Help me give my students basic art class supplies, such as a drying rack and paper cutter, that will help us speed up clean-up and prep time and allow us to have more class time for making art.
My students are middle schoolers who love all sorts of art: animals, animation, clay, and painting in particular. The sixth graders are especially excited by all things clay, seventh grade is enthralled by anime, and eighth grade is beginning to become aware of art that speaks to issues within society.
These students come from many different countries and backgrounds and speak many different languages at home, but speak one common language in my classroom: art.
This common language is comprised of many different dialects: oil pastel, ceramics, acrylic paint, and charcoal, just to name a few. I would love to expand my students' artistic language by providing them with supplies that will aid in clean-up and prep, so that they can have the greatest amount of time in-class to use these materials and work on projects that speak to their interests.
My Project
What is an art class about? A common thought is that the purpose of art classes is to provide students with a chance to express themselves creatively; that art classes are more freeform or lax with their grading, and are a place where messiness and chaos abound. Depending on the classroom, this might be true. In my class, we are messy and students are afforded plenty of opportunity to creatively express themselves, but there is more to my classes than that. In my room, students are held to rigorous standards with an emphasis on the elements and principles of art, while participating in projects using a variety of different media. The key to providing projects that utilize different media with my students is having classroom supplies that allow for quick preparation and clean-up.
However, because my art room is still in its first year of existence and we are still building our classroom inventory, we are asking you for more basic materials that will allow us to have even faster preps and clean up, which will give us more time for art.
Every day, at least one student laments how quickly art class ends. If we can get a drying rack, we can speed up time putting away work at the end of class, which will give us more time to work in-class. If we can have trays for each table, we will be able to set our liquid watercolors on the trays, and save time by only getting out and putting away the one tray, instead of cleaning individual palettes for each student. With your donation towards supplies, you can give my artists more time to work, helping them create individualized, "non-cookie cutter," works of art. We appreciate your support!
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As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Ms. Young and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.
