What is zentangle?
Two adult names Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas invented an art technique called zentangle. Zen stands for calm and Tangle stands for a collection of overlapping patterns. It is a type of doodling that calms the mind and relaxes your body. They discover the doodling simple patterns on a piece of paper or notebook helps people deal with stress and get in touch with creativity and turn mistakes into positives. Right now we all going through tough times because of COVID19-Virus and Delta variants but if we follow the rules, put masks on, and keep our hands clean this will soon be over. So instead of being worried and scared all the time maybe this zentangle art project might help you relax and calm your mind and let us stay healthy and safe. So let’s get started.

STEP 1: On a letter-size white paper, divide the section by drawing straight or curved lines with a pencil.

STEP 2: Neatly and accurately draw out your initials in the middle of the page. (Use a block and bubble font style)

STEP 3: Erased out the lines inside the letters.

STEP 4: Fill in the spaces around the letters with zentangle patterns using a pencil. You are going to treat each space as its own unique canvas. Drawing in a pattern that fills just that space until you hit another line. The pattern can be anything you can dream of. Be creative and experiment with the lines, shapes, and dots. It will take a while to fill all the space so go slow and take your time as much as you want. This is a great time for you to be away from those worries and fears. 

STEP 5: If you finish filling in all of your spaces with patterns you can start to color it in with only using a black marker, pen, and sharpies.

STEP 6: Now let’s color your initials. Use a crayon to color your letters. Let me tell you one technique you can do in your letters with the toothpick. After you have colored all your letters, using a toothpick to scratch out the crayons and create patterns inside the letters too.

Since most of the learning takes online, educational remote learning resources are overflowing everywhere. I have been receiving emails from many education companies that are offering free subscriptions to parents, and students during school closures.

And many school districts are providing at-home learning, we(as a parent) still find ourselves to come up with some kinds of lesson plans, educational activities, DIY projects, indoor activities, and to keep the kids entertained while everybody is staying home. Especially for the younger kids, they get bored easily so we need something to make them busy.

Many apps and websites have been lowering their subscription fees and offering their services for free to families affected by school closures. Others were always have been free, but now they are adding more free content to their apps and websites. These couple of education companies are currently offering free subscriptions.

• Scholastic Learn at Home (Grades Pre-K thru 9th grade)
• Mystery Science (Grade K thru 5th)
• Scratch Jr. (Children ages 5-7, introductory programming language)
• GoNoodle (All age)
• Colorme Ph.D. (All age)
• Picasso Head (All age)
• Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (16 virtual exhibits)
• Math Games (Grade K- 8th)
• PBS (Age 2 to 8) & PBS LearningMedia
• National Geographic Kids (All age)
• All Kids Network (All age)
• Wonderopolis (All age)
• Arcademic Skill Builders (Grade 1st thru 8th)
• Book Creator (School-age)
• Conjuguemos (All ages, Vocabulary & Grammar)
• Crayola (All ages, Crafts & lesson plans)
• Epic! (Kids 12 and under)
• Nasa Kids’ Club (Pre-K thru 4th grade)
• Rockalingua (All age, A music-based Spanish learning program)
• TypingClub (Age 7 and up)
• Lulus (Age 5 and up, Fun Fashion Activities)

I have updated the lists. Thanks to Michelle for sharing the good activities.

If there are other good educational websites that I didn’t mention here please feel free to commenting below.
Smile and create all the time!

When the school announced school closure and knowing that kids are staying home 24/ 7, kids will be very restless and live the day unproductively. Therefore we have to make a plan. When I was young I remember that the beginning of the summer and winter break my parents always made me create a daily routine. So I suggest you make a daily schedule so we can live more productive and we all can survive through this tough time. Let’s talk about how to build a daily schedule that actually works with kids home from school due to COVID19-Virus.

First I suggest that you make a list of things you can do. For example:

• Quiet Time
• Exercise (since kids staying indoor all day long it’s very important that we do some exercise)
• Reading 30min for twice a day (perhaps one in the morning and one in the afternoon)
• Writing 30min (about the book you read or simply write what you are going to do for the day)
• Math workbook or go to websites that teach math like www.mathplayground.com, or prodigy
• Cello practice (if you do play any instrument)
• Creating Time
• Movie Time
• Family Time

Plan a routine you can stick to. Too much workbook or too little screening time won’t work with kids. Take a new routine for a test drive for at least a week and if it didn’t work out re-evaluate to make some adjustments. One of the tips I can give you would be to engage your kids in making the schedule. This will help them buy into it. Most importantly all the parents and all the children you must be willing to listen to each other. Have good discussions with your kids. The conversation should not be a one-way conversation one forcing the other to do what he/she doesn’t want to do but you have to agree and make a consent. By creating and keeping up with daily schedule we keep them focused and productive so that they’ve made academic progress when school resumes.

The widespread COVID19 virus affecting so many lives, like educators, business owners, and other professions. As a parent, teacher knowing schools are closed for more than a month and all the stores are closed except for essential markets, these extraordinary circumstances asking us questions like, “What do I need to do?”, “What do I need to prepare for our kids to continue learning?”, “How do I teach when students have limited access to art supplies at home? (because I am an art teacher)”, “How can I help our kids to be positive and keep moving forward?” I have been searching online to obtain the resources as much as possible to provide for my families and our students to have but there is no set answer for this kind of situation. Everyone has different situations and each one of us has to find a way that fits them. As a parent and art teacher, I have to develop or find ways to plan and facilitate learning in a way that meets everyone’s specific situation. Maybe this is a good time to challenge our kids and discover what natural materials we can find around us to create artworks. We have been exposed so much to the chemicals and manmade resources. Now let’s think about the primitive era. During my student teaching time(still am though), I remember one of the students was asking me “How did the artist paint when there were no paints like we have now?” I told the class briefly what and how they used the materials in old times. People used natural resources found in their pantry and backyard to create arts like what we see in cave arts. So next couple of weeks, I would like to share and introduce art projects that you can do with material easily be found in your home and natural resources.

I hope you enjoy, learn, discover through my website and get inspired by my art works.
Keep mile and create all the time!

-Robin Lee

“Our greates natural resource is the minds of our children.”

Walter Elias Disney