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Don’t you just love opening an order that came in?! It’s something along the lines of Birthday and Christmas and Fourth of July all rolled into one.
But, I have to confess… we have definitely been using some of the wrong stuff- especially for the projects I was assigning to that class.
Within the last month, we’ve had two broken handheld sharpeners, three ruined colored pencils and a class full of too many frustrated students. I knew I had to do something differently!
After listening to the woes of my Art Appreciation class, I figured I’d try and make a case for more “grown up” supplies.
This brings me to raving about my boss. No, she doesn’t read this. No, I’m not showing her in hopes for a raise. It’s just the truth that I’m so lucky to have such a receptive principal. I gave her an estimate and the reason why we needed them, and she was happy to oblige.
It also helps to have good students who are responsible enough to know how to treat materials respectfully. We both knew we could trust them.
So anyway, the order just came in yesterday, and of course I had to try them out right away! Here we go:
Prismacolor Premier Colored Pencils, Verithin
I had used the colored pencils in my own artwork with success. I love the way they build and blend and create a thick cover without having to press to hard. I wanted my students to have that experience, too. Their colored pencil and shading skills are evolving, and the materials needed to catch up!
Prismacolor Ebony Jet Black Very Smooth
In the past, I tried a few different ebony pencils, but I’m really a fan of the Prismacolor Ebony pencil. They are amazing for drawing because you can build up the graphite and the pencil is soft, but hard enough not to lose its tip too quickly. It smudges, but not more than the artist can control- it definitely doesn’t go haywire! 🙂
LYRA Graphite Crayon, Water-Soluble in 9B
The Lyra graphite crayon will be a good replacement for the chalk and oil pastels I was making them use before! (THEY TOTALLY HATE ME FOR THAT!) I find that it’s a little bit more tricky to get complete accuracy, but I’m sure a stump would help with that. OR an emery board, whatever…. we improvise!
Another feature I love about the Lyra crayon is that it is water soluble. Besides the fact that my students are for some reason incredibly “mess averse”, they’re going to love being able to use it as water media. They can use a brush to smudge values instead of their fingers… just one more option to accommodate the preferences of my persnickety preteens. 🙂
Because of the variety of “light to heavy handed-ness” in my classroom, I think there is definitely something for everyone with these drawing products. Can’t wait to show the results!
(PS I am not being paid to endorse supplies-just trying and sharing what works!)