Artist urges consistent practice to elementary school students
CENTER TWP — John Manders showed students at Center Township Elementary School how to draw a Tyrannosaurus Rex slam dunking a basketball on Wednesday, May 29, but that image was only a piece of his overall lesson to the children.
Manders, an illustrator of his own children’s books, read one of his books before drawing a picture based on suggestions from the Center Township Elementary students.
“If you want to get good at something, you do it a lot, and you do it every day,” Manders said. “If you think about it, there’s something you do, maybe it’s cooking, maybe it’s eating, maybe it’s writing, maybe playing music; there is something that each of you does that you love and you can do every day.”
While many of the students assembled in the gym were focused on Manders’ drawing and painting, his words didn’t go unnoticed by some students who already had a passion for art.
“I learned that if you want to be good at something, you have to practice for a long time,” said Jacob Miller, a second-grade student. “You can’t just practice when you get old.”
Tanya Lewis, principal of the school, said Manders’ visit was possible thanks to a partnership the school has with Blackwood Arts. Each school in Butler Area School District has a focus area, with Center Township Elementary’s being creative thinking and arts. Lewis said Manders exemplified both of those tent poles as an artist, and was able to educate students at the same time.
Throughout his 45-minute presentation, Manders explained to the students how he takes on an art project, which on Wednesday started with a blank easel and a tarp. He asked the students for suggestions on what he should draw, which returned three words: “dinosaur,” “basketball” and “rainbow.”
“I try to make audience participation a feature,” Manders said. “If I can get some crazy combination of ideas and smoosh them together, we usually get an interesting painting.”
Matthew Herman, a second-grade student, said he enjoyed the story time portion of Manders’ talk, but as a budding artist himself, found the drawing interesting, too.
“My favorite part was when he read the story,” Matthew said. “I draw a little bit, I usually draw just random stuff.”
Jacob was particularly excited to see Manders draw a dinosaur — one of his favorite subjects to draw.
“My favorite part was when he was drawing the dino that was dunking the basketball,” Jacob said. “Sometimes dinos, sometimes tigers, basically wildlife.”
Although the drawing portion of his talk was the highlight for many students, Manders’ humor helped keep the students’ attention. After his talk, Manders said he thought he got his message across to the students.
“If there is something you like to do, keep working on it,” Manders said. “When I was young, I couldn’t be stopped from drawing, even if someone tied me up, I’d still be drawing.”
