Customer Reviews

Primary Art: It's the Process, Not the Product

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Primary Art (for elementary aged kids) has it all for many abilities in one group. Using the same directions and materials, three versions of the same project are offered from very easy to moderately experienced to highly challenging. What fun! Middle schoolers and pre-k's all working together with the same materials, but with different focus and results. It's possible! These projects are very unusual and have great results that impress the kids. Having an art fair? This book will be your main source of inspiration.

I used activities in this book frequently with my after-school care kids ranging in age from five to ten years.
There are a couple things about this book that made it a go-to in my planning arsenal.

I love that it's about the process, not the product. I found it tough to find really good books for school-age kids that were process-oriented.
She really strikes a balance between giving enough ideas to pique their interest without telling them what it should look like.

On top of that, she knows kids this age want to produce work that really looks good, and the projects in this book do.

As an adult reader, I love that she also does a great job illustrating the concept of scaffolding--how to introduce children to a basic concept, and then build on it as they master each new level.

Not only do you get a ton of ideas, you get a whole new way of looking at what can be done with simple, inexpensive materials. A really wonderful book.

i have another book from this series: Preschool Art and now this one, I liked them both and alot of the projects allow you to add your own little touches on them! wonderful ideas!!

Really good book, but I am sorry that the inside is not in color, since it is a art book.

Thank you to all the people who have so kindly and carefully reviewed Primary Art with such positive comments. As a former elementary school teacher, I particularly love this book because it gives a three possible activities presentation for each project, which means, it gives the basic project in its easiest form, then an intermediate step up project, and then a very challenging project, all with the same materials as the basic. You can do the same project at least three times and progress upward in skill. And of course we all know kids love to repeat things and learn from them each time they do. I hope you will enjoy this book as much as the kids I worked with when I wrote it. Thank you again, MaryAnn Kohl
w w w . brightring . com

Childhood is a time for exploration, discovery, experimentation....thus, the process of art has always outweighed the final product in its value and focus. But it's also true that elementary aged kids are taking a new interest in the results of their explorations. That is, they enjoy the outcomes of their work in art. The art works in Primary Art will be valued as "unique results", not as pre-planned crafts or adult-designed artworks. Kids value aesthetically pleasing art, which can take many avenues as they explore...they use words like fancy, amazing, awesome, interesting, special, and "mine". To say they expect resuls is to reinforce the philosophy of exploring and experimenting with art as they apply their developing skills and abilities to control their own chosen results. So art is still a process for elementary kids, and the product is their own design and making. Art is an exciting experiment that encourages individuals to explore and discover their abilities and expressions, with artistic results that range from astonished to delighted, spectacular to breath-taking, lovely to reserved, and charming to rare. And as the adults who help it all happen, we are allowed the gift of seeing it before our very eyes. Primary Art offers art in three steps...introductory, exploratory, and challenging, all related and building on each other. I love this book!!!