2nd semester sketchbooks!

We began our 2nd semester in January, so I have a new crop of students for art! We started working on sketchbooks as our first project.  Last semester we made books using rafia binding.  This time I used a comb binding machine to make them.  I can't decide if this was a better way or not, since I ended up binding most of the books myself.  It's a little tricky to get the pages onto the teeth of the combs. 

We painted the covers before binding, and if students had time, they painted a back cover as well.  We practiced some abstract designs for a couple of days before they picked their favorite to transfer onto their cover.  They learned about some of the basic elements of art, like line, shape, and color.  We also discussed a few of the principles of design like repetition and emphasis to make their design more effective.