The "I'm Done" Conundrum - When students finish their artwork early

It's my fourth year of teaching art, and I feel like I'm just getting a handle on this - and really, there's still room to improve (isn't there always, though?). We've all been there - a few kids finish in 20 minutes, others take the full 50 and then some, and the rest are somewhere in between.

For grades 3-5, I'm extremely happy with my current solution - the "I'm Done" station. We go over all the rules/parts the first day of art class, and it has been a dream ever since. I have 3 different schools, and at each it looks a little different - at one it's a table, at another it's a shelf, and at the third it's a cart. At two of the schools, I like to put the parts away that I don't want used while I'm not there because there tends to be under-supervised children in my room at various points in the week.

All 3 stations have: free draw paper (classic), multiplication flash cards (can never practice too much), clay, origami, individual white boards, and drawing books.

Clay

I use regular old modeling clay that can be found at Wal Mart. I keep small balls in sandwich bags and even though the bags tend to be left open, the clay hasn't dried out yet. My genius moment with this one comes in the place mats that read, "I will keep the clay on this mat." I'm very strict about it - if I see the kids with clay and not a mat, or they have their clay off the mat at any time, they have to put it away and cannot use it the next class either (if I remember, let's be honest). It's enough of a threat that it keeps the clay from flying through the air, or from getting dropped all over the floor, or from getting stuck in a neighbor's ear.

Whiteboards

A kind neighbor teacher drilled a hole in my whiteboards so I can attach a marker - otherwise I'm sure they'd walk away. I'm a fan of the mini ones you see in the picture - I got them at Target - because there's a hole at the top to put the string through, and plus, they're cute.

Origami

For the origami, I keep phone books on hand for the origami paper. I teach the kids the first day how to rip out a page and turn the rectangle into a perfect square by folding over the corner and cutting off the excess with scissors. The ones who don't remember after that have to ask the ones who do. The directions are just laminated pages from a copied origami book.

Flash Cards/Drawing Books

The flash cards can be found at the dollar store or Wal Mart super cheap, and I get the drawing books on clearance at the book store whenever I see them.

I have thoughts of adding more things in the future - maybe puzzles, but I can never find any that don't have too many pieces. Plus, I'd really like them to be art-related. In the future, I might copy some pages from this book and keep them as educational coloring pages:


For K-2, I usually have a coloring page/worksheet that goes with the lesson. I say "usually" because at my school, we have a set-up where we don't make our own copies - we send them to a "copy center," which requires us to give them 48 hours notice. For whatever reason, these worksheets seem to always be an afterthought on my part, and I never get to them in time. But, hey, there is always free draw, and I always stick to the rule that they have to keep working on the same single sheet of free draw paper until art is over. This usually discourages the kids who rush through their project just to scribble on 8 sheets of free draw paper. They get one - no exceptions. And more often than not, they surprise me with their creativity and I love to see what they come up with.

What to do with those drawings they want to give you at the end of class? I find it a bit difficult when I'm trying to give clean-up instructions to the class, and 8 students are trying to hand me their free draw papers that they drew especially for me (I'm sure). So this year, I put in a mailbox. Literally, a U.S.P.S. mailbox that I bought at Wal Mart (you'd think I never shop anywhere else). The kids know that if they want to give me a picture, they just have to quickly and quietly slip it in the mailbox, and I will check it at the end of the day. I have a bulletin board where I tack up these treasures - new ones can just be posted over older ones (sometimes they are seasonal, any way). At the end of the year, I pull them down and only keep the ones that are truly special/adorable. Or, if you ask my students, I keep them all forever and always. : )

At Art with Mr. E, Mr. E posted about a brilliant bulletin board he created for these pictures. It's essentially a large paper refrigerator door titled "Mr. E's Refrigerator Art." I thought it was a clever idea.