Lauren Estes

Hartselle Enquirer

A Morgan County teacher who travels between schools decided that she wanted to further involve students into making fun art projects; she didn’t realize the success the students would find as they began.

High School Art teacher April Childers said the projects initially started through ideas from Pinterest and similar sites of that nature. 

“I had taken note a couple of years ago of a great idea on Pinterest to use pizza boxes as a canvas,” Childers said. “Cardboard is a great painting surface, so when I saw the hundreds of boxes that our student’s Chrome books came in and all of the large cardboard sheets from our interactive boards packaging, I knew I had to store as much as we had room for at the school for our art program this year. 

The participation to make the projects was fully evolved with students from age 15-18.

“All of my 9-12 grade Art One students created a textured painting on the Chrome book boxes,” Childers said. “My Art Two classes work more independently so they are given broad project guidelines to give them room for their own unique creativity. This year they have been challenged to make a piece of art using books, magazine, 4’X8’ cardboard for their mural, scrap cardboard, and wire. My Art Club, Art One and Art Two classes are collectively collaborating on a project for the hallway that connects the middle and high school called ‘Sunshine Alley.’ Students are painting tons of water bottles and using brown packing materials to create a 3-dimensional tree for a mural on that wall.”

Several of her students have voiced how much they look forward to the new projects that they will take part in, including senior Kylie Rye.

“I was really excited to work on this mural because it was this big piece of cardboard and I saw so many ideas popping up,” Rye said. “I loved experimenting with the texture already on the board and I’m so happy with the results.

I learned that it’s great and so many mediums work on it just the same as a regular canvas, but cheaper.”

Childers said although the students do get enjoyment out of the class, they do receive a grade for their projects.

“Students are given a grade in art my art class based primarily on creativity, effort put into that project, and completion of the assignment so, yes, all of these projects were done for a grade,” Childers said.

Senior Aldair Carrillo said he used a dictionary as the basis of his art project.

“I chose to use a dictionary as my medium for our “book art” project in my Art two class because it was unique and I had never done it before,” Carrillo said. “It was a real challenge for me. It took me three weeks for me to figure out what I wanted to do but as soon as I knew exactly what I wanted, everything clicked so perfectly. I also really enjoyed how I didn’t have to go out of my way to find supplies since it was an old book. It was fun using spray paint on paper as well. I would absolutely do this again.”

Childers is confident that using recycled items has greatly better their art program as a whole.

“I believe the students thought I was crazy every time I threw a new idea and project at them involving used materials,” Childers said. “I like to make them think about how to repurpose things and realize that they don’t always have to create art on a clean, white canvas or piece of paper. Not all students have the means to purchase art supplies so hopefully, through these projects this year, they will start seeing more used items as a way to create art and repurpose items they may already have. It also really helped our supply budget this year using so many recycled materials. This is the second year that West Morgan has had an art program in quite some time so we had to start from scratch purchasing every paint brush. Thankfully, our art program is very much supported by the staff and administration and 3M has graciously helped to purchase art supplies by way of grants. The dilemma, however, is that most art supplies are consumable so every art teacher balances the struggle of what they wish to teach versus what the student donations will allow you to purchase. This year we have stretched our imagination and the student’s have produced amazing recycled art.”

“A simple way of encouraging the students who participate and finish their unique art is to show other students and teachers what they are accomplishing.”

“We display all of the murals in our cafeteria and front foyer so that the whole school can see what our Visual Art classes create,” Childers said. “This is a great way to promote our program and give the students some well-deserved recognition. They get the choice to either take their work home at the end of the year or donate it for me to use as an example for future classes.”