Students Turtle Art

This will be my last blog until next week. I have three art related meetings and a wedding to prepare for this week so I’ll be very, very busy.

This coming weekend Joanne and I will be in Picton, Ontario for our friends wedding. We met Neal while living in Neepawa, Manitoba in 1999-2000 and we’ve been friends ever since. We talk on the phone about twice a year to keep in touch. Jo’ and I are both excited to see our friend and meet the woman he will be marrying. I’m sure we’ll have a blast.

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I thought that today I would share some of the artwork that my students created last year.

I always try to make my art classes fun and one way that I do that is by handing out homework. The students always moan and complain when I mention this and then they become excited when they see what the homework is. Sometimes I hand out ‘Search-A-Words’ that I’ve created or poetry assignments related to the topic of that class’ lesson.

During one of my classes I brought in colouring sheets. We were learning about turtles and their different environments – fresh and salt water habitats so I created a page with a simple drawing of a turtle on it. I explain to the students that if they hand in their homework sheets and I see that ONLY the turtle is coloured in, they will not pass the assignment.




“To create an artwork you (the students) must draw a scene with the turtle in it, filling the entire page. I want to see the environment that the turtle lives in. Is your turtle swimming at the top of the ocean with the sky above the waves or is your turtle swimming at the bottom of the ocean so deep that all we see are the other plants and fish that also share this space? What types of plants and fish share the same waters as your turtle?”


I’m always surprised when I’m shown the completed artworks the next day.

These artworks were created by the grade four students at Matthews Hall Private School in the autumn of 2007.

Thanks for reading my blog!

Until next week….

Jim