The Author Conservatory has been stretching me to try new things lately, one of which being starting my own business!
Although I haven’t officially launched my business or finished the training to do so, my instructors were alright with me doing a sort of test class to teach some friends acrylic painting.
This first class happened on Monday the 29th of May: just this week! I think it went pretty well, although I was really nervous about it.
Here is the painting we did!
I’ve never tried to teach anyone to paint except a friend and my siblings when we did art and science classes together many years ago. And this time, I was teaching adults who were a lot older than me (except my younger sister XD).
Thankfully, all my students were amazing and friendly, wanting me to succeed. Add to that the fact that I knew all but one of them, and I started to wonder why I was so nervous . . .
Anyway, here are some things I learned during the class and my hopes for future ones!
Take it slow, and don’t rush the process. As the teacher, I seemed to finish each step a lot faster than everyone else! I had a lot of waiting time, so I went around the group to see how everyone was doing and give tips. It was amazing how different everyone’s painting turned out!
Demonstrate well. This one is very important, and one I need to get better at. For the leaves in the painting, I had a particular brush stroke that works pretty well with the brush I was using, and I showed everyone how to do it by using my finger as a “canvas.” With a dry brush, I held up my finger so everyone could see it and “painted” vertically on it while showing when to press harder and when to lighten up. I think it worked pretty well!
Do a simple painting. The class was supposed to take two hours, but it ended up going over a bit because the bird was so complicated! So a note for next time, do something a little easier.
Give each student tips relative to THEIR painting. Like I said, everyone’s finished piece was completely unique and different! So when I went around the circle giving tips, what I suggested for one person wouldn’t work for the other. I gave custom tips to each person to help them with their piece. I think this helped a lot.
Friendly conversation. I think this was a key to the happy atmosphere. As we went step by step, I would demonstrate and they would follow. While we were all working, we talked a lot!
What’s Next?
I hope to do many more classes in the future, maybe even make some recordings so that others who aren’t local to my area can buy them and learn at home! First, I need to work on my Conservatory homework though. It might take a while until I’m launched and teaching regularly, but I’m looking forward to it!
And that’s about it!
God bless,
Janet
PS: I mentioned a free list template a while ago, and I have finished that for you all! There are downloadable pdfs below so you can print out some pretty cool blank lists for yourself! You can see the explanation HERE.