In this article, the authors discuss how incorporating traveling sketchbooks into their preservice art education and high school classrooms allowed students' situated knowledge to cross the boundaries of age and location. They begin with an overview of the evolution of sketchbook use in art education and the emergence of traveling sketchbooks.…

The demands of art projects in public schools may not fit with reality for many exceptional students because the project outcomes are often too specific (Henley, 1992). One strong motivator for students is looking at and discussing visual culture, involving all the images they see and all the visual experiences they have every day. This pedagogy…

This case study reports on an arts-based project called "Tree-Mappa," one that sought to engage primary-school children in learning about their local environment through significant trees. Pedagogical approaches featured the use of arts-based strategies as the means for activating cognitive and affective responses and learning. The frame…

The author argues that general education teacher candidates must learn to "­re-start" art to empower them with the skills needed to realize art's promise within their future classrooms. Entry/exit surveys completed by candidates ­revealed that an art methods course corrected misconceptions about the nature of creativity and improved…

The purpose of this study was to explore the anxiety and stress-reducing effects of drawing, using different drawing materials by promoting the development of student confidence. The drawing activities were designed to foster the exploration of identity, emotion, and sense of self, while encouraging the exploration of materials and mark making.…

Drawing is described as the bases of all art work when an art idea is conceived. It can only materialize into concrete form when it has gone through a process of designing which basically involves drawing. The ability of an artist to draw is very paramount in the art profession. The bases for selecting students to pursue an art programme is their…

This article is an account of a national project established to support secondary school art teachers to re-engage with their own artistic practice. It draws extensively upon the experiences of the participants and examines the value of teachers making time for their own practical work, both personally and professionally. Beginning in January…

A student's lack of belief in his or her own ability to do well in school can be a driving component of disengagement. In response, the author created art activities aimed to build students' confidence in their ability to learn, carry out a given art task, and identify a competence; such asset-based thinking approaches encourage students to reach…

In this article, I will examine the use of picture books as a means of supporting the intellectual pursuits of young children. Theoretical frameworks will be discussed as they pertain to the integration of these books in the Municipal Infant Toddler Centers and Preschools of Reggio Emilia and Pistoia, Italy. The pedagogical framework of these…

What is the first thing to learn in art school? "Art can be anything." The second thing? "Learn to draw." With "101 Things to Learn in Art School", artist and teacher Kit White delivers and develops such lessons, striking an instructive balance between technical advice and sage concepts. These 101 maxims, meditations, and demonstrations offer both…

The author is always on the lookout for new ideas, and found one with her state's new "grade-level expectations" in art. She had printed the expectations from the state department and bound them in book form for herself and other art teachers in her district. When the author was flipping through the booklet thinking, two things caught her eye:…

When teaching still-life drawing to her eighth-grade students, the author decided they needed a challenge on their final assignment. She thought that making it personal would be more appealing to students than drawing a typical still-life arrangement. She decided to have students create a small collage-style arrangement as a subject for a…

This study portrayed a picture of kindergarten through 3rd-grade teachers who teach visual arts, their perceptions of the value of visual arts, their visual arts teaching practices, visual arts experiences provided to young learners in school, and major factors and/or influences that affect their teaching of visual arts. The sample for this study…

When working with very young children and/or students with special needs, it is beneficial for teachers to think "outside the box" in order to preserve and enhance a child's natural curiosity. In an effort to teach young children to control their drawing tools, they are often presented with coloring book-type pages and instructed to "stay inside…

An artist outlines her system (called the Monart Drawing Method) for teaching children to draw realistically. Children are taught an alphabet of five elements of shape and allowed to interpret and utilize the information any way they wish. The system allows children's natural creative abilities to flourish. (MD)