Kindergarteners require little or no motivation from a teacher to create art. Encourage and guide individual expression. Help children to be inwardly motivated and to use person symbols. Help children understand appropriate behaviors in working with art materials. Avoid asking questions that may divert their attention from their work. Clearly demonstrate how to handle art supplies and finished work appropriately and reinforce proper classroom behaviors. Follow-the-directions projects promote doing without thinking; they are the antithesis to creative expression. Alternative approaches should also be shown or encouraged. Help every child think in positive self- statements such as: “I am able to think of new ideas. I am a capable person. Etc.” Respect the product, but don’t over- emphasize it! For the parents: Urge them to provide a safe climate in which their children can feel relaxed and accepted in their artistic expression. Commend the child for what she has done – not for what she is. TEACHING ART TEACHING ART Letitia KintzelSarah Howell K

Teaching Drawing Drawing clarifies, focuses, and increases children’s comprehension. It communicates to the world some idea of the child’s understanding. Discourage erasing, and help children develop confidence in their ability to put their ideas down on paper. Students draw things intuitively as they know them. Good supplies to use: thick kindergarten pencils, markers, extra stout crayons, and ballpoint pens Pages We would read the book, Rainbow Fish. Then we would have the students draw their own fish.

Teaching Painting Kindergarteners typically love to paint with large brushes that allow them to convey boldly the strong, clear configurations they have created. If space permits, allow students to sit on the floor and paint. To minimize drips and spills, it should be like heavy cream, NOT water. Use four jars of different colors in a cardboard box with a different brush for each color. Fill paint containers only to the depth of the brush bristles. Tap their brushes against the inside of the container/jar to knock off excess paint. SMOCKS (adult shirts to protect child’s clothes) Newspapers and Warm soapy water.

Teaching Cutting, Pasting, and Collage To assure a pair of good scissors per child, some schools encourage the parents to send a good pair to school. Have a few pairs of left-handed scissors available. If none are available, try paper tearing. Remind students to hold scissors carefully. Teach the mechanics: how much glue to use on which surfaces to apply it. Collages are always fun to create. Organize trays or shoeboxes of found treasures: wallpaper and cloth scraps, metal foils and textured papers, feathers, and yarn with which to adorn pictures help children become aware of contrasts in solid versus patterned papers, dark and light coloration, and rough and smooth surfaces. We would have the students cut out many different shapes from different colors of construction paper. Once they have the shapes, we would have them use their own imaginations to form a picture. They would then have to share with the class what they created.

Teaching Fingerpainting Children discover different types of lines. Children may draw fan shapes and parallel lines. Guide children to use not only their fingers but also the edge of their hands, their palms, and so on as they paint. Fingerpainting can be done directly on washable Formica-type table surfaces as well as on paper. Surfaces may be dampened to facilitate the paint’s movement. Wear smocks, use newspapers, keep soapy water available to rinse hands as children finish. You can create homemade fingerpaint. Clean up can be fun: use a bucket of soapy water, a big sponge, and a rubber squeegee for the task. WAIT UNTIL YOU SEE OUR MINI LESSON

TEACHING CHALK Used outside on a sidewalk or playground If you are using chalk inside: reduce the level of dust by fist sponging the paper with water or starch diluted to half strength and then having the children draw one the paper with thick chalks Use dark colored paper for giving chalk drawings a dramatic effect

TEACHING THREE- DIMENSIONAL ART Puppetry is an excellent way for children to overcome shyness and develop public-speaking ability. Puppets can be made many different ways: paper plates, paper lunch bag, fingers, socks, etc. Other three-dimensional activities: construction with boxes and tape, stringing beads, and building with blocks Clay allows: touching and feeling experiences Clay can be pulled apart and smoothed together repeatedly. Clay can also be made into about anything. It can also be reused if clay is limited. Clay can free children’s imaginations! We would have the students play with the PlayDoh at a learning center.

ART CRITICISM Describe a way of talking about not only fine arts but also one’s own art and that of classmates At the kindergarten level: what we see, what it is called, how it appears, what colors and shapes and textures it has in it, and what ideas it brings to mind As children talk about art, accept their approximations and their weakness in logic.

Children like to look at pictures, to hear the teacher tell about them, and to tell about them themselves, so showing and talking about art reproductions can be a simple way to introduce art history to kindergarteners. If fine art is introduced as a drawing stimulus for the children, use art folk art or art from prehistoric civilizations, which may bear a surface similarity to young children’s ways of representing forms.

Discussions about aesthetics are not beyond kindergarteners. Teacher may ask, “Is it okay for art to show scary things and ugly things, or is it better for it to show mostly nice things and pretty things?”

Letitia Kintzel Sarah Howell