I went to my daughter's school recently for play her third grade class was putting on, and had the opportunity to meet with her teacher and talk about how she was doing in school. She told me that my daughter was performing well and giving her best, and actually showed me an art project that she had been working on in class.

The teacher had pretty much given the students free reign to choose whatever type of project they wanted to, and I saw all different types of mediums and objects throughout the class. I had never really seen anything like it.

My daughter loves dinosaurs, and her project was a paper mache brontosaurus. It was pink, and in my somewhat biased opinion, very realistic. My daughter likes the brontosaurus because it was an herbivore, and she does not favor the carnivorous dinosaurs.

The teacher told me that the art projects for kids were something she has done every year that she has been a teacher to try to inspire her students to explore their creative sides. She had been teaching for 30 years at the school and said that she had students return to her and tell her that they decided to become artists largely because of the inspiration they found from doing the art projects in her class.

I went over and looked at some of the other art projects and saw paintings with water colors and tempera paint, and saw a number of clay sculptures as well. The students were obviously having a lot of fun, making them.

I saw one clay sculpture that was a replica of the Alamo, and another of the school itself. Another student had carved a little canoe out of wood and made tiny little oars to go with the boat. One parent told me that she volunteered with the art projects for kids and said that the students really put forth a great effort across the board and enjoyed each others' creations as well.

I probably spent more than hour with my daughter looking around at the various works of art, and she showed me how her friends had used certain techniques to create their projects. She seemed very knowledgeable about the project as a whole, and it was really nice to see her so enthusiastic about something.

The art projects for kids that my daughter's teacher incorporated into her classroom curriculum turned out to be very popular, and I was impressed with what a group of eight- and nine-year olds were able to create. I don't know if I have a budding Georgia O'Keeffe in my daughter or not, but I am glad that she was exposed to something so enriching.