Artists Explore

Myth of TAB: it's a free-for all.
Fact: Offering choice takes organization and planning, but when that foundation is in place students are empowered to create. 

Table 4, working with oil pastel as part of "Artists Learn".

It's taken us all year to get here, but my Art 1 students are flying solo. They are confident, ambitious and self-directed artists. Not just a few kids - everyone is able to find an idea and use Design Process Thinking to bring it to fruition. 

Sharing tips on how to center clay.

For the past two weeks. Art 1 has been working through "Artists Explore" - a self-directed, self paced unit, where kids are tasked with completing three of the following choices:
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- Learn new skills and use them to make art.
- Re-visit a work of art you could improve on and recreate it.
- Learn about an artist and make a work of art in their style.
- Make art about a political or social issue that's important to you.
- Work with a group to make a collaborative artwork. 

All of these pictures are from my classroom today. None of theses artworks were planned or organized by me. Instead, my students are generating ideas, planning to make them happen, then creating and revising. I'm conferencing with students, giving one on one demonstrations and just having a lot of fun watching everyone be so successful.