Old Tropes

This year, I taught art in my youngest daughter’s second-grade class. Taught? Kinda. More like I herded cats toward making marks on paper.

We “did art” for 45 minutes every Friday. That’s right, a timeless activity crammed into 45 minutes. In case you haven’t tried it yourself, it’s very difficult to do interesting and satisfying art projects in 45 minutes. And on top of that, I wanted to get across to the kids the idea that it takes time and effort to do something worthwhile.

So I decided to paint something with the whole class. Real painting, with oils and brushes and turpentine. Not that other mediums aren’t art, but I thought it was a great idea to have second-graders paint with oils. We started with a blank 30x40 inch illustration board, roughed out the picture and painted it together. I directed where to paint, but the kids did a lot of the actual brush work.

After about 5 weeks, we ended up with a painting of a dragon posing for his school picture.

Afterwards, the teacher had them each write a note to me. I had been a little concerned this crazy oil painting adventure hadn't worked out too well for the kids, but based on the responses, I’d say I was wrong. Here are a few.

Dear Mr. Brad.
Thank you for teaching us cool art!

Dear Mr. Brad,
Thank you for doing art with us. The dragon is my favrite. RRRRROOOOaaaarrrr.

Dear Mr. Brad,
Thank you for doing art with us. I rely relly like the Dragon that you did with us. If we did it with out you we would be good! But you were better. Thank you!

Dear Brad: I love how you be so so funny we all love the paintings with out you we would cry to sleep.