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10 Must-Have Art Supplies at Home!
An art supply gift guide for kids ages 3-7 One of the most frequently asked questions I receive around this time of year is what supplies I recommend for young children to use at home. Well, y’all are in luck- as an elementary art teacher AND a mom of two young children (ages 2 and 5) I am here to share my favorite art supplies that my kiddos, students, and I all love! It’s worth noting that the links in this blog post contain affiliate links to supplies I love, and I hope you do too! BUY HERE OOLY Drawing Duet Markers We have gone through ALOT of drawing markers here in the Edington house and I can easily say these Ooly Double sided Duet markers are my son’s favorite to draw with! The colors are vibrant, the shape of the marker is triangular which is great for gripping and one pack comes with 24 colors! We take these markers with us everywhere! You can grab them here! BUY HERE Melissa & Doug Large Paper Roll Ok I know this looks large and in charge but TRUST ME on this. This paper roll literally saved me during the lockdown in the early stages of the pandemic. I would roll out a long piece of paper on this roll and start drawing roads, cities, speed ways, you name it! My (then 3 year old) couldn’t get enough of playing on a paper he was also drawing on! It was the best of all worlds! Kids go crazy for drawing on large surfaces and the best part about this roll of paper is that the supplies are relatively contained! When your kiddos are done you either just roll up the drawing or you can recycle it if everyone is done with it! You won’t regret this one. You can purchase this paper here. BUY HERE Kwik Stix Paint Sticks We are totally paint sticks crazy over here! There are so many amazing brands to try, but I am such a big fan of one of the originals, Kwik Stix. If you’ve never tried a paint stick, they are so satisfying to draw with and they are (relatively) less messy than traditional paint! My kids both love Kwik Stix for all kinds of art projects, especially when drawing on cardboard boxes! Grab them here! BUY HERE Arteza Sketchbook If you have been following me on Instagram for a while, you’ll know how much of a sketchbook advocate I am! I love sketchbooks for all children and for countless reasons! Two of the most important being: 1. The mess of papers is contained! Need I say more? Your child always has access to paper and their completed drawings stay nice and safely in one place. 2. This is the best way to document growth in your budding artist. As they draw in their sketchbooks their skills will naturally improve and how wonderful for them to see their own progress! I love Arteza’s 9 x 12 spiral sketchbooks for my kids! BUY HERE BUY HERE Paint Sets! There are so many great watercolors and paints but a few of my favorites to keep on hand for my own kids are these Ooly Chroma Blends Neon watercolors and Faber Castell Watercolor Set We love neons alot in this family but it’s also great to have a high quality set of traditional watercolors for your kiddos. Both of these paints are great! Faber Castell Beeswax Crayons As an art teacher I am typically tried and true Crayola crayons in my classroom, but at home we are 100% obsessed with these Faber Castell Bees Wax crayons! Why? Because they are a bit thicker / more heavy duty than typical crayons making them perfect for little ones. I also feel as though the crayon glides smoother than other crayons and I just love the plastic carrying case they come in! Perfect to throw in your diaper bag and take to a restaurant to entertain your kids. We love them! Find them here! BUY HERE BUY HERE Ooly Watercolor Gel Crayons These are SO fun! Smooth like Kwik Stix but a bit smaller and water soluble, which means double the entertainment! If you child loves to paint, you could just give them a small cup of water and a paint brush and allow them to paint over the Ooly smooth stix! You can find them here! BUY HERE Crayola Paint Brushes The quality of these really are *chef’s kiss * Different sizes and shapes with synthetic bristles- we love them! You can find them here! BUY HERE Cloud Clay from Excellerations Ok so this cloud clay isn’t exactly an art supply by my adapted art students absolutely LOVE this stuff!! Originally put on my radar by the amazing Friends Art Lab, it is the perfect squishy yet clean, and totally satisfying dough that kids of all ages go crazy for! This is definitely on our Christmas list for my own children this year! You can find Cloud Clay here. BUY HERE Canary Corrugated Cardboard Cutter Ok this supply is definitely NOT for kids but 100000% recommended by me for parents of littles to have on hand! If your children are anything like mine they absolutely LOVE cardboard boxes. With the holidays coming up and I’m sure endless packages showing up, make good use of all that cardboard by encouraging imaginative play and building! My son is so cardboard obsessed now that everyday there is even the tiniest piece of cardboard he immediately asks “Mommy, what are we going to make THIS out of today?” If you want to help make your child’s cardboard dreams come true, this tool is a game changer! With a corrugated blade, it’s kind of like a mini saw and the blade just glides through the cardboard like butter! It’s been hands down the best tool to have on hand when creating with my kiddos. You can find it here!
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Botanical Plexiglass Painting
Is there anything more satisfying than painting on glass or plastic? I think not! That’s why plexiglass is the perfect surface to keep your students engaged while painting. A few days before my adapted class while chatting with my librarian pals, I noticed an extra standing piece of plexiglass in their storage room that was currently not in use. My brain instantly started spinning thinking of potential ideas of how I could use it in the art room. My students paint and print on small pieces of individually cut plexiglass all the time, so I’m no stranger to how wonderful plexiglass is- but I was so excited to have a large piece that was vertical! Thankfully my fabulous coworkers said I was happy to borrow the plexiglass for class so that’s what I did! Photo of Lucy Tiffney working (Source https://www.sofa.com/inspiration-corner/design-lab-lucy-tiffney/ ) When trying to figure out what it is we were going to paint on the plexiglass, I suddenly remembered artist and designer Lucy Tiffney who I had started following randomly on Instagram a few years back. Lucy is an artist, muralist, and designer with a distinct painterly style of vibrant botanicals and her work is just gorgeous! With our theme this year being the rainforest, I thought that Lucy’s work would be the perfect reference for this project in adapted art. So here’s how we did it! Materials: Plexiglass soft bristle paint brushes (I love Royal Langnickle brushes of all sizes) Tempera paint (if you plan on washing it off) I use Crayola Premier Tempera paint- the fluorescent colors are my favorite! Messy Mats & Smocks Reference images of Lucy’s work and plants 1. Prepare Your Materials and Work Space Prep your paint. Lucy obviously uses many different types of greens and blues, but she also uses different pinks for a pop in her work. So I prepared lidded ice cube trays with colors from Lucy’s palette mixed with a bit of white to make the paint nice and opaque on the glass. Prep the space I prepared the tables by covering them in my large messy mats with the plexiglass in the middle and Lucy’s work on my board as reference 2. Get Them Started Before my students arrived, I painted a few of the leaves/ botanicals around the edges to show them ahead of time what will be going on the surface. This is also a fun way to invite them into the lesson- when they came in and saw this interesting glass on the table with paint on it, they were ready to jump right in! 3. Demo How to Paint the Leaves then Let Them Do Their Thing! On a piece of scrap paper nearby I showed my students how to paint one long line for the stem and then add short lines on each side for the leaves. Some students really grasped the demo and others decided to paint whatever they wanted- and both were completely fine! As long as your students are safe, engaged, and hopefully having fun then that’s a win in my eyes! If the artwork happens to turn out lovely at the end then that’s a bonus! For my teaching adapted art is so much more about the experience for my students than the final product. Students sat on each side of the plexiglass which was really fun for them to see their peers across from them also painting the same surface! 4. Display Your Art! The best part about our plexiglass botanicals was showcasing how beautiful they turned out! Our wonderful librarian suggested we display our work in the windows of the library since we have large bright windows. It turned out to be the perfect space for our display and is enjoyed by every student in the school! Be sure to give plexiglass (or even window painting) a try! Your students are sure to love it!
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How to Make Painted Paper
First of all, if you’re not following the fabulous Laura Lohman over at Painted Paper Art (@paintedpaperart) then stop what you are doing and follow her on all social media outlets. Laura is a fabulous veteran teacher who so many lessons, resources and much more available on her blog. Through the magic of Instagram, one of the thing I learned from Laura was how to make painted paper. I never thought I was one much for collage but creating beautiful unique painted papers has become a game changer and my students just adore them! You can check out Laura’s blog post here about how she orchestrates her painted paper set up and organization. Laura has taught me a ton about painted paper but I thought I would go ahead and share with you how I go about making them with my students. PAPERIn years past I have made painted paper with 80 lb drawing paper but this year I decided to try it out with cheap newsprint (to save my good paper for drawing projects). After watching a video about Eric Carle making his papers on tissue paper I decided to give thinner paper a whirl- And guess what! The newsprint was awesome! I just had to remind my students that the paper was thin so they couldn’t “over paint” or “over scrape” in one area of the paper or it might rip through. PAINT I only use Crayola Premier tempera. Fluorescent paint too (it’s a must for me!) I tell my students that as a class we are going to all work together to make a huge assortment of painted paper to all share. Using lidded ice cube trays (thanks @kelsiquicksall for that genius hack!) I supply each table with two analogous colors (colors that are next to each other on the color wheel) plus a little white. The reason for only analogous colors is that no matter how much of little they colors are mixed they will still look lovely no matter what! When you add too many color options you can go ahead and assume the kids will mix them all and leave them with brown or gray painted paper. After providing paint, i encourage students to add any lighter paints first and then layer darker colors. That way when they go to add texture the dark paint scraps away revealing a beautiful bright texture underneath. TOOLS I provide each table with a variety of texture tools. Textured scrapers, texture rollers, plastic forks & knives, bottle caps, sponges, toothbrushes, old hotel swipe cards, you name it! The key is reminding them paint about a quarter / half of their paper at a time and then adding texture while the paint is still wet! If they paint the whole paper, chances are by the time they go back to add texture not much will happen or they will rip the paper Bc the paint is no longer wet & smooth. Allow the paper to dry then (if needed) press with large books to flatten (my go-to are those old art history books from college that I no longer need!) Have fun making lots of painted paper and don’t forget to head to the queen of painted paper’s blog, Mrs. Laura Lohman aka Painted Paper Art.
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Sugar Skulls (Part 2): Fluorescent Paint
Hi friends! Today I wanted to share with you part two of my giant Symmetrical Sugar Skulls lesson that I did with my adapted art class. This lesson was so fun and would be well loved by students of all ages and abilities! If you are looking for part one of this lesson, you can follow this link to learn how to make the big ole sugar skulls. For this lesson you need: MATERIALS for Part 1: Oversized white paper (I used 18 x 24 posterboard) Black tempera paint Large paint brushes Part 2: Fluorescent tempera paint (I love Crayola Fluorescent paint) Paint brushes, Cut up sponges in clothes pins, Q tips, or any other stamping materials you have around the house! Optional (but recommended) Black lights for glowing fun! I use these HouLight black light flood lights. Sugar Skull Idea Sheet Step 1: Gather your Supplies For this project you will need fluorescent tempera paint if you would like your paint to glow for your students. I use Crayola Premier Fluorescent Tempera paint. I also gathered various painting/stamping tools for my students to use such as: Q tips, Sponges cut into pieces and held by clothes pins and large round paint brushes. Step 2: Set the Scene! To add a bit of extra excitement to this project I went ahead and blacked out my classroom before my students arrived. I pulled down the blinds and plugged in 3 Black Light Flood lights that I had previously purchased for art shows. There are tons of options regarding black lights on Amazon but I found that flood lights really project and fill a space! I ended up buying a brand called Houlight. I placed my black lights as high up and tilted downward as I could. The paint was poured and the scene was set and I was so excited for my students to arrive! Step 3: Let them paint and have fun! I showed my students that they could do the same “paint then fold” transferring technique that we did the previous week but I found that so many of my adapted art students truly just wanted the freedom to paint their skulls however they wanted. Like the previous class I had my Sugar Skull idea sheets available and they enjoyed dotting around the eyes, and using sponges to paint florals in the eyes. However, some of them just really wanted to paint their skulls however they wanted and that was completely fine with me! The important thing is that they were engaged in the project and having fun! There is something so (dare I say) satisfying about painting in a black light setting. The paint glowed as the students painted and they were quiet and focused the whole class period! I plan on hanging these sugar skulls in a showcase in the school and hopefully shining a black light on them to glow so that other students can be amazed! This was such a fun project and I know that students of all ages and abilities would love it!
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Oversized Symmetrical Sugar Skulls (Part 1)
Let's learn about the Mexican holiday, Dia de los Muertos by creating an oversized symmetrical sugar skull in art class! This lesson is hands on, fun and has the perfect books to accompany it!
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Interactive Haunted House Art Lesson
Allow me to introduce you to one of my students’ favorite halloween/ fall themed lessons! This interactive haunted house project has been one of my tride and true lessons over the last 15 years as an art teacher, and my students never cease to amaze me with their creativity! First, to create this haunted house (or fall house for any students who do not celebrate Halloween), students will need my Haunted House Drawing Guide that can be found in my Teachers Pay Teachers store. This drawing guide easily breaks down how students can use line and shapes to create an old creaky and run-down haunted house. Students are able to follow along with this guide both in person or it’s perfect for remote learning! There were even several times last year that my Smartboard wasn’t working, so my students pulled up these guides from their ipads and followed along without missing a beat! Once students have finished drawing their haunted house, they are able to add several signature creepy halloween characters to their houses (also provided in the guide)- but don’t add them all YET because the best part is yet to come! After drawing, have your student trace their pencil lines in varying-sized Sharpies (fine for the larger shapes of the house and an ultra-fine Sharpie for the small details and textures around the house. Have students color their haunted houses in materials of their choice (I usually do crayon, construction paper crayons or colored pencils). Once the Haunted Houses are colored in, using a Xacto blade, carefully cut open the window flaps or door to the house leaving one seem open and tape a small piece of paper behind the windows on the back. Have students add more funny/ creepy characters in the windows for added fun. I love giving my students the prompt of “What would be the weirdest/ silliest thing you would never expect to see in a haunted house?” A ghost singing in the shower? Dracula cooking garlic soup? You will be pleasantly shocked and in awe of the creative ideas your students come up with for this project! If you decide to do this lesson with your students be sure to tag me on Instagram so I can see (@artwithmrs.e ). Have fun and Happy Halloween!
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Cardboard Houses in Adapted Art
Creating oversized cardboard houses is one of my favorite projects to do with my adapted art class! How To Create Oversized Cardboard Houses with your Students 1. Gather your supplies As many of you probably know, the #1 rule as an art teacher is NEVER EVER throw away any type of cardboard! These cardboard houses that I created with my adapted art class were created from old Tag Board paper boxes or you could also use old boxes that anchor charts come in. Every year when I am unloading my supplies I make sure to keep these trifold boxes safe in my storage room because they are ✨GOLD ✨. 2. Draw the simple features of a home Using a thick black marker or bingo dauber (if you haven’t created the Cassie Stephens India ink bingo daubers yet, what are you waiting for? They are a GAME CHANGER in the art room! You can find everything you need to know on her blog here), begin by drawing simple house details on each cardboard box. A roofline, front door, windows, maybe some shutters, whatever you want! I try to make them each a little different but it’s ok if they are all similar. This is just to help give my students a start to the project, instead of having them create a house from a completely blank canvas. (Note: this is all PREP work meant to be done before you see students in class.) 3. (Optional) Draw the start of the nside of the house You can draw windows or bushes on the side panels, as well as flipping the box over to draw what the inside of the house would be. In the past when I have drawn a few things for the “inside” my students’ imaginations take off and I love seeing what else they add inside their houses! 4. Let students go wild with color! Next, using Kwik Stix paint sticks or some other kind of paint stick/ gel crayon have your students color in their houses and add their own details. If you’re feeling brave you can also have students just use tempera paint (add a little bit of white to each color so it stands out on the cardboard). But if you’re looking for a “less messy” option I could go with the Kwik Stix. If you don’t have enough boxes for each student to have their own, they can absolutely collaborate! I have had up to 3 or 4 students working on one house before. It’s totally up to you! Lastly, for some extra fun you can also partially cut open some of the doors or windows with a box cutter or, my personal favorite The Canary corrugated cardboard cutter (another essential for the art room!) I hope your student enjoy this fun project! Don’t forget to tag me on Instagram if you share so I can see your students’ amazing work!
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Collaborative “I am Human” Display
With Dot Day coming soon (September 15), I thought I would share another collaborative display that my students and I created a few years ago. For this display I decided to take Dot Day in a different direction and combine it with the amazing new book “I Am Human” by Susan Verde and Peter H. Reynolds. If you haven’t read it yet, this is a book all about what it means to show empathy, how we all have the ability as humans to make choices, learn from our mistakes and show kindness and compassion. Each student in our school “made their mark” by painting their self-portrait in the style of Peter Reynolds. This mural was inspired by the cover of the book with all of the small faces behind the main character. Peter Reynolds’ illustration from the book I Am Human, the inspiration for our school mural. I facilitated this mural with the help of my amazing specials team in the gym. I had a large piece of black bulletin paper laid out that was the length of the bulletin board I planned on displaying it on. I then used Crayola Premier tempera (regular & fluorescent) paint mixed with a bit of white paint to make the paint more opaque so that it would stand out on the black paper. I mixed each color of the rainbow, as well as the intermediate colors (red, red-orange, orange, yellow-orange, Yellow, etc..) in several container cups so that multiple students could paint at the same time (probably 3-4 cups of each color) and had them laid out along the side of the black paper in ROYGBIV order. In small groups, I had students come up to the black paper (starting at the top of the paper so they wouldn’t step in wet paint) and carefully paint a simple self portrait illustration similar to the style of Peter Reynolds, but also painted uniquely to represent each child. Once every student in the school had a chance to paint their portrait, I hung our rainbow portrait mural in our hallway with a line from the book that said: “I am Human. One of billions but unique”. My students loved finding their self-portraits and the impact this collaborative piece had in our hallway. If you decide to try a mural like this in your school, be sure to tag me on Instagram so I can see your amazing work!
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Dot Day Rainbow Display
Looking for the perfect collaborative art project for Dot Day? Celebrate creativity, courage, and school-wide connection with this Rainbow Dot Day Display inspired by The Dot by Peter H. Reynolds. Ideal for elementary art teachers, this vibrant monochromatic display uses simple materials like oil pastels, watercolor, and tempera to help students explore color theory and radial design. It's one of my most recreated Dot Day art lessons—sure to wow your school community and get everyone talking!
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Simple Portrait Back-to-School Bulletin Board
Need an Easy Back-to-School Bulletin Board Idea?Looking for a fun and meaningful way to fill your empty bulletin boards at the start of the school year? This creative self-portrait display was inspired by my own students—and made using my Simple Self-Portrait Drawing Guide! With just bulletin board paper, India ink, and a little imagination, I created life-sized illustrations to frame student artwork and build community right from day one. This project is low-prep, high-impact, and guaranteed to spark smiles!
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8 Amazing Adapted Art Lessons
Scribble monsters are a favorite in my adapted art class! If you follow me on Instagram you probably know that I am absolutely head over heels in love with teaching adapted art! I love teaching and creating lessons that meet the individual needs of my students in order to provide them with their own authentic, enriching, and engaging artistic experiences. I am so excited to share some of my favorite art projects for adapted art class at the elementary level. Muffin Tin Prints Before I go any further with this post you must stop right now and purchase the book Art Workshop for Children by Bar Rucci. Bar has been one of the most influential art educators in my life regarding planning my adapted art lessons. In her book, you will find SO many incredible process-based art lessons that can all easily be adapted to students with varying needs. One of my favorite lessons of hers is called Muffin Tin Prints. The concept is pretty easy- paint the back of a muffin tin with whatever colors you like (I usually have an analogous color scheme available for students). Then place a small piece of paper over the top of the paint, creating a monoprint, pull up, and wa-la! You have pulled a gorgeous print from the paint! These are so fun for students and the products are gorgeous when displayed together! For more detailed instructions be sure to grab Bar’s book or head to her blog artbarblog.com. 2. Bubble Wrap Printing Bubble wrap printing is so fun for any student, but my adapted students absolutely love the texture and process of bubble printing. It’s so easy, just use tempera paint to paint on the bumpy side of the bubble wrap, flip it over onto another piece of construction paper and lift to reveal a print! You could also take it a step further and wrap a piece of bubble wrap around a rolling pin so students can roll the texture onto paper. I love to use this printed paper for other projects, like paper weaving (as shown here) and as the texture for this rainbow cloud mobiles. 3. Sensory Bottles For this project, we followed Especially Education’s blog post that you can find here. Plastic bottles were ordered from amazon, and all you need is water, clear glue, and random snazzy goodies! We filled the bottles 3/4 with water and then my students did an amazing job squeezing enough clear glue to the top. I had an assortment of water beads, glitter, sequins, beads etc available for students to pick and choose to add. Even though I bought funnels I found that styrofoam cups were the best way to pour the goodies in! We added a few drops of liquid watercolor (don’t add too much- a little goes a LONG way) and then once they were filled I hot glued the lids on justttt Incase! You can find the steps above. Disclaimer: Please make sure your students’ safety is your #1 priority. Any of my students who crave oral stimulation were not given access to water beads or anything that could potentially go in their mouth, or they were added by an adult in the room. Always always make sure your students are being closely supervised when using art supplies no matter what they are! 4. Scribble Monsters For years I’ve done some version of this “scribble monster”‘ with my adapted art class but recently tied this project to the book The Color Monster. Here’s how you can make your own! 1. Using fluorescent oil pastels students used either warm or cool colors to scribble on a piece of 80lb drawing paper. 2. Using watercolor (or liquid watercolor) students painted over their scribbles. This technique is called “wax-resist”, meaning the water-based paint will not stick to the oil pastels which allows them to shine through the paint brightly. 3. Once the painting is dry, I lightly drew an outline similar to a chubby cat over the paintings in pencil. Then using a small piece of cardboard and black tempera paint, students dipped one of the edges of cardboard into the black paint and “tap tap tapped” along the edge of my pencil lines making the monsters look like they are covered in hair. 4. We glued google eyes on and tapped the black paint and cardboard across for a mouth and then also used it to stamp the monsters’ bushy unibrow 🤣 5. Teeth were cut out of white scrap paper and glued on my students. I encouraged them to add as many teeth as they wanted! 6. Monsters are then cut out, mounted, and matted. Bonus if you want to create a fun textured border with texture rollers! 5. Colorful Cardboard Village Inspired by the gorgeous rainbow murals in the Village of Palmitas in Mexico by the German Crew, my adapted students love always love transforming old cardboard supply boxes into gorgeous colorful houses! To make the colors pop on the cardboard be sure to use higher quality tempera paint and mix it with a little bit of white to make it more opaque. I love to use fluorescent paints because they look so bright on the cardboard. Often times to get the students started I will draw a few doors or windows with a chisel tip sharpie or bingo dauber filled with black India ink (a Cassie Stephens hack you can find here) and I will even cut open a few parts with a Canary cardboard knife (the best tool ever) so they will get even more excited about their house/ building! One of the best parts of making huge cardboard houses is how they all look when you display them together. 6. Nature Mobile The project comes from my friends Bar and Shannon over at The Creativity Project. You can find so many incredible ideas through their blog and website, so be sure to check it out! My adapted art students loved painting the leaves, pine cones, sticks, threading beads, and wrapping pine cones in brightly colored yarn. This beauty was then hung from the ceiling in the students’ classroom. 7. Flower CD Prints I started this project a few years ago and it never ceases to amaze me every time I do it! Shout out to my media specialist for all the old CDs that were no longer used- perfect for printmaking! Starting with a little white for paint mixing (this makes the paint pop on the black paper- but not necessary if you print on white). Crayola premier fluorescent tempera is my paint of choice! Students could either paint some type of radial flower design or they could paint the CD solid and then use a Q-tip to subtract away paint with bumpy or curvy lines- or do both! Once the CD is painted just stamp it on the paper. I also love to have my kids do a ghost print right after to see how it looks! One thing I try to do is have my students use two analogous colors per CD and have multiple colors schemed CDs in rotation. If you mix too many colors on one CD they will definitely get muddy. To finish them up I cut a few leaf shapes out of styrofoam to paint and print as well. You could also add small dots of seeds/ details with Q tips at the end lots of possibilities for exploring! So easy and fun to do! 8. Contact Paper Sun Catchers Using contact paper, small pieces of tissue paper, a smidge of glitter/ sequins and embroidery hoops these beauties are sure to make any space they’re hung in gorgeous!! All you have to do is give students one piece of contact paper with the sticky side up, have students place materials of their choice in the arrangement they would like. Once they are finished, cover with another piece of contact paper, piece sticky side down, sealing the tissue inside. Place contact paper in between two rings of an embroidery hoop, trim the edges, and hang in a window. For more fun, you can hang ribbon or DIY pom-poms from the bottom. If you decide to try any of these projects be sure to tag me on Instagram (@artwithmrs.e) so I can see and share your students work!! Have fun!
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How to Organize Drawing Guides for Students in the Art Room
As an art teacher, I have tons of drawing guides that I have made and acquired over the years. Not only do these step-by-step drawing guides help students during specific projects but they are perfect for my early finishers, students who are trying to catch up after being absent, and a great backup plan for a sub in case of a teacher absence. However, one thing I had often struggled with was how to organize and store these guides for myself and my students. I wanted my students to have easy access to these guides while working in sketchbooks or practicing a new skill but found myself having to take instructional time to dig for them in my lesson folders. Not very efficient. At the start of last year, I briefly taught from an art cart and had purchased this hanging file folder from Target as my plan for storing my students’ art on the go. Thankfully I was able to use my classroom again a few weeks later and found I no longer had a need for this system of transporting student work, so I decided to use it to keep my drawing guides neat and organized! I purchased the fluorescent hanging file folders from Staples and love how bright and fun they are and love that they came with plastic tabs to label them. In each folder, I have about 20-25 copies of each guided drawing subject with a clearly written label on top of each folder. You could, of course, add fancy typed labels or pictures and organize them in ABC order, by subject, you name it. If you find yourself looking for a system for your drawing guides, I hope this helps you out! Cheers! All drawing guides pictured above can be found in my Growing Drawing Guide Bundle on TPT. You can grab them here!
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