Adapt
Week 4 of drawing class is plants, as well as composition and one-point perspective. We'd covered composition in Week 3, so I altered my lesson plan. I'd had a pretty physical weekend, so I was looking for ways to make class less physical. Not that Week 4 is super intense, but you know what I mean. I'd even spent some time over the weekend researching ways to tweak the lesson more. I decided not to change it too much, but I did add in some more about drawing plants than I have in the past.
So both students arrived, and we got started. I turned them over to draw, and said we'd learn about perspective after our break. They both chose to copy one of the simple how-tos in their handout. This is fine, and in every class at least one person does this. But they both did and it's extremely hard to give feedback! "Good job copying!"
I spent some time drawing a flower digitally. This program is called Graphiter, and it mimics drawing pencils/tools.
During our break, one student stepped out and the other asked what kind of paint the artist had used in their finished version in the how-to. I said watercolor, and mentioned watercolor vs gouache vs watercolor pens and pencils. She asked about the differences in the final product; I have some examples on my drawing laptop, so I set about digging them up.
While I was doing that, the first student returned and the other stepped out. That first student said she wasn't feeling well and was going to leave, though she really wanted to stay. I said, of course, no worries, take care of yourself, see you next week.
But I'm thinking......what do I do now?!
The second student returned and I showed her my paintings. I half-joked we could even pull out the watercolors. She was the only student so she had free choice.
We went through the one-point perspective lesson, and then we still had like 30 minutes, so I asked what she wanted to do. I mentioned the watercolors again, and she said sure.
I pulled out the supplies. I asked if she had experience with watercolors. She said not in a long time, so I turned it into a mini lesson. Afterwards though, I laughed at myself because I'd been trying to make class less physical and instead it was more so. Ah well.
