many of the projects in the middle of the year are organized, in order to give everyone a chance to work at their own pace, but still keeping everyone moving from one step to another.

Whenever I demo everything all at once, I usually try to repeat the first step, right before handing out supplies…but someone always gets lost. It is difficult to recall everything in the correct order.  

This is how many lessons at the end of the year are organized in order to give the creative ones a bit of a chance explore the finished product a bit further and interpret the instructions in a way that allows for some creative freedom.

Generally, whenever someone gets lost or frustrated by my instructions with the step-by-step method, I think, ‘If you aren’t sure what to do, look at the finished product….you obviously haven’t created the eyes on your bear….how hard could it be to figure out what comes next.’

I offer assistance, but I just don’t GET why they don’t GET it!

Today in dance class…I had a bit of a revelation about my students and what they may or may not understand.

 I totally GOT how some kids just don’t GET art….they just don’t see what I see.

They can’t look at the finished product and make assumptions about what needs to happen next.

Some kids just don’t connect with visual art the same way that I don’t really connect with dance.

Dancing does not come naturally to me. I don’t have a background in dance.

Apart from the random dance parties in my living room, which require no real skills or rhythm; up until January of this year, I had never really been to a dance class.

My only experience with dancing was a bit of two-stepping at a barn warming in high school for FFA. Anytime I try to two-step now, I have to be completely reintroduced to it as if I’ve never done it.  I don’t naturally have the ability to pick up a little line dance here or a salsa move there. I just don’t.

Whenever I see an instructor do a simple combination of moves…I usually just stand there with my mouth hanging open for a bit. . Confused. Befuddled. Stupified. Bewildered.

 I have to ease my way into a dance with an awkward thrusting or jutting of my arms and legs in a manner that is not rhythmic or beautiful in any way. I try. I really do. But my body just doesn’t move like that. And it is frustrating. I want to move in a way that is beautiful…but I just can’t. Physically. Mentally. I cannot connect with music the way that other people can.

I still try. In fact, the very act of trying makes me a better teacher. Feeling that same frustration with myself, and my instructor (who definitely is not to blame) helps me understand what my students experience whenever they are trying something new for the first time.

I would definitely recommend this to any beginning teacher. Take a class or learn a skill in which you are not naturally talented or have ever experienced before….in order to understand how frustrating it can be to someone who doesn’t quite ‘GET IT’.

Many of my students have never used scissors, glue, paint or markers before using them in my art class—just as I have never been exposed to dance—I shouldn’t expect a masterpiece…just some experimentation…I should expect my students to ease into an artwork with a bit of thrusting or jutting of their arms and legs in a manner that is not rhythmic or beautiful in any way.

Confused. Befuddled. Stupified. Bewildered. I GET that now.

I really do love my job. You can read more funny and serious stories here, here, here, here and here.