How do you begin teaching art? Do you have a starter? I used to feel swarmed by student questions without a warm-up. A daily warm-up sets the routine and order for my class. It allows me to greet everyone at the door as they enter the classroom, take roll promptly, and help with any emergency student issues. The warm-up should be at most 5 minutes in total. I like to put extra information on each prompt for students who arrive early or are fast-paced. Everyone can respond in some way. Have a short discussion or pair-and-share to close the warm-up time.
Warm-up Book Storage
Store warm-up books that are easily accessible and distributable. Hanging magnetic drop-down file folders for each class allows segregation by class group and tables. I found mine on IKEA called KVISSLE Wall magazine rack, white. They fit four warm-up books per slot and take up a small vertical wall space. I have two classes, so I have two sections of the racks for the amount of tables in my room – eight.
Labeling the Warm-up Rack
You can add a magnetic label to the side for easy identification. My labels are by grade and table number. Print the 8.5×11 file, laminate, and then cut with a 1-inch circle cutter. I punched magnetic circles the same size, peeled them and adhered them to the laminated numbers. I haven’t had to replace them in years even though they’re removable, students have left them alone. Download my Warm-up Table Labels Here. Printing Supplies:
- Color printer – print on white cardstock
- Laminate
- Punch laminated labels with 2-inch circle cutter (you’ll need to trim the paper in rows to fit the circle shape with the text. Hold the cutter upside down to cut the shape in the correct position visibly.)
- Punch 2-inch flexible magnetic flat adhesive sheets
- See my post on Teacher Labels here to see how to punch the circles.
Warm-up Book Distribution
The first person in the room at each table will take all the warm-up books for everyone at the table. Collecting for your table allows eight people to manage them and prevents thirty people from trying to get them. Take the table stack and distribute them for everyone to use.
Easy Warm-up Page Marker
Save transition time by marking the pages so students can easily find their place in the warm-up book. At the beginning of the year, I pass around a small tin full of Avery UltraTabs. (Note the picture above with the tabs visible inside the U.S.A. Warm-up books.) These are durable tabs, so students can put them at the top of their books to quickly turn to the spread we are working on that week. You can find a lot of fun patterns. I like to buy three packages and let students choose the one they want for their book. They are removable and stay sticky all year if they do not draw on the sticky part. Here are some options you could give your students for movable page markers.
- Avery Multiuse Ultra Tabs, 2″ x 1.5″, Assorted Pastel Dots, 24 Repositionable Tabs
- Avery Ultra Tabs, 2.5″ x 1″, 2-Side, Neon, 24 Repositionable Margin Tabs
- Avery 74769 Ultra Tabs, 2.5 x 1 Inch, Pastel, 24 Repositionable Margin Tabs
- Avery Margin Ultra Tabs, 2.5″ x 1″, Assorted Metallic, 24 Repositionable Page Tabs
Warm-up Book Clean-up
When warm-up time is over, after teacher instruction, pass the books to the end of the table, and one person puts all the books from their table back on the wall rack in the designated table slot during work time.
Warm-up Book Grading
On Fridays, or at the end of the week, after class has begun, remind the students to keep the warm-up books open and at the top of the desk. As the students work on their class project, walk around with a grading sheet on a clipboard to record what was completed. It’s also a chance to comment individually about something they drew well or responded to creatively as you walk around. NOTE: This is a quick overview. If something looks off, you can look closer later, but it saves teachers time from opening every book each week and keeps students accountable to complete the warm-ups. My students earn 1 point for each day.
Warm-up Research
The purpose of my warm-ups is to help students mentally switch gears to think about art and begin their creativity process. Spending just 5 minutes a day throughout the year, I hope they leave with exposure to artwork, artists, and museums they would know otherwise. Maybe when traveling, they’ll go into a museum or pass a sculpture they recall seeing before, but this time, look closer and experience the artwork in person. Planting seeds of art history in adolescents is a fertile ground they’ll revisit.
Another purpose of pre-planned warm-ups is to help students mentally switch gears to prepare for art and begin their creativity process. There have been many studies on the meaning of warm-ups in classrooms. Rosalba (2008) surveyed the effect of warm-ups to begin English class to get students engaged and prepared for the rest of the class period. A starter can break up the flow, produce interest, and create increased involvement during class (p. 12).
In 2001, Dornyei published Motivational Strategies in the English Classroom. He counseled educators to plan and promote student’s positive experiences of learning. The key to creating this environment is presenting information that can be appealing and encourage student curiosity. Such activities that promote involvement will produce a student’s need to try and actively generate connection. (Dornyei, Z. (2001). Motivational strategies in the English classroom. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.)
Warm-Up Options
You can create a warm-up with a daily drawing prompt, but I needed a bigger-picture long-term plan. I am an art educator. How could I use every minute of the class to help educate my students? There’s so much art history, and my goal as their teacher is to expose students to the variety of art in the world. How do they know what is in the world if they’ve never seen or experienced it? Even with a year-long class together, I needed more time to cover the humanities. So, I compiled information and designed three coordinating warm-up books that can be rotated. The activities vary from written response, observation, drawing, sketching, creatively rewriting, recognizing, and identifying artwork, to list a few varieties. You can use them in a homeschool, middle, or high school setting. There are 180 days of prompts in each book.
- Ancient Art History Warm-up Journal
- Modern Art History Warm-up Journal
- U.S.A. Art History Warm-up Journal