The End of the School Year

A year of wonderful artwork is nearly at its end. Students have learned new skills and used new materials. They’ve completed amazing artworks and persevered when lessons have been challenging, especially this term in weaving. My on-going philosophy in teaching, especially with the younger grades, is the idea of “beautiful oops”, i.e. there are no mistakes in art, only new opportunities to make something beautiful. Older students have considered the “embrace the shake” approach, based on an inspiring TED talk of the same name. This is all about looking at any limitation we might have as a chance to problem-solve and think creatively in art, and more importantly, generally, in life.