My First Time Teaching Art
So, last Saturday was my first time teaching an art class of any kind. I was pretty nervous. It was a two-hour session with kids from 6-14 years old. To my surprise, there was 11 signed up and there was genuinely a kid every age in between 6 and 14. That was weird to me. All I can hope for is that they liked it. My whole scheme for this class was showing how to use sketching, acrylic paint, and stippling all at once on a final canvas.
I started with explaining what “sketching” is, also when and how to use that specific method. The older kids rolled their eyes, because of course they know what sketching is! But the 6 year old and the other younger lads seemed interested enough by what I had to say. I showed them what crosshatching, smudging, and stippling with pencil looked like and how to do it. Also, where the shadow would go depending on where the light source is. They all did really well on this part.
Next we did an acrylic shading scale with 6 blocks, painting the first one black. The next 5 blocks were to be going from black to white with a colour of their choice. In simpler terms, they painted with one colour, adding different amount of black and white to their paint. The more white, the lighter their colour would be, and vise-versa. They did really well with this too, it actually took them a while. They really cared what their art and texture of the paint looked like. They WANTED to be there. That was fascinating to me in itself. I half expected kids that were forced to go because their parents wanted to have a babysitter for a while. This was not the case. Even the 9 year olds were super focused and responsive. When I asked if they understood, they nodded expectantly waiting for the next step.
After the acrylic, I showed them what stippling is. Stippling is my main source of love for art. I love doing it, looking at it, and showing others how to do it. It is so simple to me! The only thing was, and I realized this right before the class started, that little kids would not have to patience to sit and dot something until it looked shaded. I was right, because when I got them all to do a scale in a small rectangle, starting with dark, dense dots and fading out to zero dots, the younger ones didn’t really understand the concept. I wish I knew how to communicate with kids a bit better. I’m not used to being around them, and I am an only child. I only had kids my own age around me, or older. I showed the older, interested kids my own artwork and other’s, and they were fascinated. I told the whole class before I started this segment that I will not force them to use stippling in the final project, (all the different ages made it seem impossible to have one consecutive goal sadly.) Once they all understood that stippling is a way of shading, they started to like it a bit more. The older ones were definitely more experimental with the method!
Lastly, each student was provided with a small canvas. I told them they could have free reign, (which went better than I expected, I was a little nervous to let them do whatever they wanted,) and that they should use the methods I taught them. You can combine everything, or take bits and pieces and put them into your own style. After explaining and starting the last hour of the class, one little boy was just done. He did not want to be there anymore. He poked holes in his canvas and distracted others, but he was artistic. I could see why his mother put him in this class, but he was finished for the day and there was nothing I could do but try to entertain him a bit longer. Other than that, all the students got to work, collected what they needed and were super focused the whole hour. Only a few “finished” their work on the canvas, and some didn’t even use any methods I had taught them, which I was fine with. They were all really artistic in different ways, and that was extremely interesting. I walked around the room so many times just so I could see what things they had come up with since I last looked at their pieces. I hoped they were having a good time, because in my mind that’s all that mattered.
In the end, everyone seemed happy, the mothers that came to pick up their children were happy with their little canvases filled with different things. That actually was a big worry for me too, the parents. I was honestly scared that the mothers would see the inconsistent works of everyone’s and get angry that they wasted their $20 to put their kid in a dumb class. Thankfully I don’t think that was the case. All the students thanked me and left. I cleaned up, put everything away and left as well. It was an interesting and enlightening experience all together, and I get to do it again in March. I definitely know what not to do, and what to add for next time. Make more of a goal for the whole group. I was too worried about the younger ones that I think I lost my authority in a way. Kids make me nervous. Also, if you have a cough, take some Buckley’s before. I made the mistake of just bringing a Gatorade and coughed through a quarter of my talking. Noted for next time! If anyone has any advice on teaching a mix of ages basics about the methods talked about above, let me know! I’d love to try some different things. But, for my first time, it was alright. Better than I expected it to be.
I’ll probably write again about the next class. Hopefully I can learn from both classes just as much as I can help some of these kids learn new things about art. Maybe I’ll add in some tattoo style art to show them! :)
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