A method was developed to encourage urban elementary school students to humanize their environments through artwork and stories. The 46 participants were students in grades 2 through 6 from an inner city neighborhood characterized by violence and urban crime. The children came to a neighborhood center once a week for an enrichment and tutoring…

Ideas for spring arts activities include a whimsical play about royal dragons, a skit on an April fool, and a song. Instructions for making brightly colored birds from boxes, a happy day hat, decorated eggs, and other art projects are given. (PP)

Provides steps for making papier-mache birds, the final activity in a fifth and sixth grade class study project. (RL)

Evaluated the effectiveness of a drawing program called "negotiated drawing" with children aged 5-7 years. Compared drawings of children using this program with those of children given normal drawing lessons. All the children improved their drawings, but the children using the negotiated drawing program improved more than the children…

Describes an artists workshop, parallel to a writers workshop, that integrated student choice of topic and media, reading, art, and writing. Outlines the workshop routine, discusses the artists' notebooks kept by the students, and explains how writing as an essential element of the workshop reveals the thinking, planning, and discovering that…

This article discusses how art activities can be adapted for students with visual impairments, focusing on textural art, sculpture, sound art, smell, taste, kinetic art, dioramas and maps, and computer art. Suggestions for adapting visual arts are also offered, by using good contrast in projects or by enlarging or simplifying pictures. (JDD)

In an eight-week project, an award-winning children's book author and illustrator helped third grade students create impressive artwork. Children worked in pairs to create collaborative drawings, and they gained confidence in their artistic abilities over time. The project developed strategies for use by classroom teachers. (SM)

Steps for organizing and implementing a program that involves elementary students in beautifying their school with large-scale wall graphics are outlined. Sources of design, drawing hints, painting methods, application techniques, and follow-up activities are discussed. (RM)

Lowenfeld enjoined teachers never to permit children to copy art works because children's art was such a crucial part of the self. Yet by rejecting all copying, one can place too great a value on novelty and miss the essence of Lowenfeld's emphasis on the individual child's experience. (IS)

The monotype is a singular work of art created by transferring an image from one surface to another. Methods and suggestions to help elementary and secondary students make watercolor monotypes are discussed. (RM)

The authors present an art teaching idea which extends the graphic discussion method described in the October 1981 issue. Rather than drawing together, the two participants respond in writing to each other's completed work, which provides an essential aspect of art learning--responding to another artist's images. (SJL)

The author argues that American art education has long been misled by its reliance on Lowenfeld's theory that creativity is the ultimate good and that children are innately creative. She proposes a more structured and technical approach to art education, based on developmental research with children and art. (SJL)

An activity book presents arts and crafts projects for the special events and holidays occurring during November and December. The section includes class activities, student activity pages, and directions for making several kinds of bird feeders. (SM)

Presents art projects to help elementary educators teach their students about seascapes, providing students with basic techniques for portraying texture and mood in art. After discussing seascapes and lines and showing some examples, teachers can help students create seascapes from construction paper alone or with construction paper and…

Presents strategies for using children's drawing as scaffolding for early writing: (1) paving the way with drawing (talking about drawing, asking the right questions, social context); and (2) getting stories into writing (supporting children just learning what letters look like, with a good mental image of some letters, who can write most letters,…