Tips to encourage creativity through art among kids?

Art and crafts activities can help foster creativity and other skills needed to speed up learning process. Kids love art and crafts projects and enjoy doing it. My nursery class waits for Thursday as they know that it is their art and crafts class day. At their art and crafts class they are kept engaged in various kind of drawing, or crafts activities.
I encourage them by praising their effort. Asking related questions such as 'what you have drawn or created?. Often I show the good work to other children.

This post helps you learn tips which can help encourage creativity among kids.
In Childhood and Society, Erik Erikson wrote that the developmental goals of school-age children fall into four main categories:

1. cognitive, 
2. emotional, 
3. social and 
4. sensory motor

In order to become healthy, happy and productive teenagers (and later healthy, happy and productive adults) children from 5—12 years old must have lots of experience and repeated practice with tasks in each of these four areas.  
Arts and crafts help children experience and practice their skills in all four of these areas.


Tips to encourage Creativity 

• Take time with a child’s art.
• Show respect for the art and the artist’s process
• Comment on lines, shapes and colors: “I see you used three colors.”
• Show curiosity: “How did you get this effect here?”
• Comment on changes: “Your drawings look bigger these days.”
• Ask open-ended questions: “Will you tell me about your picture?”
• Provide fuel for creativity: “What other materials do you need?”                                                                       
• Collect recycled boxes, tubes, and lumber scraps. Make 3-D creations. 
• Provide a variety of drawing, painting, and clay materials.
• Praise their work
• Show good work to other children
• Avoid coloring books.

Remember: Art is not coloring books or mimeo sheets.
Art is not copying or coloring between the lines.
Art is not restrictive.
To be art, a work has to demonstrate individuality.

Easy toilet paper roll pencil holder crafts with kids

I was inspired by the crafts idea at 'Khadija's creative mind' and planned to do toilet paper roll crafts for my nursery class.

Today I could finish making a cute pencil holder. As I had to give this projects individually to all children of nursery class, I asked them to bring at least one toilet paper roll from home. It took about a week to collect toilet paper tubes. The first step was to cut slits on paper tubes and teachers have to do it as our kids are small to handle a bit hard stuff of toilet paper tube.

For next step I used a square sheet of white art paper for the base of pencil holder. Slit ends of tube were folded and fixed at square base.

We teachers of nursery class prepared it before kid's work. Kids were happy to see the raw form of pencil holder. They colored it and happily took home.

I have added two feet with this pencil holder.

With two feets I have trimmed the upper folded parts into circle petals.

Upper edges of paper tube can be trimmed into any shape.

As you can see I have shaped the finished product into more interesting work of crafts. What more you can do with it?
Pasting sequences, buttons and glitter can make it prettier and shows your creative skills when placing at your reading table and may be you can give it to your friend as a gift.
Note: I have taken all the pictures with my digital camera, keeping resolution a bit low as I have to edit pictures later for posting to blog. I will put my blog address or name at these pictures later but I hope that these pictures are not adopted at any other place without my permission. 

Interactive way of learning doubles with origami and crafts

I love to experiment new ways to make my teaching interactive. Last week I teach them addition with doubles. Kids do the addition sums from 1-10 in different ways and doing it with doubles makes the sum solving process easier.
Thursday was our art and crafts class and my project was to teach them origami double boat. We all know that learning origami helps in development of eye and hand co-ordination. So mixing of origami with drawing and maths results in an interesting and interactive activity.

Normally the origami boat creating process is difficult to follow for my class kids (age group 4 plus) and I try to find the ways to make it easier.


How to create double boat?              

This unique dual hulled traditional boat is called 'catamaron'. If you can make origami house then you can easily make this fold. It is made by inside reverse fold. You need to learn valley and mountain-fold.

Link: 'Make traditional catamaron boat'

You can see the process of creating crafts with double boat from the pictures. First they fixed the boat at their art book. Following pictures show the cut and paste (strips of light, and deep blue color poster paper)

I asked them to add double clouds at sky. A child came up with idea of drawing a rainbow which was liked by all kids and they followed it.

My students love to work at crafts projects. I feel that they may forget the 'addition with doubles' but they won't forget making or creating 'double boat'.

I hope to share more experiences with my readers. So keep in touch and don't forget to submit your comments.

More ideas while teaching doubles:

This is simple double house fold which is easier for young kids to learn and  drawing makes this origami project more interesting.

This is also a combine work of maths and crafts. Kids loved creating this crafts and they were happy to do addition sums while doing this activity.

Finished work

Useful links:


* Learn origami for the development of creative skills

Making crafts with paper strips and newspaper

Paper is easily available product which can be used in variety of ways. You can encourage and help kids in creating crafts with newspaper or paper strips. Usually I keep a stock of colorful paper strips. At crafts class kids love to touch and feel paper strips and they love to create shapes or different objects. This article offers few tips and ideas how you can keep your kids busy with these paper crafts or sculptures.

Newspaper can be used to create crafts and paper sculptures.  “Newspaper sculpture” is a way for kids to create an art piece with tightly rolled-up pieces of newspaper. 


With a “newspaper sculpture,” children will use their hand-eye coordination. Encourage them to make their own sculpture. 

Before you begin the activity, prepare by having several wands of tightly rolled newspaper pre-made. This way, the children can dive right into the activity. Place the wands of newspaper rolls standing up (like a flower arrangement) in a bucket or container so they are easy for the children to grab. Lay out lots of rolls of masking tape of different colors.


 Bring the kids over to your activity area and let the kids start creating their own sculptures. Encourage them to bend the wands of newspaper into different shapes. Have them use the masking tape to help retain the shape of their sculpture and to tape together different pieces of newspaper rolls. You may offer idea of making a weaving mat using newspaper wands.
Learn more at: 'A place of our own.org'

Children love to use the paper strips.   Many objects, figures, shapes or 3D shapes, or mobiles can be made by just tying strings to them. This is a great way to teach children about 3 dimensional figures and space…. not to mention teaching them their basic shapes.


Just show them a few examples of figures or shapes and kids would come up with more ideas. 

Stars and Stripes or Shape Sculptures:   Cut different size strips of red, yellow and blue paper.
Fold some strips into circles, some into squares others into triangles. Cut out large shapes for a base. Arrange shapes and strips on your base and glue into place. 


Cut free-form shapes of varying sizes from colored card stock or scrapbook paper (ours measure 3 to 5 inches wide and 3 to 8 inches long). Snip two to four 1-inch slits into the sides of each shape. Build a sculpture by interlocking the pieces along the slits. 


 Useful links: 
 * Paper Flowers – Anyone Can Do That 
* Recycled Paper Weaving in Grade Two 
* Art Lessons For Kids 
* Summer Crafts For Kids: Sculpting With Paper Strips

Get origami projects or crafts ideas online

Origami can be used for skill development for educational, developmental, and therapeutic aspects. Origami is good for any age as it provide an entertaining and creative feeling when you are busy doing it.

For kids at preschool or kindergarten stage you need to teach them easy origami which they can learn themselves. Your instructions should be clear and easy to follow. You can find lot of sites and links online where you can get ideas, projects details and even step by step tutorial helping you learn origami projects or crafts ideas yourself or for your kids. This post is helpful for teachers, parents who are interested to start teaching this creative activity for kids.

* 'How to origami' is full of easy projects for children. You can get an idea from the pictures I have loaded here. These easy instruction are enough to start learning with basic folds. As you can see that the 3rd picture shows a table chair made with origami folds which seems difficult to make, but as first two pictures show easy steps to follow, you can easily learn it. Even your kids can follow these instructions by watching these pictures or online videos.

* 'Free Homemade bookmarks, crafts and gifts' 

* 'Origami Resources' Helps you make Origami crafts, Origami Crafts for children, free videos on Origami, Origami Aeroplane, Origami Flowers, Origami Animals etc.

* 'Simple Kids Crafts': Daily, Easy, Educational, Functional Children Arts and Crafts projects for children of all ages using easy to find materials such as recyclables, egg cartons, cardboard, paper, boxes, string, crayons, paint, glue, fabric and pompoms, pipe cleaners, beads, ribbons, construction paper and more. They offer toys, games, school crafts, experiments, FREE printable coloring pages/templates and craft recipes.

* 'Easy origami forkids'

* Paper the World offers simple origami of models that focus on endangered animal species.
It educates and teaches some charming origami animal figures to children so that they can enjoy the art and creativity of folding paper and making beautiful things from such common material.

Activities and crafts for preschool kids

Art and crafts is always a favourite time pass for me and for my nursery class kids. I usually search for crafts ideas at the net and participate at many parents, teachers or craft, drawing related online communities. I just pick up some ideas or project instructions, just follow it or create similar or different activities for my students. There are many sites around which offer crafts or art activities for toddlers or preschool kids and most of those sites provide free access for that stuff.

"Pre school learning and crafts" is created by former teacher who describes the purpose of creating this site:

'Using toddler and preschool learning activities, crafts, games, and songs in your everyday busy life can help your child (and you) in so many ways. As a former teacher and current stay-at-home mom, I have noticed that many of the activities for preschoolers I find online don't actually work with my kids. I have to modify them to avoid having to do most of the project myself!'

She has explained it in details at 'about me' page.

She is a stay-at-home mom of three young kids ages 1, 3, and 6.

The easy and fun learning activities and crafts on this site have all been tested by her children and friends. These activities on Preschool-Learning-and-Crafts.com are age appropriate (moms won't have to do them for their kids), have easy to follow directions.

Each month you can receive the "Craft Your Kids Smart newsletter" directly to your email. Each issue will be full of learning ideas, games, crafts, and songs around a preschool theme (Valentine's Day, Animals, Dinosaurs, Weather, etc.)
All of the preschool activities will have easy to follow directions and supply lists.

Subscribe for the newsletter at 'this link'

The site owner has account at 'facebook' and if you are interested to get updated news about her crafts then go directly to her account 'here'

Frugal crafts links for kids

At home we can guide our kids to recycle the trash or unused stuff to make crafts. Making crafts or art projects with recycle products or cheap stuff is called 'frugal crafts' and as a parent or teacher I am very happy to recycle the stuff around the storage or cheap available material. This posts would help kids find the sites which offer frugal crafts for them.

In school art teachers can teach kids to make crafts with the stuff which is easily available around us and it costs almost nothing. For example they can make pinwheels out of construction paper, pencils and stick pins. Kids can create flowers using tissue paper and pipe.

Useful links:

* Frugal Crafts and Recipes for Kids

* Frugal Crafts For Kids at 'Frugal mommy living.info.'

* 'thrifty Thursday- frugal crafts for kids'

* 10 Fun and Frugal Gift Ideas

Art and craft activities help children with learning disabilities

Art, crafts or drawing are creative activities which help children in learning disabilies. Being an art/crafts teacher I have noticed that these activities are very helpful in skill development, which helps children in other subjects.

Learning Disabilities and the Arts

The arts are more than a fun, superficial way to keep kids occupied. Art activities can help children with learning disabilities begin to overcome the challenges they face in learning in many different ways. Of course, having a learning disability does not necessarily mean that a person has an exceptional artistic talent. However, music, art, crafts and dance can give students with learning disabilities a chance to express themselves through different media and gain confidence along the way.

Unlocking Confidence
A feeling of self-worth - the knowledge that you can do something - is a critical part of the learning process. Children with learning disabilities often come to think they are incapable of learning because of their ongoing difficulties in school. A paintbrush, a costume, a drum or paper, scissors and glue can be new tools for self-expression that boost confidence while providing opportunities for learning and practice.

Learning Through Art
The arts can open the world of learning to students who have trouble with traditional teaching methods. The arts are intellectual disciplines - requiring complex thinking and problem solving - that offer students the opportunity to construct their own understanding of the world.

* Drawing and painting reinforce motor skills and can also be a way of learning shapes, contrasts, boundaries, spatial relationships, size and other math concepts.

* Music teaches children about rhythm, sound and pitch. Beats can help children learn rhymes and other features of reading such as phonological awareness. Using repetitive songs to learn academic facts (like the alphabet song or multiplication tables) can make the learning experience easier and more fun.

* Dance provides children with a social way to learn about sequencing, rhythm and following directions. While developing coordination and motor control, students can also learn counting and directionality, which can enhance reading and writing concepts - such as understanding the difference between similar looking letters (like p/b/d/q) and telling left from right.

* Performing plays is an opportunity for children to immerse themselves in a theme and learn about it in a profound and personal way. Acting out historical or literary figures and events gives students a sense of ownership about what they've learned, allowing them to acquire a deeper appreciation of the subject matter.

* Crafts offer children the opportunity to express themselves in two- and three-dimensional ways. Students can develop vital problem-solving skills without having to rely on areas of expression that may be more challenging.
Arts as a means of assessment

Timed tests and take-home reports are traditional means of academic assessment that can be especially difficult for individuals with learning disabilities. Creative projects offer these students the freedom to show what they know without the constraints of printed text. Offering students art projects or multi-media presentations as a way to demonstrate an understanding of material they've learned can be an excellent alternative.

Because a person has difficulty learning through hearing alone or seeing alone does not mean they cannot learn. The arts offer individuals with learning disabilities dynamic ways of learning, and just as importantly, a way to fully discover their own self-worth.

Article is courtesy of "National Ceneter for learning disabilities"
- source link

Craft activities improve student learning skills

There is a strong link between crafts activities and skill development among children of all ages. I am also a craft teacher and noticed it very often that many kind of crafts help in skill development which as a results produce good learning outcome in their other subject areas. Let's have a look at some research based studies and reports in this connection:

"The Academic Value of Hands-on Craft Projects in Elementary Schools"

Conducted in 2001 by ROCKMAN ET AL, an independent educational research and consulting company, the study revealed the following key findings:

* Student learning improves when classroom lessons incorporate hands-on craft activities.
* Students develop greater curiosity about the subject matter when craft projects are included.
* Student behavior and socialization skills improve when crafts are undertaken.'

Teachers regularly use craft projects to teach the core subjects and link the projects to state and national curriculum standards.
Teachers say learning through craft projects accommodates students with different learning styles.

Focus Group Research

In 2005 teachers from two different U.S. cities, Paramus, NJ and Cleveland, OH, participated in two focus group studies. Key findings of these studies include:
Crafts can enhance the lesson and the learning process and in many cases are vital to the learning process.
Crafts can be a break from some of the serious and boring academic activities
Through the use of crafts, teachers gain a better understanding of the child’s thought process
Teachers agree the average amount of time for a craft activity in the classroom is thirty minutes.
During the fall of 2001, the Hobby Industry Association (HIA) contracted [with] an independent educational research and consulting company, to study the impact of hands-on craft projects as an instructional method within the core curriculum. Additionally, they wished to determine ways this teaching technique links to state and national education standards.

As the only large-scale study of its kind, and one of the first efforts to investigate the area of hands-on projects and academic learning, this study found that a significant number of teachers use hands-on projects linked to core curriculum content to advance standards-based learning. Teachers said hands-on projects enhance the instructional process and help students learn both basic information and more complex ideas. Additionally, students develop important learning skills and the abilities to articulate complex ideas, to use appropriate and sophisticated terminology, and to integrate the ideas they have learned into their continuing learning efforts. This belief was confirmed by student data evidence collected in this study.

KEY FINDINGS

Student learning improves when classroom lessons incorporate hands-on craft projects.

Students who spent a greater proportion of their classroom learning time engaged in hands-on projects scored significantly higher on writing and drawing knowledge application tasks. In classes that spent almost half of instructional time on hands-on projects (48%), students scored an average of 83 out of a possible 100 on the knowledge application task. Comparatively, students whose classes devoted a low percentage of class time to craft projects (11.8%) scored an average of 75. The creativity and level of detail students demonstrated on the application tasks also indicated that the hands-on projects left many students with vivid and lasting understanding of both facts and concepts.

Teachers regularly use hands-on craft projects to teach the core subjects and link the projects to state and national curriculum standards.

Almost three-fourths (72%) of the participating teachers indicated that they explicitly and intentionally link their instructional units involving hands-on projects to state or national standards. In addition, writing, research and presentation skills are typically incorporated into the projects.

Students develop greater curiosity about the subject matter when hands-on craft projects are included.

Ninety-six percent (96%) of teachers agreed that students exhibit greater curiosity about the learning unit when hands-on projects are included in the instructional approach. Teachers also reported significant differences in learning behaviors when students are involved in hands-on projects. They reported increases in student motivation, willingness to ask questions and volunteer information, enthusiasm, and attention to assigned tasks.

Teachers say learning through hands-on craft projects accommodates students with different learning styles.

While 46% of teachers viewed hands-on projects as an effective learning technique for all students, 54% said this approach is particularly well suited for students who learned more effectively in non-traditional approaches, such as visual or kinesthetic learners, slow readers or writers, or non-native English speakers.

Student behavior and socialization skills improve when hands-on craft projects are undertaken.

Teachers reported enhanced cooperation, responsibility, dedication, confidence, and time management skills when students participated in hands-on projects. Eighty-five percent (85%) of the teachers said students work cooperatively on handcrafted projects, while only 50% of the teachers said they do so in non hands-on projects.

CONCLUSION

The study concludes that hands-on craft projects are an effective means of teaching a standards-based curriculum and that students develop both a greater appreciation for and understanding of what they are learning.

Hands-on projects appear to function as learning anchors that organize and integrate various classroom-learning activities.

By making the learning experience concrete, the dynamics of these learning anchors inspire students to enjoy learning, accomplish goals, take pride in their achievements, and persevere in their learning.

For the full 45 page PDF report: Download for FREE

Few resources providing FREE tutorials "To learn Drawing "

I am a drawing and art lover and from my childhood I was among few students who were interested in drawing, art and crafts, and their work was always appreciated. Even now I am taking art, crafts and drawing classes at my school. I still search for art and drawing links at the net, and now it's time to share those links with other teachers and students who love to draw. Most of the given links are FREE.

1- Drawing tutorial at "South wind" by "Rebekah Lynn"
Includes:

* Basic drawing steps
* The tools
* Understanding the art of shading

You may subscribe to their newsletter if you want to be informed of new art from SouthWind!

2- Kinder art.com is the largest collection of free art lessons on the internet. It started in 1997, providing an opportunity for parents, educators, artists, students to have fun while exchanging ideas, finding information and learning.

Mission of the site is to make art lessons and educational information accessible to all. They offer printable activity pages, the art kitchen, educational links and articles, early childhood education resources and much more.

JANTJE SAYS:
"Let children try. Let children fail. Let children succeed. Give them the freedom and they will create."

* art lessons
* drawing
* Articles on art education and profiles of young artists. Includes ways to cultivate creativity in children, over 200 things you can do with an art degree, Tips for Teachers and Children & Their Art at: Art speack
* Recipes galore so you can make your own art materials and/or some yummy treats to fuel your creativity: art kitchen
* Tips for teaching ECE: Tips

3- "Artists Helping Children" is a Children's site dedicated to comforting children by empowering artists and others to donate artwork, donated murals, donated art supplies, donated toys and a lot of love to sick and needy children. Artists Helping Children also helps artists by giving them information on how they can help the sick and poor children by volunteering to paint murals and other art for hospitals, shelters, clinics, etc.
We also have filled this site with free coloring pages & coloring printouts for children to color with as well as 1000s of free arts and crafts projects for kids to use when they need some crafts ideas.

4- Drawing curriculum, art lessons

5- Creativity portal provides lot of resources.

6- Drawing coach Learn how to draw and improve your skill in no time with the help of an online coach. Whether you're an art teacher, art student, or just a hobbyist artist you will find the step by step education that will give you the ability to bring those images in your mind into paper reality.
monthly newsletter, Just Draw It. It's delivered at the end of each month and will inform you about new info that has been added to the site. It's a great way to keep up with the latest an greatest drawing tutorials from the coach.
- drawing techniques
- Subscibe to their blog

7- Study sphere

8- draw

9- Free drawing lessons

10- Drawing techniques

12- Drawspace is the largest and fastest growing recreational art education website in the world. The site owner, Brenda Hoddinott, is a world renowned artist and art educator, and is the author of two internationally published books on drawing.Free lessons

13- Back in the mid-1980s, a young man named Mark Kistler took up a cause. He envisioned that every child would be able to expand their imaginations by using art. He believed that the key to understanding art was to teach children how to record their art on paper in a meaningful way, which in his mind meant learning how to draw three dimensional pictures. Mark's teaching methods found their way into the world of public television. His "The Draw Squad" series of 44 video lessons is the highest quality TV production Mark has ever done. It includes Mark's standard 7 Seven Magic Words of Drawing format AND high tech set design with backgrounds and animated characters flying around while he enthusiastically teaches kids how to draw.
Link to the site:
- draw squad

14- It is one of the TV show which features art and craft projects. You may find some drawing techniques from the link below.
-Art attack

15- This is a free site for students who want to learn 'how to look' and teachers who require practical drawing and painting lesson notes. Cowdisley Lessons are currently being used by over 1000 US and international schools, colleges, universities and ateliers by teachers for their classroom lesson plans. We aim for a world of greatly improved visual 'literacy' and begin here with the basics.
- Drawing lessons

Amazing paper craft blogs

Paper craft is not only limited to the paper folding or origami. You would be amazed to see the work poeple do with simple papers, as I was astonished to see the artistic creation. It is simplt ab art
According to Wikipedia

"Origami (折り紙 origami?) (from ori meaning "folding", and kami meaning "paper") is the ancient Japanese art of paper folding. The goal of this art is to create a given result using geometric folds and crease patterns preferably without the use of gluing or cutting the paper medium.

Origami only uses a small number of different folds, but they can be combined in a variety of ways to make intricate designs. In general, these designs begin with a square sheet of paper whose sides may be different colors. Contrary to most popular belief, traditional Japanese origami, which has been practiced since the Edo era (1603-1867), has often been less strict about these conventions, sometimes cutting the paper during the creation of the design. There are many different designs such as the traditional crane or the very confusing flower."

1-"Paper forest"
The name of the blog is "Paper forest" and it is for paper craft lovers. It might be surprising to know that origami or paper folding seems child's play, comparing to the craft shown at this blog.

Blogger "Jaime Zollars" is a painter and she loves making, constructiong paper mechanical toys or writes about them at blog. More about her at her blog: Jaime Zollars blog

Blog Paper Forest provides a lot of paper projects you may try to make yourself. There are other paper craft site links at the blog. There are lot of paper craft projects which are FREE to use, and every post or paper project is unique.

2- Peter Callesen.com

Peter Callesen is from Denmark, and he is a paper magician, becaue the craft he has created from flat piece of paper into a 3D form is unbelievable.

He uses the A4 blank sheet of paper, which in his opinion gives the paper sculptures a fragility which underlines the tragic and romantic theme of the works.

* Samples of his magic art work with A4 paper

3- Paper kraft.net is to guide people find the best FREE papercraft on the web promote the works of prominent and up-and-coming paper modelers.

Blog is created by Ron Rementilla.
Main focus of this site is on 3D (three-dimensional) paper models. Whenever you see the word "papercraft" it refers to "3D paper models". The types of genre included are anime, manga, video game, PC game, cartoon, and film. Also included are origami, paper automata, pop-up cards, and dioramas.

4- Paper craft world provides free paper models and papercraft goods.

5- Paper box world presents boxy paper toys, available for download free of charge.


6- SS42.com is directory of very talented paper model artists from all over the world that have created and offer free printable paper models, paper toys, cut-outs, paper dolls, printable paper crafts of cars, buildings, spacecraft, animals and more.
-Origami projects

7- Paper arts links at Craft pop.com

"Make Stuff"- A site for hobbyist and crafters!

This is one of the site, where you can get a lot of "Do it yourself" ideas. People having interest in making crafts would like browsing these kind of sites, as there are a lot of projects, crafts to start working on. There is a lot of stuff at each page of the site, and it is distributed on topics basis, so its easy for you to search for your interest item.

Topics:

Crafts & Projects Great ideas for all kinds of crafts and projects for any season.

Cooking Recipes, and cooking tips.

Kid Stuff Easy art, crafts and cooking projects your kids can do.

Gardening For people who love to grow stuff!

Formulas & Remedies Homemade insect repellent, fertilizers, lotions, potions, bath salts.

Recycle It! Make something with it!

Sewing, Knitting, crochet, quilting and sewing projects.

Holidays Valentine, Easter, Mother Day, Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas

I liked the page where there is a list of resources or ingredients used in different projects. And site has also guided where you can find those things.

* Resource list

* Link Pages takes you to the other craft or hobby sites.

Free resources and links to learn glass painting!

Glass painting is a popular, pleasurable art and craft. And internet provides lot of basic information and guidelines for this hobby as well. I have searched at the web to make this post useful for you. I have checked these all links and then enlisted them, but I would be updating my post, as I get more useful and free resouces.

This hobby is an amazing creative art. If you could learn basics of this art, then you can create "master pieces!".
Yes, if you love drawing and know how to create/ make innovative projects then you are going to create real professional touch pieces of art.

I could find many free resources where you can not only learn basics of "glass painting" but get ideas from free patterns. At some sites, you can download the black& white pattern and print it.

It is also called "stained glass painting", or "Reverse glass painting". Stained glass is often used in the making of windows and lampshades, but is also useful for boxes, clocks, cabinet doors, picture frames and other 3-dimensional projects.

1- Hobby craft Here at this site, you can learn the basics of glass painting, so for beginners it is a good start link.

2- A tutorial with pictures: Stain on glass and How to apply It

3- Art of stained glass This site is dedicated to providing step by step video and photo instructions, on a variety of techniques. step by step video and photo illustrations will include both original color photographs and short videoclips that are easily downloaded.
The site not only give you some guidelines for beginners but for professionals or mature artists it provides information on:
• How to cut glass - from large sheets to small pieces.
• Perfect tube hinges for stained glass boxes.
• Designing your own lampshades - panel and on mold.
• Assembling an Odyssey shade without tacky wax.
• How to build a bird feeder.
• Foiling heavily textured glass.
• Lampshade photography.
• Pricing your work.

Beginners can start from here:
Art of stained glass-begginers

4- Free and easy stain glass patterns
Lot of free patterns

5- FREE patterns at this site: Stain glass free patterns This site features only stained glass patterns for windows and panels. All patterns are absolutely and completely free.
Each stained glass pattern page features both a black and white and a colored version to give you color ideas. Just below the series of black and white versions, you will see a small, but complete, black and white version of the pattern. It looks small on your screen, but if you right-click on it, as save to your computer, you will be saving a full size stained glass pattern which you can use to resize as you please.

6- Warner-Criv.com This is a commercial site, but you can get a lot of ideas and patterns for your stained glass projects free from this site. They are offering 173 free patterns.

7- Harmoney glass
These patterns are for sale, but you can just copy the pattern.

8- Forums are a good place to discuss about the topic and get advice or tips. This forum is free to participate. And it is only for "Stain glass" topic discussion. So you can get in touch with other persons having the same hobby and interest.
Link: Stain Glass Square

9- Chickadee dee dee offers free stain glass patterns.

Learn drawing from free to offer sites!- Part 1

From my student age I love art, crafts and drawing. Now I am an art teacher for reception year class, and love working with kids, especially teaching them drawing or crafts.
I was really astonished to see that internet has a rich source of really free and quality stuff about art/crafts and drawing.
Before creating this blog, I had many sites links saved at my hard disk and often read those lessons or articles about drawing. Now this blog is providing me an opportunity to share all that stuff with the parents, teachers and of course children.

My readers would be happy to know that there are number of sites, offering free drawing lessons. So hold a pencil and paper and get ready to DRAW:

1- Artists helping children
Artists Helping Children is a Children's site dedicated to comforting children by empowering artists and others to donate artwork, donated murals, donated art supplies, donated toys and a lot of love to sick and needy children. Artists Helping Children also helps artists by giving them information on how they can help the sick and poor children by volunteering to paint murals and other art for hospitals, shelters, clinics, etc.
We also have filled this site with free coloring pages & coloring printouts for children to color with as well as 1000s of free arts and crafts projects for kids to use when they need some crafts ideas.
Link: Artists helping children

2- Learn how to draw and improve your skill in no time with the help of an online coach. Whether you're an art teacher, art student, or just a hobbyist artist you will find the step by step education that will give you the ability to bring those images in your mind into paper reality.
monthly newsletter, Just Draw It. It's delivered at the end of each month and will inform you about new info that has been added to the site. It's a great way to keep up with the latest an greatest drawing tutorials from the coach.

*Drawing techniques
*Drawing blog
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3- free drawing lessons at Fine art education

4- KinderArt® was developed in 1997, because they think art should be an important part of any home or school curriculum, and if there are easy-to-follow lessons with readily available materials, it makes the lives of artists, teachers and parents much easier.
The goal of KinderArt® has been, to make art lessons and educational information accessible to people around the world.
In addition to the thousands of free art lesson plans, they offer printable activity pages, the art kitchen, educational links and articles, early childhood education resources and much more.
Everyone who visits KinderArt® is encouraged to share their experiences, questions, comments and ideas. The result? A wonderful variety of lesson plans and educational tips complete with an online children's art gallery.

* lot of resources at Kinder Art

* Bulletin board ideas at Kinder Art

* Art from recycled materials

5- For art teachers a must check site: Every day Art
Art Curriculum for Classroom Teachers and Homeschoolers:
On this page classroom teachers and homeschoolers can find resources for teaching art, including classroom art projects for kids and guidelines for class discussion. These children's art lessons are open ended to stimulate creativity, and are flexible enough to work with a wide range of ages and abilities.
Page link: Art Curriculum for Classroom Teachers and Homeschoolers

* What is Art?

I liked the sentence at the bottom of the page, saying "Art makes kids smart" and I took the picture of it.