Let’s have some fun today!
Let’s play!
I love giving this age group (10-16 years) a prompt like this. You absolutely never know what will come out.
I want to encourage freedom and creativity in my students’ artwork. That’s the whole purpose of this Creativity Series, to have students push themselves past what is comfortable. I want them to try new things, experiment.
Guidelines:
- stick to 3 magazine images
- put your images in an unexpected or unusual setting/background
Materials:
- sketchbook
- oil pastels
- magazines
- scissors
- glue sticks
- colored pencils
The guidelines and materials were a bit fluid. I let them push the boundaries or switch up the materials. The idea is to scaffold their creativity. To give them structure that they can build off of. The Art of Education recently had a article on How to Kill Creativity in the Classroom. It talks about how Art Educators may use the word “no” too readily and by doing so we stifle student creativity. This was a project where I could say “yes” instead of “no” and that is the best part of this project.
Process:
We started out with the images. I encouraged them to slow down and find just a few images they could use.
They played with placing images together as they searched.
Once their images were selected the had to decide on the background. If they needed prompting, I encouraged them to come up with an unexpected background.
One student started out with a fun project but because I knew the student I pushed her to try another project where the images interacted more with each other and the background. Here they are next to each other..
I love how this student’s strength really shined with this project. But the best part was the look on his face as he came up with ideas. He sat looking around with bright eyes and a sly smile on his face. It was like you could see his mind going a million miles a minute.
This is another student who’s strengths came out. Though I encouraged a light hearted quicker project, in fact several students were able to complete 2 projects, this student took it further. She used her images to create a very detailed story through image. Here’s just a peek since she is finishing this up on her own.
Loved letting them loose to be silly and have some fun!
How about you? Do you ever create just to have Fun?
