Art Attack! - When picture books inspire art and learning in schools - Lucy Rowland

In both my role as a Children's Author, and my role as a Speech and Language Therapist, I regularly visit primary schools and nurseries.  I always notice the beautiful displays of children's writing and their colourful artwork hanging in the corridors and have recently started to realise just how much of this artwork and learning is inspired by picture books.

Over the last year or so, with the schools' permission, I have been taking pictures of some of the work I've seen.  I decided to share my photos here in the PICTURE BOOK DEN ART GALLERY.

Please Mr Panda- by Steve Antony.

 In this school, Reception Class made Panda faces and wrote shopping lists for a Panda Party!  What a lovely idea!

A smiley Mr Panda awaiting his party!

 Gregory Cool by Caroline Binch

This class created collages based on the colourful art work in Gregory Cool 

You Choose- by Pippa Goodhart and Nick Sharratt

Always a popular book with schools, I saw 2 different 'You Choose' displays this year.

 Year 1 wrote about which pets they would choose.

        In this Reception Class, the children all drew their choice of pets.

Then they made their own You Choose books to document all of their You Choose choices! 

Oi Frog! by Kes Gray and Jim Field

Some children used Oi Frog! to explore rhyme.

Kevin by Rob Biddulph

This class made their own monster 'WANTED' posters after reading 'Kevin'.

A great way to practise describing characters.

Little Red Reading Hood by Lucy Rowland and Ben Mantle. 

During my author visits, I even spotted some learning and art work based on mine and Ben Mantle's book Little Red Reading Hood.

 

This school created a Little Red Reading Hood mural in their new library!

 And this school created Book Hoops for World Book Day! They looked wonderful! 

Owl Babies by Martin Waddell and Patrick Benson

In this Nursery class, the children read Owl Babies and then made their own owls from paper plates.

And in this school, the children chose to make their World Book Day book hoop using Owl Babies for inspiration.

One of my favourite things is when teachers tell me how they have used my books in class to support children's learning. I love to share photos with other authors and illustrators when I see the beautiful work that children have created based on their books. 

Do you have any other photos to add to our gallery? Please comment below if you've come across other examples where picture books have been used to inspire children's learning in schools.