How to Create Process Art
Last year, I sort of accidentally experienced the greatest child-led process art in which I’ve ever been lucky enough to participate. That’s what I want to share with you - it happened a whole year ago, but I wasn’t writing about all of this then, so I didn’t have a place to share it. And it’s totally share-worthy!
Last fall, for reference, I spent my weekdays with two 4-year-olds (although one was a month shy of 5 and one had just turned 4), a 2.5-year-old, a just-turned 2-year-old, and a 1.5-year-old. Baby B was a 20-week baby bump at the time. That’s a pretty broad age range, which I love…one day I’ll write about mixed-age grouping and my incredible adoration of that method. For reference, I usually referred to last year’s group as “The Bigs” (the preK ladies) and “The Littles” (the three toddlers who still napped).
As they are every year, all the kids were pretty excited about the changing leaves. Leaf magic never gets old! It doesn’t matter how many walks we take and how many similar leaves we see, they are just as excited to point out and exclaim over the beauty of every single, unique leaf. I love that about young children. It’s part of what makes my job (Profession? Calling? Lifestyle?) so wondrous. Seeing the fall leaves change is beautiful enough in and of itself every year, but to see it through the eyes of these sweet children is…well, genuinely inspiring.
They also all love painting in any form, so I figured we’d combine the two. I had a gigantic (think half-the-kitchen-floor-sized) piece of paper that had arrived in a package. I love to repurpose packing paper into art paper and I had plans for this one! We were going to take a walk and gather our favorite leaves du jour. Then we’d come back and use the leaves as paintbrushes and go to town on that giant piece of paper, right in the middle of the kitchen floor. Aside from a general plan, I didn’t have anything specific I was hoping for. That is true process art - I had no end product in mind. There was no right or wrong way to do it. I was going to provide materials, and let the children lead.
Toddlers, toddlers everywhere!
I could NEVER have imagined all the divergent ways in which they would take this project! It turned into a literal all-morning affair. My neighbor joined us with an extra 2-year-old (because we really just didn’t have enough toddlers - HA!) and she and I had the BEST time standing back and watching this develop.
It began as planned. We walked around the block and chose our favorite leaves. There was no rush and we stopped and started a dozen times, inspecting trees, leaves, bugs, and neighbors’ dogs. I vividly remember toddler pace being just about a perfect match for pregnant-Elise pace.
There’s Baby B!
When we got back with our leaves, I put some paint on paper plates, set them on the giant paper on the floor, and turned them loose. I was careful to provide them with a minimum of instruction. I wanted them to create THEIR vision, not mine. I pretty quickly realized that clothes weren’t a great idea for Mr. Middle, who at 17 months, was not yet Mr. Middle - he was still Mr. Youngest. He stripped down to his diaper because it was less stressful for all of us. Everyone else got sleeves and pant legs rolled up and socks removed.
It was when the socks came off that things started to get interesting.
Painting with leaves merged with painting with fingers…and then painting with feet! It was a natural development to use their feet, since the paper was already on the floor. There was lots of mixing of colors - I had only provided red/yellow/orange so it worked well and didn’t all turn into brown.
It was at this point that my poor patient husband, who mayyyyybe doesn’t have *quite* the tolerance for painting free-for-alls with which I am blessed, came up from his office to refill his coffee. I refilled it for him verrry nicely, handed him a cookie, and shoved him back down the stairs with many empty promises of the careful clean-up we had planned.
When they were all done painting (and I let them decide that; I did not rush them at all), I figured it was over and done with. And that was great! It had been a wonderful morning of painting with leaves, hands, and feet! That enormous sheet of paper looked really abstract and beautiful.
So we sat down to have snack and read books while it dried. When it was dry though, I discovered that the kids had other ideas. They went for the crayons and colored pencils next and began to draw and color all over and around the painted bits. Even better, most of them were narrating for me as they were drawing and writing, so I had a window into their creative process and what they were seeing in the paintings and drawings. I did intervene just a bit here, only to correct pencil grips. I’m pretty laid-back about most things, but pencil grips are not one of those things. That’s something else I’ll share more about another day.
Mr. Middle, age 17 months, in his favorite painting outfit
AND THEN…(yes, there’s more!). Then they went for the scissors! So their hands got the excellent experience of painting with leaves (which was novel), finger painting, working on that pencil grip by coloring and drawing, and now scissor skills! I was thrilled to pieces with how this was all going but trying not to get in their way or distract them by geeking out visibly. I was working very hard to hide my “professional crazy.” (Every true teacher has this - it’s a documented thing. I think. And if it’s not, IT SHOULD BE!)
They worked those little hand muscles like crazy cutting up that big ol’ masterpiece. Some of them cut out the paintings/drawings they had done and were proud of, some just practiced cutting, some made confetti. This was another point at which I got slightly involved - using scissors correctly is a hard line for me. Using them incorrectly is really hard on your hand muscles and doesn’t lead to great results in whatever you are cutting - so I work hard on correct scissor use early on.
At the end of the day, we didn’t really have much of an end product. I’d never been happier with a project. We accomplished what I set out to do - and SO MUCH MORE. The only reason I stopped them was because the whole, entire morning had flown by, and it was time for lunch and naps! And believe it or not, after I got those toddlers down for naps, the big girls wanted to do more with our project. In the end, I couldn’t help myself and drew F-A-L-L in big bubble letters on the prettiest painted part of the remaining paper and had the preK girls cut them out (hey, more scissor skills AND some letter recognition) so we could hang them on the wall to remember the fun we had had. That last bit was my idea and definitely not process art… but like I said, I just couldn’t help myself. I taught public-school Kindergarten, and I know exactly what will be expected of those precious babies when they get to Kindergarten, whether it’s developmentally appropriate or not. So even though it’s not really what their brains *should* be doing at the age of 3 or 4, sometimes I squeeze in some letter practice anyway. But I digress…look out for a Very Important Blog on that topic soon.
To return to the topic at hand, the most child-led, beautiful process art was accomplished that day. So much so that I’m still this excited to share it with you a whole year later!
Now it’s important to note that few process art opportunities will turn out like this. They won’t often morph into an all-morning experience that encompasses a variety of experiences. Your children won’t always get excited about the materials at hand or the processes available. Sometimes you’ll set something up and they’ll take one look and go back to their blocks. That’s okay! Your job is not to get them to do something - your job is just to provide that something. It’s kind of like how we handle food at our house - we provide, they decide. I lay out all the nutritious food, and they decide what and how much to eat. I don’t say another word about it other than to sometimes talk about what I enjoy eating or what great things it does for my body. Process art is similar - we provide, they decide…we provide the opportunities and they decide what to engage with and in which ways. They decide when they start and when they finish. As long as you’ve provided the opportunity, your end of the deal is fulfilled. You have to believe that. Do not feel like a failure if your art idea doesn’t go the way you imagined. This particular leaf painting idea was just one of a billion we tried last year - some were amazing, and some weren’t. It’s just part of the process. (See what I did there?)
How are you feeling about process art? Does it make you uncomfortable? Excited? Both? Tell me below about your experience with process art, or ask me questions if you need help getting started trying process art with your child.