Getting Arty - My Journey to School

Art is one of my favourite lessons as I enjoy seeing the children expressing their creativity and imagination. Within this post I aim to inspire you with a unique art style, for focusing a series of art lessons upon. Can you draw a picture without lifting your pencil off of a piece of paper? I would like to credit my university art and design tutor for recommending use of this technique to me. 

Before beginning the lesson the children should be encouraged to think about their journey to school. Here are some examples:
-Where did you go?
-What did you pass on the way?
-What was on the left/right of your route?
-What did you see?
-How big were the things you saw?

After the children should draw their 'route', this should be a simple line based upon the directions they travelled in from home to school. 

Next the children should begin to add detail of what the saw on the way to school. This could be absolutely anything. In my example I began by drawing a hotel.

Continue to draw, BUT remember not to take your pencil off the page! I continued by drawing a bench, trees and a church.

To finish the picture off I added a title, this fitted in nicely with handwriting too. 

Now you can take your pencil off of the paper and view your creation!

On reflection this is just a snapshot of what you could do with this art form. With older year groups they could draw their route to represent what they saw on the left and right of the route, instead of writing a title. You could also allow children to experience different media for example charcoal or coloured pencils. Overall I believe that the quality of art produced would make a fantastic display for your classroom and children will really enjoy working on their pictures.

I hope you enjoy a lot of success using this technique,

best wishes,

Ben :-)