During my artistic journaling unit at Cooper Elementary while student teaching, I worked with a combined 4th–5th grade class (including a few 6th graders placed in the group). This project invited students to create their own hand-bound art journals and explore drawing, collage, writing, and mixed media as a form of personal expression. The students were highly engaged throughout the process—especially once they began filling the pages with their ideas, feelings, and creative experiments.
The most challenging part for them was the bookmaking itself. For many, this was their first time using a hole puncher, and several struggled with punching holes cleanly, cutting their cardboard neatly, or keeping pages aligned during binding. I also had to teach quite a few students how to tie simple knots, which became its own mini-lesson in patience and problem-solving. While craftsmanship during construction was difficult, once the journals were built, the students thrived. Their confidence grew as they moved into thumbnail sketching, mixed-media experimentation, and personal storytelling within their books.
Overall, this lesson supported hands-on skill building while giving students a meaningful creative outlet—and their excitement to work in their journals each day made the challenges well worth it.
Ava Sandersen 