In this article, the author describes the Mississippi University for Women's studio art course that teaches students the ins and outs of mural making from inception and design to application of the final glaze. While students in other courses may spend the semester working toward a final exam or paper, this four-and-a-half-week summer course…

In this article, the author presents the "Rags to Riches" design project she introduced to her students. She assigned each of her students one item from an array to thrift store goods which included old scarves, sweaters, jackets, and even evening gowns. The design problem was to imagine what a clothing tag might look like if the assigned item…

Can art be powerful enough as medium to connect two economically and culturally diverse groups of students totally unfamiliar with each other? The author put this question to the test by introducing a lesson on Madhubani, a traditional folk art from a remote region in India. The author describes how this activity gives students an opportunity to…

A friendship fence is a wonderful alternative to the standard mural. It provides a fantastic opportunity for children to help design a creative learning environment. In this article, the author describes an art project that involves creating a friendship fence. The author relates that she began introducing her students to Ndebele beadwork dolls…

"Letras y Arte: Literacy and Art" is a 3-week summer course at Regis University in Denver, Colorado, offering a social justice approach to art education. In this article, the authors outline the background of "Letras y Arte," contextualize the program in art education, and explain three strategies for engaging students: (1)…

In this article, the author shares a lesson that uses the Message in a Bottle concept. This lesson combines social studies, language arts, technology, and art, particularly studying and drawing portraits and utilizing values within a drawing. As part of their grade-four art curriculum, students are required to correctly proportion the face and the…

In this article, an art teacher relates how she uses her enthusiasm for collecting aesthetic objects to transform or generate ideas for art problems for her students, in the belief that teachers teach best about that which they are most enthusiastic. In her classes, she introduces the idea of collecting by asking students to discuss what they…

For four months, St. Paul's Episcopal School in the Lakeview neighborhood of New Orleans, Louisiana remained closed after Hurricane Katrina ravaged the entire city in August 2005. The storm left St. Paul's campus under nine feet of water for two weeks, destroying many buildings and the entire first floor of the campus. As the only remaining art…

In this article, the author discusses an art adventure with her third, fourth, and fifth grade enrichment kids to the Fort Collins Museum of Contemporary Art in Colorado. The author demonstrates and teaches her students how to use the art tissue paper and oil pastel complementing the creative spirit of the Jaune Quick-to-See Smith work presented…

Cultural diversity presents many challenges to the art educator. Teaching children to be tolerant and to appreciate differences is particularly important in a world that is characterized by polarization, embittered cultural divisions, and prejudice. Students' knowledge and attitudes are mediated by popular culture, which often reduces cultural…

The authors describe how they started a holiday mural project for students in different grades. They discuss how Gustav Klimt became the inspiration for this project. Klimt is an artist known for his "painted mosaics." The authors decided to use a theme that was decorative and enchanting, containing all of the jewel-like qualities that a holiday…

In this article, the author shares how she develops a curriculum that allows many creative opportunities and builds on the art vocabulary of her fourth, fifth, and sixth grade students. She calls this year-long curriculum "Art A to Z." At the start of the year, she gives a project packet to each student in each class. Each page represents a…

Promoting student artwork through national publication empowers students to celebrate their accomplishment in the artroom. As a form of art advocacy, it can also promote a teacher's art program, reinforcing the value of art education. In this article, the author relates how he was encouraged by an administrator to look for a professional journal…

The construction and infrastructure of a city provide the foundation of an ideal urban lab for high school students to discover how to dissect the multifaceted layers of a place and make it their own. For six weeks in the winter of 2008, ninth-grade students in Providence, Rhode Island's Hope High School/Hope Arts Community learned to look closely…

The Pardada Pardadi Girls Vocational School (PPGVS) in India was established in 2000 by Virendera (Sam) Singh, a retired U.S. Dupont South Asia department head to address the issue of gender bias in India. According to the school's website, nearly half of India's population is illiterate: males outnumber females two-to-one in literacy and drop-out…