Back up a little bit: Do you ever remember your days in school when you would walk into class and standing at the front of the class where the teacher would be was the coveted and adored A/V cart? (A/V=Audio Visual). You know what I'm talking about, right? The tall metal cart that had a television and VCR (and later DVD/VCR combo) secured to it that basically meant one thing - VIDEO DAY IN CLASS!!!!!!!!!
Well, using Youtube videos are just about the equivalent to having a video day in class for any kid. Seriously. They almost don't even care if the youtube clip is hokey or not. Most of them will watch just about anything you present to them AND enjoy it AND remember it. Which is the BIG kicker!)
For the purposes of visual art instruction, I am a hardcore believer in the power of demonstrations. I mean, what better way to explain something than to SHOW them how and what to do, right? But in all honesty, demos kind of drive me crazy sometimes. For whatever reason, they require an immense amount for me to set up for both my classes and myself to experience together. I mean, I suppose I could just set up the demo and do it and have the kids do nothing but sit and watch but I have found that to be unproductive to a point because they will get side tracked and just generally do their own thing and waste materials. Also, if they need/want me to repeat a certain step after I have gone beyond it? Well... most demos that I do are very prohibitive of that being able to happen.
Enter the Youtube's Drawing with Anna!!!!!
Perhaps you already know Anna very well and I am behind the times but if that's not the case, join me and get with it!!! Drawing with Anna is AWESOME!!!!! She has only a handful of instructional videos but they are very useful and I have recently used two - the Continuous Line Drawing video and the Blind Contour video:
I used both of these videos in the 2D Design class that I am currently teaching and while Anna can be a little hokey for high schoolers - she is honestly pretty sweet, an awful lot like someone's really nice mom, and she does a pretty decent job at teaching the general jist of both Continuous Line drawing and the Blind Contour drawing. It was also nice to be able to have a video that I could stop and start and back up as I needed to in order to specifically speak about different things that are relevant to what I am doing with my students and their project work currently.
So there you have it! I am a fan of Drawing with Anna. And now you can be too!
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