Zebra Stripes

I LOVE art work that looks pretty in the end. BUT the way art turns out is NOT always the most important thing for a 3 and 4 year old child. The most important thing IS the PROCESS of making the art, thought and physical. Luckily, most projects end up looking GREAT when the child feels he/she is in control and doing what they feel free to do. I accomplish this mostly by giving them art materials and letting them have at it, other times I ask them what they want to make and how they can do it and then provide everything they need. Then there are times that I have a project in mind, so the get the most of their thought and creativity going, I ask them questions or read books that lead to "my" project. Don't get me wrong, there are times where teacher/mommy led work is very important.

Today I asked the kiddos what a zebra looks like. They of course said it has black and white stripes. So we got out a big piece of paper (the back side of the paper we used last week for yo yo painting) and black and white paint. As you can see, Aidman made one horizontal stripe, he then stood back and said "that's not right", then he made a vertical stripe and decided that's the way a zebra looks. I led them to what we were going to make without telling why or how to do it, they came up with the rest on their own and had a great time doing it.

The kiddos want me to cut it into the shape of a zebra, so we will work on that tomorrow.